{ "schemaVersion": "2.0.0", "proposalId": "one-boise", "publicationDate": "2026-07-21", "lastUpdated": "2026-07-21", "status": "operative-enabling-act-and-compact", "legalFinding": "Chapter 21 was written in 1967. It can count votes and move property. It cannot protect a workforce, hold Garden City's land-use rules steady for three years, seat a seventh mayor-council member, bind the ballot to immutable files, execute the Dividend across fiscal years, or displace Title 55 preemption for manufactured-home conversion protection. One Boise fills every gap before the election through one statewide general law and one identical voter-approved compact.", "currentLaw": { "route": "Idaho Code sections 50-2101 through 50-2114", "facts": [ "Boise and Garden City are contiguous general-law cities eligible for the consolidation process described in section 50-2101.", "The councils may initiate consolidation by resolution; the existing elector-petition route remains available at the statutory 20 percent threshold.", "Section 50-222 annexes subject land through a landowner and boundary process; it does not dissolve an already incorporated city or transfer its officers, debts, contracts, employees, and public duties. Two existing cities therefore use Chapter 21 consolidation, not ordinary parcel annexation.", "Each city votes separately and a majority in each city is required.", "Current section 50-2108 makes consolidation effective immediately after the officer-election abstract is filed.", "Sections 50-2109 through 50-2111 carry property, liabilities, debts, obligations, and proceedings into the successor city.", "Section 50-2110 keeps pre-consolidation debt on the property previously obligated for it.", "Section 50-2112 otherwise extends Boise ordinances and repeals conflicting Garden City ordinances at effectiveness.", "Sections 50-402 and 50-404 limit city elections to qualified electors residing inside the current city; the compact's post-transfer territorial ballot styles therefore classify current successor-city electors and exclude detached nonresidents.", "Section 50-1003(4) terminates annual appropriations at fiscal-year close, so the act expressly authorizes a new annual formula appropriation and automatic October 1 reappropriation instead of claiming an unstated continuing appropriation.", "Sections 55-306 and 55-2006 preempt local rent control and sections 55-2004 and 55-2010 govern manufactured-home communities; the act therefore imposes the conversion and replacement-space duties directly as statewide law and adds an express conforming exception." ], "sourceRefs": ["idaho-code-title-50-chapter-21", "idaho-code-50-222", "idaho-code-50-402", "idaho-code-50-404", "idaho-code-50-405", "idaho-code-50-1003", "idaho-code-55-306", "idaho-code-55-2004", "idaho-code-55-2006", "idaho-code-55-2010"] }, "enablingAct": { "title": "Municipal Consolidation Compact Act", "form": "Statewide general law available to every consolidation of two or more contiguous Idaho general-law cities under section 50-2101 that approves one complete compact by separate majorities. Eligibility contains no city name, county, population, distance, enactment date, or form-of-government threshold, and the same powers apply to every member of the class.", "constitutionalDesign": "Article XII, section 1 supplies statewide municipal-organization power and article III, section 19 forbids disguised local or special election and municipal-corporation laws. The class is open, statewide, and based on the common legal work of consolidation: continuous public service, exact voter notice, corporate succession, employee and creditor reliance, utility and land-use continuity, displacement prevention, and separate community consent. State law supplies identical authority to the class; each local compact supplies its chosen name, seats, map, dollars, and schedules.", "classificationRule": "A classification is valid only when every similarly situated Idaho consolidation may enter it on the same terms. No substitute verbiage may identify Boise or Garden City by population, geography, proximity, date, county, or another closed proxy.", "amendments": [ { "code": "Idaho Code §§ 50-203, 50-701, 50-703", "rule": "Authorize a mayor and seven district council members when a voter-approved municipal consolidation compact selects that structure." }, { "code": "Idaho Code §§ 50-2104 and 50-2105", "rule": "Make the complete identical compact package part of the proposition. Immediately before either compact ordinance or joint resolution, require both city clerks to deposit byte-identical package copies and one canonical manifest with the