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Show Page 2 AMERICAN FORK CITIZEN Thursday, January 15, 2009 vv? JoLaviivi NEWS AND NOTES TO KEEP YOU INFORMED AND INVOLVED Cn C Barbara Christiansen NOPTH COUNTY STAFF American Fork City is looking for ways to reduce water rates for businesses and high water users. With the installation of the pressurized irrigation system, the rates for culinary water have been increased. That was planned to be on a sliding scale, with a larger amount charged for those who use the most water. Several business owners voiced objections to the new rates, saying the new rates were high enough to put them out of business or cause them to move out of town. At a work session Thursday, Thurs-day, the City Council has considered some options that would lower those charges for the high users. With the initial rates there was an amount planned to rebuild portions of the culinary water system as it became necessary. Project manager John Schiess took a look at what would happen to the rates of some of the users if those funds were cut back. One scenario included cutting S500.WXJ from the depreciation costs. In that instance, residential residen-tial users would be charged slightly less and the larger users would have their bills cut nearly in half. Doug Smith Autoplex would pay $9,2W instead of $Ki.:2. Morinda, Inc. would pay $47,604 instead of $95,844. The City Council will review the options and is considering consider-ing taking action on Jan. 27 to adopt new culinary water rates. Mayor Heber Thompson said there were items to consider. con-sider. "On the one hand you want the lowest rates possible for the citizens," he said. "On the other hand the citizens would not like to see these businesses have to depart from the community." com-munity." Thompson said a comparison compari-son of the rates in surrounding surround-ing communities showed that American Fork's would be the highest. Councilwoman Heidi Rode-back Rode-back said the city should be cautious in making any changes. Roads Continued from Page 1 Gallo said. "With the pressurized pressur-ized irrigation project, they were going to cut the roads. It didn't make any sense to move ahead with it at that time." With a significant portion of the pressurized irrigation system in place and more to come in the spring and summer, sum-mer, it may be time to move ahead, he said. "Now we can be proactive and do a pavement evaluation program and start repaying or overlaying the roads," he said. A drilling machine would be used to take samples of the roadways. Those are then taken to a lab for analysis, analy-sis, including the amount of oil remaining in the asphalt. Fair Continued from Page I the city for providing the facility. fa-cility. "We had a lot of staff members who worked hard," he said. "(The centerj gives people a boost to kick off their New Year's resolutions and meet their fitness goals. I am happy that American Fork City is able to provide the facility fa-cility for them." In a related issue, Rykert made a presentation to the City Council at the group's Jan. 8 work session. In it, he gave an analysis of the city's recreation programs and its costs. Rykert said he would work out a cost analysis for the fitness center in the future. fu-ture. He suggested charging rates for programs that would enable the city to recover a greater percentage of its costs than it has in the past. He said he was working toward to-ward a 61 percent cost recovery, recov-ery, while the last year's rate had been at about 55 percent. Rykert said the city did not plan on a 100 percent cost recovery, but suggested hopes lo reduce culinary-water rates DAVIS ARCHIBALD Da ly Herald Sylvan Buhler clears snow with his tractor in front of his coin-operated laundromat on Dec. 22 in American Fork. According to Buhler, American Fork is raising water rates for businesses to help pay for the new pressurized irrigation system in the city. If the rates stand us proposed, businesses will he spending up to six times as much as a residential customer for water. "We have a moral obligation obliga-tion to hold true to the rates that were established in the bond (when the residents voted in 2007)," she said. "The other obligation is to recover the costs. We want to be friendly to business but we cannot provide a service below be-low costs. We have had either deferred maintenance or we have not charged enough in the past." COMMUNITY NOTES Planners recommend new building at The Meadows With some conditioas, the American Fork Planning and Zoning Commission on Jan. 7 voted to recommend approval of a new building at The Meadows. The new structure will be in front of Lane Bryant and will contain retail and restaurant res-taurant uses. One of the conditions placed on the approval was that the restaurant be one-fourth of the entire structure. If it is greater than that, the developer, Woodbury Corp., would have to come back and get a new Gallo said that the oil helps the pavement from being brittle. "The oil in the asphalt evaporates evap-orates over time," he said. With the analysis, the city can determine whether to overlay or rebuild