-- SLATE CANYON, AGAIN

The Slate Canyon SDP, (Specific Development Plan) was passed last week. The option which the Council chose would allow only low density housing east of Bicentennial Park. The study of options for the area was done by Landmarks Design (here's the link-- http://www.ldi-ut.com/pdf%20files/Slate%20Canyon%20Draft%20Final.pdf)

That study cost us over $50,000. And it told us that we wanted what we have said we wanted for the last 12 years.

In 1992, Taskforce 2000 was created. It was a citizen's committee that helped develop Provo's Master Plan, the document that determines how Provo will develop. The committee studied for 5 years. Notable members included Cindy Richards, Dave Knecht, and Tim Brough. They discovered that a healthy neighborhood did not contain over 30-40% high density housing. Since Steve Stewart's project was already approved, our neighborhood was projecting a rate more like 60% high density housing. Taskforce 2000 recommended that no more high density housing be approved in the Provost and Provost South neighborhoods. In 1997, that plan was adopted.

For many years Dennis Poulsen had been fighting to get the city to build the softball and soccer fields at Bicentennial park, as had been promised. However, the proposal began floating around to MOVE Bicentennial Park up the hill to the drainage basin out of Bulkley Draw, since the Army Corps of Engineers had determined that nothing could ever be build there due to avalanche and mudslide danger. The park, however, was nice flat ground, and since it was on the west side of the canal (the boundary line for any high-density housing) the city considered building on the park , and putting the park on the hill. (Of course, you can't build ball fields on a slope.) Dennis argued aggressively for the park to remain as it was, and to build it out as promised.

In 2003, the Master Plan was revisited (it has to be reviewed every 5 years) Again, all neighborhood activists insisted that the park remain as-is, and that no more high-density housing be permitted on city-owned land. Stan Lockhart was especially vocal, and when the city acquired the County Jail property, Stan worked hard to get the school and church built there, in preparation for more single-family housing.

In 2005, Dave Knecht put froward a proposal to fix these Master Plan recommendations for the record -- park in place, with ballfields, low-density housing elsewhere. He needed four votes for the measure to pass. He did not get them. Midge Johnson voted with Mayor Billings to conduct the SDP study. It took two years, cost over $50,000, and as I said, revealed that what everyone in the neighborhood had already decided, was, indeed, the best course of action.

Midge said, when she voted for the study, "We don't know what a good developer could do with that property."

Regardless of what a developer wanted to do, the neighborhood did not want more high-density housing, or commercial or mixed use development along Slate Canyon drive, or the park to be moved. (technically the park cannot be moved , both because of the geological faults which cause springs to pop out of the hillside, and because the land was donated as a park, and state law prohibits land that has been donated as a park from ever being developed.)

Midge voted to waste $50,000 of our money, and to discount the recommendations of the residents of Provo. Once again, reinventing the wheel.