county clerk and Secretary of State; name the consolidation-election date; require independent SHA-256 verification, the package identifier on every election instrument, public inspection copies through voting, and automatic package expiration if the proposition is not held on that date." }, { "code": "Idaho Code §§ 50-2107 and 50-707A", "rule": "Run and certify the race-neutral seven-district build immediately before package deposit and compact adoption; put the map certificate, source hashes, geometry, block and precinct assignments, voting-rights certificate, origin polygon, named consolidation-election date, and manifest digest in the voted package; make that package expire if the proposition is not held on the named date; and hold the successor officer election on the first authorized date at least 120 days after the later of package certification or the consolidation canvass." }, { "code": "Idaho Code §§ 34-301 and 50-707A", "rule": "Make the certified district polygons govern the first successor election; intersect later precinct changes with those polygons into precinct-by-district ballot subdivisions; publish the residence-to-ballot-style crosswalk; freeze every municipal boundary change not legally effective at package certification through transfer; and authorize compact-designated deemed-contiguity edges for detached municipal islands without changing precinct or municipal boundaries." }, { "code": "Idaho Code § 50-2108", "rule": "Move the legal transfer to 12:01 a.m. on the first October 1 after the successor officer election." }, { "code": "Idaho Code §§ 50-2109 through 50-2112", "rule": "Preserve succession and debt rules while adding employee transfer, enterprise and debt firewalls, the 36-month Transition Land-Use Code, and the compact's automatic controls." }, { "code": "New Idaho Code §§ 50-2114A and 50-2114B", "rule": "Transfer employees automatically and make the elected successor mayor and council the Transition Council." }, { "code": "Idaho Code § 59-1302 and Title 59 employer-reporting provisions", "rule": "Declare consolidation a continuation with one successor PERSI employer—not a separation, withdrawal, retirement event, service break, or new waiting period—and require uninterrupted successor reporting." }, { "code": "Idaho Code § 50-1003", "rule": "Create an express compact exception: a controller certificate of an actually realized current-year General Fund reduction automatically increases the current annual Dividend appropriation; spending authority closes at year-end; restricted cash does not lapse or revert; and the unspent balance plus certified recurring base is appropriated again by operation of law at 12:01 a.m. each October 1." }, { "code": "Idaho Code §§ 55-306, 55-2004, 55-2006, and 55-2010", "rule": "Provide that an elector-approved compact's manufactured-home conversion duty and recorded replacement-space rent-and-fee covenant arise directly under statewide law notwithstanding those sections. Section 55-2010 supplies a minimum; the longer compact notice and stronger state-law covenant control." } ], "sourceRefs": ["idaho-constitution-article-iii-19", "idaho-constitution-article-xii-1", "planned-parenthood-v-state-2023", "concerned-taxpayers-v-cheney", "moon-v-north-idaho", "idaho-code-title-50-chapter-21", "idaho-code-34-301", "idaho-code-50-701", "idaho-code-50-707a", "idaho-code-50-1003", "idaho-code-55-306", "idaho-code-55-2004", "idaho-code-55-2006", "idaho-code-55-2010"] }, "representationRules": { "firstElectionFreshness": "Immediately before package deposit and compact adoption, the map build uses the official boundaries and section 34-301 precinct layer then in effect. The map certificate, source hashes, geometry, block and precinct assignments, voting-rights certificate, Garden City origin polygon, named consolidation-election date, and manifest digest enter the voted package. The pre-resolution certificate fixes the first-election map. Neither consolidation certification, a later source hash, nor county precinct maintenance reruns, amends, or supersedes a voted attachment. The canvass only activates the package; failure to hold the proposition on its named date expires it. The officer election occurs at least 120 days after the later of package certification or the consolidation canvass.", "municipalIsland": "The act authorizes a statewide compact mechanism for detached municipal islands. One Boise designates a statutory deemed edge from precinct 1702 to precinct 1519. It is expressly not physical or official precinct adjacency and does not add intervening territory.", "nearestExtent": "For each map, the exact solver first