a road. The overlay costs less and can extend the life of a road, but works best when there is more original life remaining. In addition to studying the core samples, there are other ' measures Gallo is recommending. recom-mending. They include doing a drainage study, adopting a moratorium on road cuts, requiring re-quiring road cut permits with bonding, and creating a bond schedule. The drainage study would focus on where storm water goes, with a goal of keeping it away from the roads. The center gives people a boost to kick off their New Year's resolutions and meet their fitness goals. Derric Rykert PECPEATiON director there be a pyramid. The youth programs would be on level I, with a goal of 35 to 70 percent of operating costs recovered. Those programs include youth soccer, flag football, baseball and basketball. Adult and interest -specific programs would be the second level, with 45 to 100 percent of operating costs recovered. Those programs include tennis league, lessons approval. Parking requirements require-ments were the basis for that condition. Side setback change recommended recom-mended Members of the Planning Commission often cite the concern about unintended unin-tended consequences when they make changes to the city's laws. In an attempt to allow one thing, something else might become permitted. On Jan. 7, they voted to recommend rec-ommend a change to requirements require-ments about side setbacks in commercial zones. The Central Commercial 2 zone is a design zone, in which the commissioners commis-sioners have the right to make more requirements about the plans of a development than in the general commercial zone. One place the CC-2 zone is in effect is on the west end of Main Street, much of which contains historic homes. The developer of a lot next to Cypress Park, about 5M W. Main, had asked for the change in order to build a new structure and have sufficient access to parking in the rear of the narrow lot. Commission members voted "When water goes into the road base, it freezes and expands, ex-pands, then causes cracks," he said. "Then the asphalt on top fails." He suggested a moratorium, moratori-um, saying a new road could not be cut for five years after it is built. When a developer obtains a road cut permit, he or she would be required to bond $1,000 plus the amount it would cost to replace the pavement. That would be an incentive for the developer to do the job correctly, he said. The bond would be fully refundable after the work is complete. "We are in the business of protecting the taxpayers, but we don't want to bankrupt the contractors," Gallo said. For new development, Gallo would require a developer MARK JOMNSTONNorttl County Market Eggett, 5, of American Fork, has a color extension added to her hair by Abhy Allen of the Capelli Institute. in skiing and snowboarding, golf and adult basketball. At the top level of the pyramid would be competitive programs and private lessons, with a goal of recovering complete costs. mi to recommend the change to the ordinance which would make that possible, under the advice of planner Rod De-spain. De-spain. "This is practically the only place this would be usable," Despain said. "This may be the only place where it is going to happen." He explained that the change allows a building to be constructed nearly on the lot line in a CC-2 zone, only if it is adjacent to a general commercial commer-cial zone. Site plan for cell tower is tabled The Planning Commission Com-mission voted to table a request re-quest from Verizon Wireless to place a cell phone tower at 1584 S. 580 East, in the city's 1-1 industrial zone. Commission Commis-sion chairman Ken Baldwin said the city had to consider that there was another cell tower 821 feet away, even if it was not in the city limits. The city law is being changed to allow those towers at a minimum mini-mum of 1,000 feet apart. Pete Simmons from Verizon said he would look at moving the tower to put it in compliance. compli-ance. to post a bond for the costs associated with the roads, which would be indexed for two years. "That is one year to build and a one-year warranty period," he said. "That is no cost to the taxpayers and they would have the motivation to do it right." Some of his suggestions have no cost associated with them. Taking the core samples sam-ples and doing the analysis has a price tag. Gallo said the city receives approximately $650,000 a yei.r from the state to put toward road improvements improve-ments and that could be supplemented sup-plemented by the city budget. "We can do a great job with $1 million a year," he said. "We can bring this city up to compliance in three or four years." Councilman Ricky Storrs said the analysis of the recreation rec-reation programs would help the city in its budgetary process. pro-cess. ' "This gives us a base to start with," he said. A different kind of unintended consequences TTTTZ) hrough the years i ve been otten schooled in the various processes of government, at least on the local level. I've seen hour after hour, month after month, as our local lo-cal leaders have mulled over some plan or another, some idea