The Snyderville Basin Planning Commission is mulling a significant development application, which is one of the first submitted under a set of guidelines meant to encourage affordable housing in the pricey Park City real-estate market by allowing bigger subdivisions for developers who pledge to keep prices on some of their units low.
The planning guidelines are under fire by some who say the codes are forcing the development of dense, urban-like neighborhoods in rural areas where they do not belong.
But not everyone living near a sagebrush-lined tract of land will likely ever be convinced that the property is suited for a 250-unit residential development near Old Ranch Road. Neighbors near Silver Summit Parkway have likened the roughly 300 acres to open space as they have hiked and biked near the private ground while playing at the edge of Round Valley.
However, the builder says the Stone Ridge housing project could provide the West Side of Summit County with about 65 deed-restricted homes for people earning from 40 to 80 percent of the annual area median income of roughly $93,000.
Still, Basin resident Gary Nielsen said he attended a public input session Dec. 8 before the Snyderville Basin Planning Commission to speak against the Stone Ridge proposal.
The general plan for the Snyderville Basin says new development should “preserve, protect and enhance the rural, residential character of our neighborhood,” said Nielsen who lives near Old Ranch Road.
“You tell me how 250 units, one house per acre over the whole project, enhances, let alone preserves and protects the rural, residential feeling of our neighborhood,” Nielsen said in a telephone interview.
The project could more than double the size of the Old Ranch Road neighborhood, he said.
“I submit to you, there are more people who are going to be put into this project than presently live within the Old Ranch Road planning area,” Nielsen said. “And they’d have probably something like 500 cars.”
Meanwhile, Nielsen said there could be a conflict of interest if the Basin Planning Commission works too closely with former Summit County Planning Director Michael Barille, who is now working in the private sector on behalf of the Stone Ridge developer.
“It makes for a coziness that makes it uncomfortable when the public can’t get in there and say, ‘We think you better be looking at this,'” Nielsen said.
Still, Summit County Community Development Director Don Sargent insists Barille, who resigned from his county post in 2007, has been very straightforward during the Stone Ridge talks.
“Ethically, he is completely above board,” Sargent said in a telephone interview Tuesday. “If it was two months after, yeah, there would be some concern It’s been over a year and [Barille] is back now as a consultant to a private citizen in front of the county.”
Time and time again Summit County officials have stressed the importance of developing more work force housing on the West Side of Summit County, because home prices in the Park City area are not affordable.
But the public needs more opportunities to speak out about the Stone Ridge proposal, Sargent said.
The Dec. 8 public input session at the Sheldon Richins Building was a “full house,” he said.
“My sense is, all of the public that were there, did not have the opportunity to speak because of the time constraints,” Sargent added. “The Planning Commission, at this point, is very interested in receiving as much input as they can on this application given its complexity.”
The project’s size may need to be reduced, he said.
“It may not work. There may need to be a reduction, and density may need to be reconsidered,” Sargent said.
The neighborhood would sit near the edge of the Swaner EcoCenter where the Planning Commission has struggled to determine whether it is compatible.
“Those opposed, are mostly opposed to the number of units or lots, traffic impacts and the compatibility to existing neighborhoods,” Sargent said. “It comes down to how it’s designed and how it fits into the fabric of the community and the terrain.”