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Show 1 t- Til llLLvr? a Park City, Utah 250 Vol. VII, No. 6 Thursday, October 29, 1931 2 sections, 32 pages Call for city back in s In the wake of the controversial city employee strike came another bombshell bomb-shell Monday when it was learned that a grand jury has been called to investigate four issues in Park City. The order was signed by 11 Third District Court judges, who wrote that after considering testimony and documentary docu-mentary evidence presented in grand jury hearings since early spring, that "reasonable" cause exists to call a special jury. The specific areas to be investigated include: ' "1. The illegal use, sale or distribution of controlled substances; "2. Any illegal conduct relating to the issuance of remodeling and-or construction permits by employees of Mayor Green responds " Frankly, I view the calling of the Grand Jury as an opportunity to lay to rest once and for all, the rumors and innuendos that have plagued city government since the Building Department investigations of two years ago. I suppose rumors of conflict of interest and improprieties are common in any rapidly developing area. You have to understand our situation in Park City. From the time we sought Federal grants for the funding of the ski resort, we have had a pro growth policy. Unfortunately, our city organization was totally unprepared to handle the problem of inspection and enforcement. Once we realized the enormity of the problem, we sought and hired the best Building Inspector in the State, Ron Ivie. At the time we were a small city without professional management and drastically understaffed. There may have been inequities and omissions in inspections and fee collection. I am certain that none of this was ever deliberate and in fact, Assistant County Attorney Terry Christiansen found no evidence of criminal misconduct in the very thorough investigation he conducted two years ago. . You kno as well as I do that Mere .narcotics investigations are concerned, con-cerned, local officials are the last to know an investigation is being eon-ducted eon-ducted in their town. We have had continuing discussion in the Council over how a small town police department with limited resources, could conduct an investigation. In fact I suggested to Sheriff Robinson that the city and county cooperate in an investigation of narcotics in Summit County, and he told me it simply wasn't possible with the financial resources we had. I have no idea which law enforcement agencies the Judges are talking about; County Sheriff's Department, City Police D.E.C. ... I simply don't know. As for conflict of interest on the Council, you know the State legislature recently revised the Ethics Act because they recognized that public officials of-ficials are inevitably business leaders in their communities. If they can't serve in public office, who will serve? I think our Council members are well aware of the requirements of the law and have never failed to make full disclosure. I don't know what else is expected of them." John C. (Jack) Green, Jr. o power to the people Where were you when the lights went out? The northern end of Park City and homes out to Kimball Junction were left in the dark for nearly a half hour about 7:20 Monday night when an underground un-derground power cable malfunctioned. Wayne Bruening, manager of the local Utah Power and Light office, said it took workers about 20 minutes to discover the ruptured line near the intersection in-tersection of Highways 224 and 248. The faulty line was dug up, spliced together and reburied, but almost immediately im-mediately the power kicked off again. "They went in and isolated the one bad cable and put it back, and then another piece went bad and they had to go back in again," Bruening said. The exact cause of the cable failure has not been determined, Bruening said, but it's possible that construction crews working in the area uncovered the cable and nicked it with equipment. equip-ment. "H cable like that gets nicked, it might be okay for today. But you could bury it again and it could go for a month mon-th or six months, and eventually water will seep in there and cause the power to go out." The damaged line affected service to Deer Valley and all areas north of Highway 224, including Prospector Square, Thaynes Canyon, Park MmmmOKammmm grand jury pets potlight Park City and the assessment and collection of fees with respect thereto; "3. Whether decisions of the governing govern-ing council of Park City or any of its administrative agencies have involved any conflict of interest of the members thereof; and "4. Whether any member of any law enforcement agency having investigative investiga-tive jurisdiction in or around Park City has been involved in any illegal conduct." The order states that the special grand jury shall limit its investigation to the special purposes listed, "unless the court for good cause shall otherwise order." Jury selection will begin next Monday, Nov. 2, at 2 p.m. in the Meadows, Park West, Silver Springs and Highland Estates, Bruening said. While crews were scrambling to find the damaged cable in the eerie darkness, Park City Police Officer Al Allen was speeding from one subdivision sub-division to another to answer burglar alarms. No, robbers