enforces seven whole-precinct contiguous districts below 10 percent maximum total deviation and the transfer-day Garden City Hall anchor; it then applies the published lexicographic population objective.", "gardenCityConflict": "All transfer-day Garden City territory remains in the named district whenever a lawful map exists. If the exact solver proves none exists, the named district retains the City Hall parcel and maximum attainable former-Garden-City census population while minimizing displaced former-Garden-City precincts. Every non-electoral Garden City compact protection remains attached to the full transfer-day polygon.", "section2Order": "The line-drawing assignment is fixed and hashed before demographic data are opened. The later VRA certificate cannot move a line. Under Louisiana v. Callais, the absence of a majority in the certificate's broader whole-precinct universe defeats the first Gingles precondition for any race-neutral comparator that also must meet the compact's legitimate objectives. The exact screen covers every single protected group and the broadest nonoverlapping protected-group coalition; the coalition remains below majority under both VAP and the adverse CVAP sampling-error outer bound." }, "territorialElectorates": { "gardenCity": "Qualified successor-city electors under Idaho Code sections 50-402 and 50-404 whose current registered residence lies inside both the current successor corporate limits and the immutable transfer-day Garden City origin polygon.", "boise": "Every other qualified successor-city elector, including every elector in later-annexed territory outside the Garden City origin polygon.", "exclusion": "A person outside the successor corporate limits on registration close belongs to neither electorate, including a detached former resident. Every current successor-city elector belongs to exactly one.", "residenceAdministration": "Ada County uses the geocoded situs point in its election-address file at registration close; if absent, the primary dwelling entrance controls. The transfer-day Garden City polygon remains an immutable ballot-reporting layer.", "constitutionalFinding": "Garden City-origin residents bear distinct permanent district, transition land-use, manufactured-home, reserve, debt, enterprise, and Dividend protections; all other current residents bear the successor city's general tax-and-service constituency. Concurrent territorial majorities preserve both interests in the restructuring compact.", "sourceRefs": ["idaho-code-50-402", "idaho-code-50-404", "idaho-code-50-2106", "lockport-v-citizens"] }, "ballotPackage": { "depositDeadline": "Immediately before either council adopts the compact ordinance or joint resolution, each city clerk deposits a byte-identical complete package with the Ada County Clerk and Idaho Secretary of State. The package certificate names the consolidation-election date the joint resolution must call.", "canonicalManifest": { "encoding": "UTF-8 JSON canonicalized under RFC 8785", "entryFields": ["path", "mediaType", "byteLength", "sha256", "legalEffect", "domain"], "legalEffectValues": ["operative", "evidentiary", "explanatory"], "hash": "SHA-256 under FIPS 180-4, rendered as 64 lowercase hexadecimal characters", "nonSelfReferentialRule": "The manifest enumerates the fifteen compact-body and attachment files and excludes itself. The SHA-256 of that canonical manifest is the package identifier. That identifier is recorded only in the adopting ordinances, joint resolution, ballot notice, ballot, and a detached public receipt; no digest is inserted into any file whose digest the manifest records." }, "independentVerification": "The county clerk recomputes every listed file digest and the canonical manifest digest. A mismatch bars the election.", "inspection": "Every operative file is part of the proposition. Read-only downloads and inspectable paper and accessible copies remain available through the notice and voting period. Derivatives are conspicuously labeled nonoperative; verified canonical bytes control.", "preElectionChange": "Any byte change before voting requires repeal, readoption, a new manifest and package identifier, and the full election interval. Failure to hold the proposition on the package's named date expires the package and requires the same restart.", "postApprovalImmutability": "No approved canonical file may be overwritten. A lost copy may be restored only from bytes matching its approved manifest digest.", "sourceRefs": ["idaho-code-50-2104", "idaho-code-50-2105", "idaho-ueta-28-50-107", "idaho-ueta-28-50-110", "idaho-ueta-28-50-112", "nist-fips-180-4", "rfc-8785"] }, "legalEffectPriority": { "hierarchy": ["Municipal