Greater Avenues Community Council Meeting Minutes

NOTE: Mayor Rocky Anderson attended our meeting tonight to take concerns and questions. If you have concerns you can call the Mayor at 535-7704 - Community Affairs Department. You can email the Mayor directly at: rocky.anderson@slcgov.com

Conducting: Wynn Johnson, who opened the meeting at 7:00 p.m.

Welcome. The Mayor and his staff will come here at 7:45 pm to answer questions. Please write out your questions and we will group them together by subject. If you need paper and pencil raise your hand and Judith Locke will bring you some.

REPORTS:

STREET FAIR - Walt Z.: The Avenues Street Fair will be held September 13th. We need more volunteers and would love to have you come and help us. It's a great opportunity to work together. If you have questions or input you can talk to Jill VanLageveld, Judith Locke or myself. My phone number is 531-0678.

SOUTH TEMPLE RECONSTRUCTION: We appreciate your patience with the construction. We also appreciate your comments and suggestions. You can contact us as www.southtempleconstruction.com or you can call me, Pat Peterson 535-7235. We are trying to be finished enough to have the street opened by the late fall. There will be some utilities shut-downs this week, primarily at night. Notice will be given to the individual properties beforehand. We have had trouble with updating the water system, some of which is 90 years old. We will be closing more of the street to two-way traffic as we continue eastward. The intersections of D F P K P and Q are all closed. Sidewalks are also being reconstructed at those points so foot traffic is diverted as well. "E" Street, "M" Street and Virginia Street are open for north-south traffic to exit the Avenues. Nighttime construction will continue Monday-Friday. We have all the necessary permits to do this. We apologize for the noise. We are muffling the back-up beeping of the equipment, but can't end all the noise. ALL ENTRANCES TO BUSINESSES ARE OPEN to auto and pedestrian traffic and so please use those and SUPPORT THE LOCAL BUSINESSES! Many are your neighbors and are hurting financially from this necessary construction.

CITY COUNCIL: Eric Jergensen- There was a hearing on Main Street Plaza last night. We will be voting next Tuesday. Last week we had a very interesting meeting with 53 people speaking with very divergent views on Main Street. I think that the answer is somewhere in between.

QUESTION: We took a vote and unanimously passed to accept the exchanging the easement for the west side facility. Why aren't you taking a position on it?

RESPONSE: I think that it is inappropriate for a Councilperson to take a stand until all the Hearings have taken place. I think that it is a legitimate public hearing. For example, the planning commission had their hearing on the Plaza. After the public hearing they pulled out their prepared speeches and read them, which means that they prepared their opinions before they listened to the public, which I think is no right.

East downwind and four corners proposals - The City Council took a firm stand where the flights should be. They should continue over the west side where there is more uninhabited space.

The Budget is getting very interesting. The deficit is $3 million. The Mayor wants to ____? (Sorry, I missed what he was saying!) But we think we can balance the budget without cutting too many services or layoffs. There are many questions on Nordstrom's moving. The Boyer Company is asking for a change in zoning to move to Gateway. We are considering different possibilities.

BOARD OF EDUCATION: Dr. Doug Nelson. The big story is the closing of Lowell. We are trying to keep it open, but in the meantime the Lowell community is being split between Ensign and Wasatch. Except for the ELP program that is moving to Hawthorne, as many teachers as possible are following the students to Ensign and Wasatch. Millie Fletcher is becoming the new principle at Ensign. Principle Lesser is the new Elementary principal at Wasatch. She is very highly recommended, and is a Utah Native. Amy Wadsworth who was the Principal at Wasatch is going to the new Charter Arts School that will be in the Library.

The new superintendent is working out very well. Dr. Robles did not endear herself to the teachers. All the teachers have concluded negotiations with the District, and no one was yelling about it. There is a new feeling of communication and openness. Many teachers now feel comfortable to call me, which they did not feel comfortable doing under the previous administration.

COMMENT: I pass the School Board Building every morning as I walk to work and in a time of drought it is pumping water into the gutter at a high rate.

RESPONSE: The grounds people should be made aware of that, so I'll mention it to them. Please call us if you become aware of needs. We are getting new energy saving innovations in the new school buildings we are building.

QUESTION: What is happening with the Lowell lawsuit?

RESPONSE: The Board of Education lawyers asked that it be dismissed. The judge dismissed some things, but this case is currently heading for a trial June 18th. As of now they are planning to go to court.

