Roger Christensen, Bonneville County commissioner and board chairman of the Idaho CAT Fund, told the Associated Taxpayers of Idaho that much of what Idaho's counties do is required by state law - it's not voluntary. "You do have these tremendous pressures on the local taxpayers, that normally have been provided for with a broader tax base, now being shifted down," Christensen said. County services, he said, are directly affected by changes in federal and state funding and regulations, from jails to roads to care for the medically indigent. "We're required if there are no other resources at the county level to pay for services, if they meet certain criteria," Christensen said. "If that mandate is not removed from the local level, that's where they end up."

He said, "All I know is that I'm standing in the water, it's kind of rising, and it's getting deeper."