Consolidation Compact Act", "compact.json body", "operative domain attachment"], "operativeDomains": { "district-block-assignments.json": "district membership and tabulated population", "districts.geojson": "public display geometry", "boundaries.geojson": "predecessor origin, successor launch, and Garden City Transition Area polygons, plus the municipal-origin key for debt and enterprise records; pledged debt parcels and actual enterprise service territories remain controlled by their own schedules and records", "workforce-transition.json": "employee transfer and placement", "departments.json": "service ownership and cutover", "fiscal-model.json": "certified amounts and formula inputs", "dividend-model.json": "allocation mechanics subject to 30/20/10/20/20", "legal-process.json": "dates, triggers, remedies, and voter amendment", "land-use-transition.json": "land-use and manufactured-home duties", "operating-layer.json": "digital and offline access" }, "evidentiary": ["population.json", "representation.json", "voting-rights.json", "sources.json"], "explanatory": "Markdown, HTML, rendered PDF, captions, summaries, and other presentations create no independent legal duty.", "construction": "A domain attachment controls only its stated domain. Any unresolved construction preserves the voter-approved benefit and remedy." }, "correctionRule": { "approvedBytes": "Approved canonical bytes are immutable.", "permittedErrata": "The city clerk may append a signed errata certificate only for an obvious citation number, cross-reference label, spelling, punctuation, or formatting error and only if no duty, beneficiary, amount, percentage, date, duration, boundary, district, entitlement, condition, remedy, or legal effect changes.", "effect": "The certificate does not replace an approved file or change its digest. Every other correction is an amendment requiring the compact's voter rule, a newly deposited package, and a new package identifier." }, "dividendAppropriation": { "statutoryException": "The enabling act expressly excepts this compact formula from section 50-1003's ordinary annual-appropriation rule while respecting its fiscal-year close.", "certificate": "The controller certifies an actually realized current-year General Fund cash reduction and the associated annual recurring base.", "currentYear": "Filing automatically increases the current annual appropriation without council action.", "yearEnd": "Spending authority ends at fiscal-year close; restricted cash neither lapses nor reverts.", "nextYear": "At 12:01 a.m. on October 1, the unspent restricted balance and certified recurring base are appropriated again by operation of law.", "displayAndLimit": "The annual ordinance displays the appropriation separately; omission is ministerial. Spending cannot exceed restricted cash plus certified realized reductions.", "exclusions": "Ad valorem revenue, debt proceeds, enterprise or trust funds, restricted grants, transition residual, one-time residual, and workforce-guarantee residual are excluded.", "allocation": "The first ten fiscal years execute 30/20/10/20/20.", "sourceRefs": ["idaho-code-50-1003"] }, "compactAttachments": [ "compact.json — operative compact body, universal succession, appropriations, territorial electorates, remedies, and automatic controls", "district-block-assignments.json — operative district membership and tabulated population; districts.geojson — operative public display geometry; boundaries.geojson — operative predecessor origin, successor launch, and Garden City Transition Area polygons plus municipal-origin keys for debt and enterprise records; pledged debt parcels and actual enterprise service territories remain controlled by their own schedules and records", "workforce-transition.json — operative employee transfer, enacted 80-record Boise-class crosswalk and pay floor, guarantee account, placement, appeal, vacancy, and deletion rules", "fiscal-model.json and dividend-model.json — operative certified amounts, formula inputs, allocation mechanics, and 30/20/10/20/20 rule", "departments.json — operative 16-function receiving owners, records custody, continuity rules, and acceptance tests", "land-use-transition.json — operative 36-month code, code-of-filing, self-executing codification, and manufactured-home duties", "operating-layer.json — operative resident journeys, offline equality, delivery dates, records, privacy, accessibility, and acceptance tests", "legal-process.json — operative dates, triggers, remedies, correction rule, severability, and voter amendment", "population.json, representation.json, voting-rights.json, and