LEGISLATORS: Not here this month. They've done a great job and deserve a break.

TRAFFIC: Jim Jenkin - the Traffic Calming on 11th Avenue was approved and they will start construction this month on permanent speed "tables" or bumps as some are fond of calling them. Everyone in the audience cheered. .

POLICE: We have good news on our crime stats. Crime is going down in the Avenues while other areas around us are going up. The car strips were 9; car prowls were 28. Burglary dropped from 41 to 31. Gang related incidents are 0; auto thefts were down 17 to 9. The reason our stats are down is that people in the Avenues are making the targets more difficult. Very good, residents! (AUDIENCE COMMENT: Plus there are no easy exit routes to South Temple!)

- There are a lot of Good Samaritan scams reported in the Avenues. It works like this: The criminal calls senior citizens at 2:30 a.m. and says that she is your neighbor's granddaughter and she needs help. The person goes to help and she steals their wallets. She also goes door-to-door asking for help and fleecing people. These people are targeting Avenues residents. Please call the police if you get any calls like these.

- Cat Mutilations: We are taking this seriously because those who mutilate animals usually also hurt people.

- Car Chases: Did you catch the motorcyclists that race up I street 80 miles an hour at 2:00 a.m.? Not yet. COMMENT from an audience member: "They are now on "A" Street."

AVENUES AWARD: Special award to Caroline Productions - Location Specialists.

Jim Jenkin, our Avenues Film Liaison: They have done a lot of filming in the Avenues during their 9 years of "Touched By An Angel" filming and have been very considerate and generous to this neighborhood. They have made our job easy by being considerate, professional, neighborhood-friendly and giving us plenty of notice. I am pleased that we can honor them for they have been so great to work with for so many years.

COMMENT from the Utah Film Representative: Caroline Productions group has always gone the extra mile on the 230 locations per year that they use. I have only had one reported problem and it was solved before I got there. John Sittner helped us work out a very fine agreement and please convey to him my thanks.

CAROLINE PRODUCTIONS: I think we filmed at all 9000 homes in the area! This award is a surprise and we are very pleased. We want to thank you for letting us come into your neighborhood. I also want to thank the LDS Church for letting us use their parking lots (which we did not have the first two years, and had to park on the streets.) But when they saw our need they came in and offered their parking lots to us, which was very helpful for us so we could take our cars and trucks off your streets. I had a great staff to work with. There are many things that my staff did that no one saw, like getting up early in the morning to pass out flyers.

MEMORY GROVE CLEAN-UP: Phil Carroll: It will be held Saturday June 14th from 8:00 TO 12:00. We are going to be working in two areas: weeding on the west side between the gates. IF you want to work there, please park on East Capitol and walk down to work on that area. There is also a major work area for the adventuresome, on "A" Street - the top 50 or 100 feet will be cleared. It will be a big job. Meet at the top of the stairs for that area. There will be a welcoming booth on Canyon Road to direct people. Lunch will be served on the Canyon Road median strips afterwards. We appreciate the cooperation and help of all the community. The lunch is free, with donations coming from LDS Hospital, Lagoon, and our own Eric Jergensen who donated $200 for the lunch. Everyone young and old come out and help us.

MAYOR ROCKY ANDERSON: We are very grateful for these City Employees who came with me to help answer questions for taking their time as they do not get paid extra. They do so much for our City. We started these neighborhood meetings so it would not be just the Mayor but also those who work in the trenches. In every meeting we have heard a suggestion or a complaint that we were not aware of that helped make things better. We take real pride in being problem solvers. I am grateful for your interest as citizens as well. All of us working together make a better City. I will introduce who is here with me and then you can address your questions to them or me.

QUESTION: Can the modern police enforce speed laws in residential areas?

ANSWER: Obvious the answer is yes, and we respond to complaints all the time. That is the highest number of calls we deal with. We respond with speed board, motorcycle police, etc. The reality is that we cannot be everywhere. Traffic control and education are also necessary. If you have a specific complaint I will pass it on to Carrie.

MAYOR: I saw speeding cars on California Avenue, and one just missed a lady and baby and I called the Chief. The next night I saw a speed board and officers on motorcycles, and that conspicuous police presence did a good job in calming the traffic.

QUESTION: Please discuss the Olympic Memorial Steps at Memory Grove.

