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Show Sat/Sun/Mon/Tues, September 12-15, 2020 The Park Record A-5 County Seat COUNTY EDITOR: ALEXANDER CRAMER 649–9014 EXT. 15712 | Countynews@parkrecord.com State again impacts Hideout TANZI PROPST/PARK RECORD After receiving phone calls from state legislators Thursday, a Hideout town councilor says he reversed how he was perceiving the Legislature’s intent in repealing the bill that allowed the town to annex land in Summit County. He then voted with his fellow councilors to start a new annexation process in the small window of time before the repeal takes effect Oct. 19. Councilor: Calls from officials sway annexation vote ALEXANDER CRAMER The Park Record What a difference two days makes. On Tuesday, Hideout town councilors indicated during a public meeting that they would likely abandon the attempt to annex hundreds of acres of land in Summit County after their two representatives at the Statehouse told them it was absolutely not the Legislature’s intent to allow Hideout to proceed with the move during a 60-day window before a law barring the annexation takes effect. “Unless new evidence comes to light, I’m questioning whether we have a need to revisit this (annexation attempt),” Councilor Jerry Dwinell said Tuesday, minutes before seconding a motion allowing the issue to be heard two days later. But at Thursday’s meeting, Dwinell said he’d reconsidered what the Legislature intended after receiving calls from two legislators, and he voted along with three of his fellow councilors to start a new annexation process. On Tuesday, Dwinell said he needed more clarity about what the Legislature intended when it declined to add a special effective date when it repealed the bill allowing for the first time a city to annex land in a neighboring county with- out that county’s consent. Legislation is effective 60 days after the session in which it was passed is adjourned, unless legislators add a special effective date, which requires a two-thirds majority vote. The repeal vote passed that threshold, and other bills during the August special session had special effective dates, but the repeal bill did not. “To me, this feels like the door is closed but they left the window open and now we’re looking to climb in the window,” Dwinell said on Tuesday. Rep. Tim Quinn, R-Heber, and Sen. Ron Winterton, R-Roosevelt, attended the Town Council meeting Tuesday. Each said the Legislature’s intent in repealing the law was to stop Hideout’s attempt. The lawmakers said they intended to address further annexation issues in the 2021 general session. Upon hearing that, Dwinell said he did not think this annexation attempt was the right one. But two days later, Dwinell’s opinion changed, after the calls he said he received calls from the other two lawmakers. Bruce Baird, a lawyer for the developer involved in the annexation, suggested during Thursday’s meeting that he had previous knowledge of the calls. He said the calls came from the original bill’s sponsors, and that they were also made to Hideout Town Councilor Chris Baier. Baird was involved in crafting the legislation, passed in March, that allows this type of annexation, which legislators have said was misrepresented on the Senate floor. Sen. Kirk Cullimore, R-Sandy, was a floor sponsor of the substitute bill that allowed the annexation. He has said the bill was misrepresented to him and introduced the measure to repeal that language during the August special session. In an interview Thursday night, Cullimore said he called two Hideout councilors that day, though he declined to say who had suggested he do so. He said he had not spoken to Baird on the matter. Cullimore said his intent was not to indicate that Hideout should proceed with the annexation, but rather to avoid wading into an ongoing legal dispute to the advantage of one side or another. “It’s not the Legislature’s place to come in and pick sides,” he said. “... It was not my intent to influence (Dwinell’s) vote, not to open the door (to Hideout’s annexation attempt).” Cullimore added that considering a special effective date was not a priority during the one-day August special session. “Frankly, as the floor sponsor, I was not paying attention to the effective date as I ran the repeal,” he said. “(The) usual implementation rule just applied to this. That wasn’t even a topic of conversation at the time.” “My intention was to repeal the bill and that we would go back to square one so the policy could be properly debated,” he added. REASONS TO SHOP LOCAL. Please see Hideout, A-6 1355 Lowell Ave., Park City, UT WE’RE OPEN Serving you safely 6 days a week. Lunch and dinner. Closed Tuesdays. Dine inside or outside or curbside pickup. BASE OF PARK CITY MOUNTAIN RESORT 435-649-2252 Studies show that when you buy from an independent, locally owned business, rather than a nationally owned business, significantly more of your money is used to make purchases from other local businesses, service providers and farms continuing to strengthen the economic base of the community. |