weren't taking advantage of the cloak of darkness. According to acting Police Chief Joe Offret, many alarms were designed with a "tail saie system that will cause them to activate when there is a loss of power. As soon as the power went out, the dispatcher in Coalville started fielding a rash of phone calls reporting burglar alarms sounding. Officer Allan could be heard on the police radio as he moved from Prospector Square to Thaynes Canyon to Deer Valley checking out what proved to be false alarms. "Power failures are kind of a shaky situation," said Chief Offret. "One problem is false alarms. The guys have a habit of responding routinely to them, since they get many of them." The officer may be eopvciauy taxed during a power failure chasing down false alarms, Offret said, but there's a danger of being too mentally casual. "Somebody might all of a sudden pop out with a .38. It places the officers in jeopardy." Summit County Courthouse. The members are selected from a 30-per-son jury wheel. After interviews with Third District Court Judge Bryant Croft, the list will be pared of members found to be ineligible to serve. From the remaining list, seven jurors will be selected. For the most part, the news of the grand jury investigation was met with optimism by city officials, despite the potential impact on the upcoming election. "It gives the people accused by gossip and innuendo a chance to face the accusations with evidence and lay to rest the rumors," said City Councilwoman Helen Alvarez. "If the grand jury is effective in cleaning up the drug problem in Summit County, then it will be beneficial." As to the investigation's damning effect on the City administration, Alvarez said, "It's part of the American system not to prejudge anyone and to give them a chance in the jury process." City Manager Arlene Loble said, "I wish a distinction in the charges could have been made between current problems and problems in the past. If the suggestion is that there was wrongdoing in the past administration, I don't known how we can be held culpable." A call to Judge Bryant Croft shed little light on the grand jury process. Croft would not comment on how often the 11 judges had met in the past several months, except to say that the meetings began sometime in the spring, Advanced Health Park City clinic closed, doctor fired In the face of mounting financial losses, Advanced Health Systems has decided to close the Park City Meadowview Medical Clinic and, in another move perhaps unrelated to the first, to fire staff doctor William Ledlie. In a Friday interview on KPCW, AHS administrator Mike Shaw acknowledged ac-knowledged that the year-old clinic had not been able to pay its way. In the same interview, Shaw explained that Ledlie's contract with AHS was being terminated "purely for professional reasons." Ledlie was hired by AHS a year and a half ago, and was the staff doctor at the Park City Clinic when it opened in October of 1980. In recent months, he had been dividing his time between the Park City clinic and a similar facility in Kamas. Early in October he began working full-time in Kamas. On Oct. 16, he got his walking papers. The official reason given for the dismissal, according to Ledlie, is that ParkWest Shopping center on A 32-acre commercial development at the entrance to the ParkWest Ski Resort moved one step closer to reality Tuesday as the Summit County Commission approved a request to rezone the land from AG-1 (Agricultural (Agricul-tural Grazing) to CR-1 (Commercial Resort). According to Ed Davis, ParkWest's vice president over real estate development, the area, when developed, devel-oped, could house a supermarket, another "anchor tenant," a theatre complex, a branch bank, a drive-in restaurant, a service station, and a neighborhood strip center containing boutiques like those in the Holiday Village Mall. Davis said the area also could house professional offices. "It depends on how we can p release the space." Newspaper y (tap By law, a hearing is held at least once every two years in each county, and a majority of judges hear in secret all persons claiming information that would justify the calling of a grand jury. That information gathered by the judges since May, apparently raised enough questions to look into at least four issues more closely. According to the law text "American Jurisprudence," the "most valuable function of the grand jury is not only to examine into the commission of crimes, but to stand between the prosecutor and the accused; that is, to protect the citizen against unfounded accusations, whether they come from the government or are prompted by partisan passion or private enmity." According to Utah Code books, in the courtroom during grand jury proceedings proceed-ings may only be the seven jurors, , witnesses and a stenographic reporter, and an appointed prosecutor. The witnesses may not have legal counsel with them during the hearings. A judge is not present at the hearings, unless jurors ask him specific advice. The proceedings of a grand jury are generally informal and free from the technicalities and stipulations at jury trials. If after the hearings five grand jurors do not concur in finding an indictment against a defendant, the charge is dismissed. However, if the jurors do hand down an indictment, the defendant