or another, to finally reach a conclusion in order to solve a situation to best benefit ben-efit the public. Most of the time it works, and works well. Sometimes Some-times it doesn't. Then the process begins again, with some refinements. Despite the warning that is often given that no one should really want to know how either sausages or laws are made, there is a lot of thought, planning and good effort put into the laws. I'm Barb's Wire BARBARA CHRISTIANSEN still unsure about the sausage, but they taste good. Don't bother me with the process or the ingredients. Forewarned is forearmed and I don't eat sausage very often. You can't say the same about laws. Once they are passed, we become subject to them. There is no middle ground. There is no "once in a while." That is a blessing and it can be a problem. Occasionally, Occasion-ally, someone will discover a loophole in a law, allowing them to do something that their friends and neighbors may not like. Those are the unintended consequences. The goal for which the law was passed may have been ever so honorable, but if it enables something bad or undesirable to happen, it is flawed. A couple of months ago there were some major changes chang-es made in the format of the newspaper. After many years' absence, I was again allowed, even asked, to write a column. That can be really enjoyable. It can also be really stressful, but for the most part it's great to have a chance to express my views about relevant topics, top-ics, or share some weird happenings hap-penings with you. Selecting a topic is usually the hardest thing. Sometimes there is really something weighing heavily on your mind and you are virtually compelled to write about that. Other times there is nothing particularly important to you. Those are the weeks In which you may NorthCounty 399 E. State St. Pleasant Grove Home Delivery 375-5103 Delivery by 6 a.m. Mon-Frl 7 a.m. Sat-Sun For missing papers, call by 9:30 a.m. SUBSCRIPTIONS New subscriptions, restarts, delivery or billing Information, call 375-5103 weekdays week-days from 6 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. SUBSCRIPTION PROORAMI NrTtan Dally i Sunday Thur. Frt. Sat, Sun Holiday' Thursday Only MorvSat Sunday Only Thur. Sun i Holiday 1124 80 130 OO 11040 15200 19100 136.40 Holiday delivery Include delivery the week of Easter, Memorial Day, Independence Day. Pioneer Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Chrlitmaa and New Year' Day. Barbara Christiansen 443-3264 American Fork, Alpine, Cedar Hills bchristiansenheraldextra.com Volumt 135 Arwetn Fort Ci n trtvr of f 0, Hm Edfton. Utf 01I-M0 wMynawp prnOWt Su,PmiO U 603 Panodbwpm0irdPlaaaarargv, U642trT)wjn'rigofV PuiiMti.SndaiOirvw)3rCarty Nwcr P0B57 Awf.lW840CJO007 FMr! THrrt Or f tcjuor go back to events in your life to remember occasions which have left an impact. It can be embarrassing. Sometimes it is to you; sometimes some-times it is to your family members, friends or coworkers. cowork-ers. It's an easy way to lose friends, I am told. Most of the time journalists consider column writing as the frosting on the cake. You research and interview and write perfectly balanced stories sto-ries about topics which may be boring, or which are not especially important im-portant to you. You have to tell the story in other people's words. Then, finally you get a chance to tell your side of a topic, and it's a relief. At any rate, it's been fun to again be writing a column. Early last week, I became sick at work and had to go home early. I stayed at home the next day, reading and sleeping and in general getting over what I thought was a 24-hour bug. Off to work I went the next day, only to find that I had one new symptom which came on me. I called my daughter, who is a nurse, and she wasn't aware of any repercussions of my symptom. Later in the day I called my daughter-in-law, who is a nurse at a different hospital with entirely different experience. She told me what I probably had and said it was quite contagious. I felt guilty about having gone to work, but I really didn't know. I hadn't come in close contact with my coworkers cowork-ers so I thought they would probably be fine. ' I was scheduled to go to Planning Commission that evening and decided that would be okay since I sat at my own desk, removed from the others. I planned on not making much contact and figured fig-ured I would not be spreading germs. However, one member of the commission wanted to pay me a compliment about my recent column writing. I was flattered, but couldn't keep my mind off the fact 1 shouldn't be talking to him that evening, or else I would spread germs, The unintended consequence? conse-quence? He tried to be nice to me and I was in fact rather rude to him. Maybe, like with the" laws, we can start that conversation over some day. Phonr 756-7669 Fax: 756-5274 DAILY BBBALD rniLiiRiMo oo. QZ33 Jennetta Esplin 756-7669 Classifieds, Obituaries, Celebrations, Legals Kira Johnson 344-2558 North County Coordinator kjohnson9heraldextra.com Megan Carieton 344-2570 Project Coordinator, DesignerCopy Editor Alison Davies 344-2570 DesignerCopy Editor 1 Issue 55 w |