Candidate Brett BS: cautious on transit and TIFs, backs ICE cooperation and opposed COVID-era mandates

In a wide-ranging April 1 interview on the Utah County Republican Party podcast, commissioner candidate Brett BS outlined positions on transportation, economic development, water and public-health mandates.

On transit and transportation funding, he said quarter-cent sales-tax funds should be used where they meaningfully reduce gridlock and that UTA expansion should be targeted to areas where residents can realistically use mass transit. He expressed skepticism about some bus-rapid-transit ridership and recounted a recent FrontRunner bus he rode that carried just two people on a long run, saying "you have to maintain that but yeah I wonder sometimes how efficient it is." He also questioned the $19.5 million interlocal commitment and ongoing $3.5 million-per-year obligation tied to the Provo Airport expansion and urged scrutiny of long-term maintenance costs.

Brett BS said he "has a real problem with TIFFs" and redevelopment agencies when those incentives disproportionately benefit large businesses at the expense of small businesses and taxpayers; he allowed narrow uses where a small jurisdiction needs to attract employment but called for a careful evaluation of net benefits and resource impacts (water, power, roads).

On water, the candidate called it "a big issue," noted efforts such as piping open ditches to reduce evaporative loss and suggested businesses reduce landscape water use (artificial turf, drip systems). He said regulation or mandates could be necessary when supplies become scarce to protect community resources.

Asked about the county's cooperation agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Brett BS said he supports cooperating with ICE and enforcing immigration laws, framing enforcement as a form of fiscal and public-order management: "They entered the country illegally... they have to leave," he said in the interview.

On pandemic-era public-health orders, he said he would not have supported a county mask mandate, explained he did not take the COVID vaccine and criticized broad mandates as overreach that can infringe on personal liberties. "I would have said absolutely not," he said of a mask mandate during the 2020 period, adding skepticism about the effectiveness of cloth and surgical masks outside certain medical contexts.

Charles Max Wood conducted the interview as part of a series of candidate conversations the Utah County Republican Party is releasing ahead of delegate and primary decision points. The candidate provided contact information at the episode's close.