sources.json — evidentiary records that create no independent duty" ], "currentLawSteps": [ { "order": 1, "id": "enact", "label": "Enact the statewide law", "currentLaw": "The Municipal Consolidation Compact Act becomes law before either city calls the consolidation election.", "legalAuthority": ["Idaho Constitution art. III, § 19", "Idaho Code Title 50"], "oneBoiseApplication": "The law supplies the seventh seat, employee transfer, October 1 effective date, land-use continuity, compact enforceability, and voter standing." }, { "order": 2, "id": "adopt-compact", "label": "Certify and adopt the compact", "currentLaw": "Immediately before adoption, the county clerk certifies the map, origin polygon, source hashes, named election date, fifteen payloads, manifest, and package identifier. Boise and Garden City then adopt those same bytes by ordinance and incorporate them into the joint resolution.", "legalAuthority": ["Amended Idaho Code § 50-2104"], "oneBoiseApplication": "The ballot asks voters to approve exact implementation bytes—not permission to design later. A missed named election date expires the package." }, { "order": 3, "id": "consolidation-vote", "label": "Hold two votes", "currentLaw": "Ada County conducts the election on an authorized May or November date. Boise and Garden City are counted separately.", "legalAuthority": ["Idaho Code §§ 50-2104 through 50-2106", "Idaho Code § 50-405"], "oneBoiseApplication": "A majority in Boise and a majority in Garden City are both required." }, { "order": 4, "id": "officer-election", "label": "Elect the successor government", "currentLaw": "The pre-resolution package certificate has already frozen the exact voter-approved map and first-election geometry. After the separate consolidation majorities are certified, voters elect one mayor and seven district council members on the first authorized date at least 120 days after the later of package certification or that canvass.", "legalAuthority": ["Amended Idaho Code §§ 50-2107, 50-701, and 50-707A"], "oneBoiseApplication": "The exact map approved by both electorates controls the first election. Later precinct maintenance becomes polygon-intersection ballot subdivisions and cannot change a council line. Precinct 1702 uses the act's disclosed statutory island edge to precinct 1519; the line-drawing build excludes racial and partisan data. The elected government—not an unelected board—owns the transition." }, { "order": 5, "id": "transition-council", "label": "Run the transfer in public", "currentLaw": "After qualification, the successor mayor and council act as the Transition Council while the predecessor cities continue ordinary service until transfer.", "legalAuthority": ["New Idaho Code § 50-2114B"], "oneBoiseApplication": "The Transition Council executes the already approved compact and publishes every action in the Unification Ledger." }, { "order": 6, "id": "october-transfer", "label": "Transfer on October 1", "currentLaw": "At 12:01 a.m. on the first October 1 after the officer election, the successor city takes title, employees cross intact, all service owners activate, and the four-year clock begins.", "legalAuthority": ["Amended Idaho Code §§ 50-2108 through 50-2113"], "oneBoiseApplication": "The municipal fiscal-year boundary becomes the legal transfer point." } ], "automaticControls": [ { "id": "protected-term", "trigger": "A protected compact term is reduced or ignored", "result": "The act gives residents, transferred employees, and property owners in the Transition Area standing for declaratory and injunctive relief plus attorney fees." }, { "id": "service-cutover", "trigger": "A cutover misses its published service standard", "result": "The prior working system stays live for that function while the named receiving owner corrects the cutover; legal transfer and other services continue." }, { "id": "worker-term", "trigger": "A worker loses a protected term", "result": "The challenged placement is held, the guarantee account funds continuity, and an independent hearing officer decides the evidence before any reduction." }, { "id": "zoning-default", "trigger": "The third October 1 arrives or a council-adopted parcel district fails the no-reduction comparison", "result": "The self-executing GC-prefix codification takes effect automatically; only a parcel district proving equal or greater lawful use and capacity can supersede it." }, { "id": "manufactured-home", "trigger": "A manufactured-home conversion lacks a protected replacement, escrow, bond, appraisal payment, or required relocation payment", "result": "Planning and Development Services denies the permit; demolition