ANSWER: Let me explain where that question comes from. There is $100,000 grant for an Olympic Memorial to be built from suggestions from each area of the Community. Each community council needs to come up with ideas for what they want related to the Olympics. The Council Member from each district makes the proposal.

QUESTION: Why do we only see you as Mayor when it gets close to election?

ANSWER: We go around to different parts of the city every month. We also do Saturday Mornings with the Mayor. We invite the news media as well. We have meetings with the Community Council chairs every month. There has never been such openness. (JIM JENKIN: The Board has had to turn the Mayor down on three other occasions because we had urgent neighborhood business we had to attend to.)

QUESTION: I saw lazy park employees in Memory Grove. We see the employees sleeping in their car, wasting tax money, and the park is looking trashy.

RESPONSE: That news is surprising and concerning to us. If you see this kind of thing call us immediately. I return all my calls.

Rick Graham, Parks: We can look into these things, as there are only a few employees who work there, so I know whom to call tomorrow. We keep staff there on a full-time basis because we really appreciate that park and want to keep it nice, so let us know if you ever see any park employee not working, as they should.

QUESTION: Will there be tennis courts returned on Reservoir Park on 1300 East.

RESPONSE: We cannot do that until we decide what to do with the reservoir because it is not structurally sound, and so we can't put the public on it. Right now it is empty. Until we resolve the issue we can do nothing, but it will be several years before that takes place. It is quite old and no one can be allowed on it. We looked at rebuilding it, but we built the Wasatch Reservoir and that took precedence. We will need it in the future as part of our water system. We were going to tear it down, but then we found that it was sitting on a fault. We don't know if that is a good idea to build the water supply on the fault.

QUESTION: Please address when the South Temple Street will be closed, and open for 2- way traffic.

RESPONSE: We are open from 500 E. to 1300 East but we are only open one way and it will be that way for several months ahead. We will have things finished at 5th east and 7th in the next few weeks. The rest is a long ways to go. We are correcting all the problems of water, sewer, lighting, and fiber optics. We are making a big push to be to Virginia Street by this fall, unless we have some unforeseen problems. The contractor is working 6 days a week and we are pouring concrete at night. Next spring we will do landscaping and lights next spring. We might do Virginia Street quickly before the U of U starts up.

QUESTION: Why are you using concrete instead of asphalt?

RESPONSE: It is cost effective. It takes longer but we won't have to redo it for 50 years, instead of putting in asphalt, which we would have to redo in 10 years.

MAYOR: We fought very hard to get the federal dollars to do this project and it will be a beautiful street for our city when it gets finished. Brigham Street is such a great tradition.

QUESTION: Who rides on the Fire trucks and why are we getting these postcards asking us to talk to our city officials?

RESPONSE: Three years ago the Mayor made a commitment to staff the fire trucks with 4 fire fighters and rescue personnel. (Rescue Personnel are EMT etc.) The reason is that two fire fighters can stay outside and two can go in the burning structure. That is the national standard. Unless there is an emergency or life or death, the firemen will not go in the burning building unless there are two people outside to man the water and things from the outside. It isn't safe. They don't want the four fire fighters cut due to lack of funding.

QUESTION: What shall we do if we don't think we are getting the things done that we need to have done in the City? Can we call you as Mayor?

RESPONSE: Yes, you can always call me. I try to get the best staff possible to respond to concerns.

QUESTION: What is the City doing about the new Air Traffic flight plans over the east residential area?

RESPONSE: We have been very aggressive in stating that we are very firm on keeping the flights on the west side, because there is a lot of unoccupied land. We can quantify the problems. We have pilots on the board that agreed with that position and have raised real safety issues.

AIRPORT - TIM: We have been very active in opposition. The comment period is finished and the FAA will issue their opinion in a year. We are hoping that we can convince them to not do it. We own the airport but the federal government controls the air space. The federal law states that all the money generated from the airport stays at the airport.

QUESTION: We have been told that the water department is dumping excess water into the Salt Lake because citizens are so conserving and are not using as much as they had thought they would.