then would be subject to the more familiar court trial. According to state statute, a grand jury may meet for as long a period as they feel is necessary to sufficiently answer the specific matters cited. he missed three hours of work on Oct. 13 while he was in Salt Lake City replacing a dead battery in his car. "They call it professional misconduct," miscon-duct," Ledlie said Wednesday. "They used that as an excuse to terminate my contract." About two weeks before he was fired, Ledlie was involved in a meeting of the AHS staff which included Shaw and one of the corporation's medical advisors. Ledlie said the meeting focused on ways to help improve the corporation's financial status in Summit Sum-mit County. "We were discussing a lot of ways of trying to turn things around," he said. As Ledlie tells it, a suggestion was made at the meeting that he should consider hospitalizing certain "gray area" patients with ailments which might or might not normally require admission into the hospital." Ledlie said he resisted the idea, and it was dropped. "I went into great deatil about how I The land is contained in two parcels on either side of the access road to the resort, immediately west of Highway 224. According to county zoning ordinances, ordin-ances, the CR-1 zone is designed for retail services and high-density lodging lod-ging in close proximity to a major recreational facility. Opposition to the zone change was expressed by nearby landowner Steven Osguthorpe and by Park City attorney Craig Smay, who was representing landowners to the south of the proposed commercial project. "They were concerned that the presence of a strip shopping area would impact their property," Smay told The Newspaper when asked why his clients were opposing the project. Smay said they were also concerned (Burma ft : ..-.?:!:- :. . ; ..-f. if..-J--;.- ' ' lr. .; .,;- ' . :l' ''-'''0.y' "''V':',';",," :-, ' ' The pithy pachyderm facing you is saying, "Pack up your trunk for trick or treat at the Halloween carnival at the Middle School." The two kids in back can't compete in the schnozz category, but their memories are long enough so they won't miss the festivities, 4-7 p.m. on Sat. wasn't willing to do that kind of thing," he said. Ledlie said he gave little thought to that discussion until two weeks later. "That meeting simply didn't have any significance to me until I got terminated," he said. Shaw maintains that there was no connection between the meeting and Ledlie's dismissal. And he argues that no such discussion took place. "Dr. Ledlie was never asked to admit patients to the hospital that he otherwise wouldn't admit," he said in the radio interview. "I'm really upset that he would make a statement like that." When contacted Wednesday by The Newspaper, Shaw said that the reasons for Ledlie's dismissal would be spelled out in a statement to be released Thursday. Meanwhile, AHS has hired another physician who is due to begin work in Kamas Monday. So where does that leave Ledlie, who is under contract the way? about potential traffic problems cause by the project. According to Summit County Clerk Reed Pace, the County Commission voted to approve the zone change, in spite of the protests, since neither Osguthorpe or Smay's client could present equally detailed plans for the development of their parcels. Earlier this year, 21 residents of the nearby ParkWest Condominiums signed a petition expressing their opposition to the proposed rezoning. Their concern was based on information infor-mation that a convenience store would be built on land immediately adjacent to their property, possibly resulting in noise, late-night traffic, and lower property values. Responding to those concern- Park- fCT is.. until December? "I don't know the answer to that question yet," he said. "Nobody's bothered to tell me what's going to happen." Ledlie said one of his options was to start his own practice in the Kamas area. Until two weeks ago, Ledlie said, he had nothing but good experiences with AHS. "Most of the people I have dealt with over the last year and a half have been honest guys trying to do a good job," he said. "These guys are trying to keep their commitment to keep that (Coalville) hospital open. And it's not easv. AHS is managing the hospital and providing clinical services in other areas under the terms of a contract with the Summit County Commission. In spite of substantial losses over the past 20 months, Shaw said the corporation had no intention of ending its association with the county. West developer Jack Roberts wrote a letter to the Summit County Commission Commis-sion detailing steps that would be taken to protect the rights of those owners. Those steps included a deed restriction to prevent any tenant of "Parcel B," north of the access road, from conducting business between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. He also promised to build a 25-foot landscaping strip east of the existing condominiums and a six-foot wooden fence along the eastern edge of the 25-foot strip. Roberts also stated that no commercial commer-cial building would go up within 85 feet of the existing condominiums. The letter apparently satisfied the concerns of the residents, since none of the individuals who signed the petition appeared at Tuesday's hearing on the zone change. |