and disconnection remain barred; any unpaid amount becomes an enforcement lien." }, { "id": "saving-restored", "trigger": "A deleted authorization returns through a backfill, contractor, temporary worker, overtime substitution, reclassification, vendor, or replacement authorization", "result": "The controller reverses the saving certificate and the responsible department restores the corresponding Dividend appropriation; both transactions remain in the ledger." }, { "id": "records-migration", "trigger": "A records migration fails checksum, security, accessibility, retention, or custody acceptance", "result": "The source system remains live or read-only and cannot retire until the repeated test passes." }, { "id": "offline-door", "trigger": "The resident platform becomes the only service door", "result": "The equivalent phone, counter, mail, language, disability, and assisted-service channel is restored immediately." }, { "id": "enterprise-breach", "trigger": "A protected enterprise dollar enters the General Fund", "result": "The controller reverses the transfer, restores lost earnings, and charges the correction to the responsible appropriation." }, { "id": "debt-territory-breach", "trigger": "A legacy ad valorem debt is charged outside its obligated territory", "result": "The levy is corrected before certification and every affected taxpayer account receives principal and statutory interest automatically." } ], "voterProtectedTerms": [ "separate-majority approval", "one mayor and seven district council members", "the permanent Garden City District name, transfer-day City Hall anchor, attached first-map certification rule, and maximum-lawful whole-community rule", "automatic employee transfer and the two-year no-layoff guarantee", "the workforce guarantee account", "legacy-debt and enterprise-fund firewalls", "the 36-month Transition Land-Use Code", "the October 1 effective date", "the manufactured-home no-net-loss rule", "public Unification Ledger and enforcement standing", "the 30/20/10/20/20 first-decade One Boise Dividend allocation" ], "severability": { "integralTerms": ["separate-majority approval and the current-resident territorial amendment rule", "one mayor, seven seats including the full-voting Garden City District seat, and the first-map rule", "the approved ballot package's byte identity and package identifier", "universal succession", "automatic worker transfer and the two-complete-fiscal-year guarantee", "legacy-debt and enterprise firewalls", "the 36-month land-use transition", "the manufactured-home one-for-one replacement rule", "the 30/20/10/20/20 first-decade Dividend"], "preTransfer": "A final judgment invalidating an integral term before transfer prevents transfer under the stripped package. Another provision is severable only if independently executable and if severance preserves the voter-approved benefit and burden; the court severs no more than necessary.", "postTransfer": "After transfer, corporate succession, title, contracts, employment transfers, debt obligations, and completed acts do not unwind. Each term remains enforceable to the maximum lawful extent and the remainder continues.", "sourceRefs": ["concerned-taxpayers-v-cheney", "ostrander-v-salmon"] }, "amendmentRule": "A voter-protected term can be reduced only by one proposition receiving a majority in each territorial electorate at the same election. The Garden City electorate is current qualified successor-city electors whose residence lies in both the current successor limits and immutable Garden City origin polygon; every other current qualified successor-city elector is the Boise electorate. Later-annexed residents outside the origin polygon vote with Boise, and detached nonresidents vote in neither.", "sourceRefs": [ "idaho-code-title-50-chapter-21", "idaho-code-50-222", "idaho-code-34-301", "idaho-code-50-405", "idaho-code-50-701", "idaho-code-50-707a", "idaho-constitution-article-iii-19", "idaho-constitution-article-xii-1", "idaho-code-50-1001", "idaho-code-50-1003", "idaho-code-50-402", "idaho-code-50-404", "idaho-code-50-2104", "idaho-code-50-2105", "idaho-code-50-2106", "lockport-v-citizens", "planned-parenthood-v-state-2023", "concerned-taxpayers-v-cheney", "moon-v-north-idaho", "ostrander-v-salmon", "rfc-8785", "nist-fips-180-4", "idaho-ueta-28-50-107", "idaho-ueta-28-50-110", "idaho-ueta-28-50-112", "idaho-code-55-306", "idaho-code-55-2004", "idaho-code-55-2006", "idaho-code-55-2010", "idaho-code-59-1302", "one-boise-compact", "louisiana-v-callais-2026", "badillo-v-city-of-stockton", "allen-v-milligan-2026", "census-acs-moe-guidance-2026", "garden-city-city-hall" ] }