RESPONSE: No water is being dumped. Deer Creek Reservoir is our main supply. It is only 2/3 full. Last year it was also very low. There is no water to dump. We had to buy water from the Provo River to make it though the winter. There is some high flow coming out of the mountain streams right now and will continue for a couple of weeks but there are water-rights holders down the stream who have claims to that water. There are no reservoirs to capture that spring run-off. It is there for a short period of time and then goes. We will have a shortage of stored water during the highest demand time. There is no new water supply coming on-line. We will have a greater population increase in the future. We have to find ways to use this limited resource. We have to be able to deal with droughts as they come periodically in this desert area.

MAYOR: We only raised rates after much study. The increase is intended to be revenue-neutral. My own personal water use has been cut by 2/3 since I put in my new water-conserving landscape. We will now hear from our WATER CONSERVATIONIST - Stephanie Dewar: We have a recommended watering schedule. We published it on our website. We looked at the demands of turf, etc. If you have an automatic system, adjust the water to water only twice a week during the nighttime, and water it a bit longer. Water about 22 minutes each time but break it down into cycles of 7 minutes each. It allows the moisture to penetrate the water more efficiently. If you water too frequently, you get shallow roots and thin blades. Don't over-water in the spring, so that your lawn will grow deeper roots and can withstand the drought of the summer. Test: get an 8-inch screwdriver and push it into the soil. If you can do it easily, don't water. If it is hard, water. If you want a free technician to come out and help you call 1-877-saveh2o. They will do a root soil test, and check your sprinklers, etc, and give you wonderful suggestions to conserve water, adjust your sprinklers and set a watering schedule. Email me or call me at 483-6860. I will get back to you within a day.

QUESTION: Why are you vacillating on Nordstrom's and the zoning at Gateway?

MAYOR RESPONSE: I negotiated with Gateway for 45,000 sq. foot because I heard they were trying then to lure Nordstrom's. I did that because I thought there was an option for Nordstrom's on Main Street. We were lobbied by Crossroads very heavily to keep Nordstrom's but a proposal from Crossroads to make it cost-effective for Nordstrom's to stay was not forthcoming. Nordstrom's were then ready to leave. So I asked for 6 more weeks to tray and work something out. I asked Zion's Securities why they weren't doing it. They were deferring to Crossroads. I gave a time-frame of 6 weeks to Crossroads and they did not even place a telephone call to Nordstrom's. I found out later that they did not do it because they were trying to sell their property to the Church. PRI's (the real estate arm of the LDS Church) purchase of that block is the best thing that could happen to it because the Church has the interest and the resources to do the best use of that development. They have hired a professional to help them determine what that would be, but they are talking mixed use, housing, retail, entertainment, and bringing back one or more of the streets, etc. I think that the worst thing that happened to Main Street was building two malls across the street from each other. I think that the City Council will ask Nordstrom's to wait to move for this major reconstruction project. Nordstrom's said that they couldn't wait. I think that if they do not have an option, we need to keep Nordstrom's in our downtown area. There has been a great deal of changes since we made that deal with Boyer Company. We have a higher office occupancy downtown than in the suburbs. We are committed to doing everything we can to keep downtown alive. The RDA took our suggestion to give $20,000 grants to businesses that would relocate on Main Street and we have six new businesses on Main Street since there. We have more housing there downtown.

QUESTION: Given that the Main Street Plaza was purchased on specific agreements, is there an ethical way to resolve this?

RESPONSE: There were two incompatible rights granted in the agreement, and so they have to be modified. I believe that you are duty bound to honor the agreement even if you didn't like the agreement. First, I wanted to preserve the easement, and proposed that we identify where the easement was (which was not done in the agreement) and make time place and manner agreements on that 10%. But then I was told that the Church rejected it primarily because people would disrupt the use on the other 90%. We would have to have their agreement if we were to modify it. So I decided that since the Council would probably vote with the Church, and my good friends at the ACLU said that they would not support it unless we allowed demonstrations or they would sue, and the same day there were preachers shouting down a wedding party and refusing to let them take their wedding pictures in front of the temple, that giving up the easement in exchange for a facility to help the needy on the west side was worth it, and the only way to solve the argument. In addition, time, place, and mannerism are fraught with lawsuits possibilities. The Church said that they would continue to let people have 24- hour access. We are not now selling away our first amendment rights, for that was done when the sale was first made. We never had those rights after the sale. I did not see any options but to go for another possibility. I think that we will have this thing resolved and a great community center made possible by very generous donors. We will still have our rights to cross there and a great community center to boot.

Wynn Johnson thanked the Mayor and his staff. Meeting adjourned at 9:06 p.m.