The Summit County Council is offering a Browns Canyon recycling facility accused of operating as an open-air landfill a chance to fix its alleged violations to prevent shuttering the business.
The Eastern Summit County Planning Commission granted, and later revoked, the property’s conditional use permits to operate the 44-acre parcel as a tree farm and recycling facility, known to the community as Spoil to Soil. County staff at the time of the revocation hearing submitted a 55-page report to commissioners that detailed dozens of perceived violations.
For example, the conditional use permit prohibited anyone from dumping, delivering or storing snow on the land. But commissioners saw a photo of a truck supposedly delivering snow to the property as recently as March.
The property was also pitched as a tree farm, but county planner Amir Caus said no trees have been planted, and investigators reportedly found trash and fecal matter on areas of the site designated for tree growth. Caus additionally pointed to issues involving unauthorized burns that spurred emergency responses from the South Summit Fire Protection District, as well as the facility’s encroachment on a neighboring property’s land.
The Planning Commission in August unanimously voted to revoke the conditional use permits, but the landowners filed an appeal within their allowed 10-day window, causing the case to come before the County Council on Wednesday for review.
Jared Clayton, who owns the property with his wife, Kristen, told the County Council that they believed county staff hadn’t given them enough time to address any potential violations before proceeding with the revocation hearing.
Kyle Reeder, an attorney representing the Claytons, specifically argued that the couple wasn’t intentionally defying county code or attempting to skirt the provisions outlined in the property’s conditional use permits. Instead, he said they were unaware of the alleged violations until shortly before the revocation process started and were not given adequate information regarding county staff’s concerns.
If they’d had more details, he said, they would have worked with the county to bring the facility up to code.
Meanwhile, Deputy County Attorney Helen Strachan said staff complied with county and state code by telling Kristen Clayton with “reasonable” notice of the upcoming hearing. She pointed to an email alerting the Claytons to the revocation proceedings on Aug. 1, approximately three weeks before the hearing on Aug. 21.
“To suggest that there was no communication is just completely wrong,” Strachan said. “Code enforcement was out there on pretty much a weekly basis for almost the last two years. Perhaps those communications weren’t specifically with the landowners, but they were with the operators. … The Planning Commission really charged the appellants, the landowners, with the fact that it’s their property, and they, as landowners, were also under a duty, as the landowners and the ones with the (conditional use permit), to be aware of what was happening on their property.”
Caus echoed Strachan’s sentiments multiple times throughout his presentation to the County Council and also pointed out the number of county resources involved in the investigation.
“The amount of staff hours that have been invested in this property and enforcement on this property and monitoring this property, it’s hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours,” he said. “It’s disproportionate. It’s not fair to the residents of Summit County. We’re there to serve the entire county, not just focus on one property.”
County councilors appeared to agree with staff regarding the seriousness of the violations, with Megan McKenna and Canice Harte calling the facility’s operations “disappointing.”
However, the County Council ultimately offered the property owners the chance to rectify the alleged issues after a 45-minute discussion in closed session. Staff were directed to provide a full list of violations for councilors to review, after which the County Council will decide appropriate “cure” periods, or a deadline for the property owners to fix the problems.
If the Claytons can adhere to the County Council’s directions and comply with the “cure” period, then councilors are poised to reinstate the conditional use permits. If the issues aren’t fixed, though, they seemingly plan on upholding the Planning Commission’s decision.
The Claytons’ appeal will be considered again in mid-October.