Utah's search and rescue teams: what the records say about workload and money

A reimbursement record shows what a county asked the state to help pay for. It does not show whether the right rescuers were free when a call came in. Paying for a rescue and keeping the ability to perform one are different things, and Utah's public records cover the first far better than the second.

In Utah, search and rescue runs through county sheriffs' offices, using staff and volunteer teams, with state helicopter crews and medical flight services called in when needed. ^[7][18] The records reviewed here show demand growing in at least one county and the state reviewing how it divides reimbursement money. They do not show a statewide volunteer shortage, and they do not measure whether teams are meeting demand.

One county's year

Washington County's sheriff's search and rescue team handled 128 incidents in 2025, up from 117 in 2024, according to its year-end report, attached to the minutes of the Jan. 6, 2026, county commission meeting. People rescued rose faster, from 148 to 208, or about 40%. Incidents rose about 9%. ^[1]

The report breaks the 208 people down by residence: 68 from Washington County, 55 from elsewhere in Utah, 82 from outside Utah and three from other countries. ^[1]

The team logged 7,113.5 person-hours in 2025, up from 6,343.5, about 12%. Training accounted for 3,684 of them, up from 3,382. Incident hours came to 3,429.5 (2,968.5 volunteer, 461 certified staff), against a combined 2,961.5 in 2024; the 2024 figure is not split, so a volunteers-only comparison is not possible. ^[1]

Counts measure different things: an incident is a response, a rescued person is someone helped, and hours capture part of the labor. One incident can involve several people and agencies. In a February 2025 Snow Canyon rescue, for example, Washington County teams searched overnight before a Department of Public Safety (DPS) helicopter crew hoisted two stranded hikers off a ledge. ^[17] DPS says its rescue flights depend on sheriffs, volunteer teams, emergency medical providers and medical helicopter crews. ^[18] Adding agencies' totals without matching incidents could count one rescue several times.

The report is a scanned image; these figures were read from the page images, and its totals add up. ^[1]

A roster is not a schedule

Salt Lake County's all-volunteer team lists 37 members, about 75 incidents a year and about 10,000 hours of rescue and training a year on its website. ^[2]

Utah County's team says it responds to roughly 100 missions a year and expects members to attend at least 30% of them, on top of a monthly business meeting and monthly training. New members can expect to spend $1,000 to $2,000 in their first year on gear, it says. When more people are needed, a second page goes out and members decide whether they can step away from their current responsibilities. ^[3]

The county sheriff's page describes about 50 volunteers with skills including rope rescue, swift-water and ice rescue, dive recovery and avalanche response. ^[4] The team's recruiting page also lists cave, medical and mass-casualty specialties. ^[3]

A membership count does not show who can leave work on a weekday afternoon, or who holds a particular skill that day. None of the records reviewed track that statewide.

Not every team is unpaid

Grand County's team pays members an hourly rate for missions and training, and Wasatch County's gives a stipend of $300 to $600 a month, the Mountain Rescue Association reported in April 2026. Summit County was working on a tiered system expected to pay around $25 an hour, after a new statewide tax for emergency services took effect. ^[5]

Wasatch County's 2025 budget confirms its volunteers are paid a regular stipend for operational support and sets aside $150,000 to begin designing an expansion of the Sheriff's and Search and Rescue Building. ^[6]

What the state reimburses

The state's Search and Rescue Financial Assistance Program reimburses sheriffs' teams for operations, training and equipment. The Division of Emergency Management supports an advisory board that administers it. ^[7] By statute, reimbursement is for all or part of counties' base expenses, needs board approval and depends on available money. ^[10]

The money comes from several sources. The state's consumer page for the Utah Search and Rescue Assistance (USARA) card cites 50-cent surcharges on recreational vehicle permits and 25-cent surcharges on hunting and fishing licenses, plus card sales. ^[8] The statute, amended in 2025, lists a wider set: voluntary contributions, money received under several recreation-related sections of code, a sales tax dedicated credit, vehicle registration contributions and legislative appropriations. ^[10] The consumer page may lag those changes, so its rates should not be treated as current.

The state says counties don't typically seek reimbursement for volunteers' time or sheriff employees' salaries and overtime, and that the fund can cover only a fraction of teams' costs. A reimbursement total therefore leaves much of the cost out. ^[8] Reimbursement goes to county entities, not individuals. The card is not insurance, it does not replace a rescued person's lost gear, and medical and ambulance costs remain the person's responsibility. ^[9]

The program's page says its data section is under construction. Its card sales table ends in 2021, when 214 cards brought in $11,397. ^[7]

A formula under review

In December 2025, the advisory board discussed changing the year-end distribution rule. Members wanted to explore a cap for high-ticket equipment items, which they said throw the formula off, and asked division finance staff for examples. ^[11] In March 2026, staff showed how late applications can cut a county's score, and the board asked for more examples, especially for small rural counties with many rescues. ^[12]

In June, staff presented a spreadsheet tool that takes a county's population, incidents, total victims and volunteer hours. Asked whether the formula disadvantages rural counties, staff said its ratios favor smaller counties. The minutes say caps are not currently in state code. The board postponed any motion until its next meeting. ^[13]

The Sept. 3 agenda listed the reimbursement projection worksheet, potential formula caps and rule changes, and a $552,000.76 figure under "End of Year - Formula & Numbers," without saying what the figure represents. ^[14] When the state's public-notice index for the board, which can lag, was read, it listed that agenda and a minutes file titled for the June 5 meeting, but no Sept. 3 minutes, so the board's action that day is unconfirmed. ^[15] An Oct. 8 special meeting was called to review an Iron County reimbursement request for a May 24, 2026, activity. ^[16]

No record reviewed shows a formula change adopted.

Toward a statewide measure

At the June meeting, a state recreation division representative described the Outdoor Recreation Mitigation Grant for third- through sixth-class rural counties strained by tourism. The division was detailing eligible costs for search and rescue, emergency medical services and road repairs tied to visitor safety. ^[13]

There are signs of work on data. In March, an emergency management staff member said she was working with the Division of Outdoor Recreation on search and rescue statistics tied to both programs. ^[12] In June, a staff member suggested mapping in-county and out-of-county data to track where searches cluster. ^[13] In December, a sheriff on the board said a first-responder statistical tracking system was still being organized, with money not expected until 2027. ^[11] The records reviewed do not show a finished statewide measure of demand, response times or volunteer availability.

A fuller picture would link three things: how many missions occur, what capability is available to answer them and what it costs to maintain that capability, all with comparable definitions.