And the 2026 Myles Rademan Spirit of Hospitality Award goes to … Randy Barton!

Barton, best known as manager of the Egyptian Theatre, was honored with the Park City Chamber/Bureau’s annual award at its meeting last week. In Barton’s words, however, it’s a “recognition,” not an award.

“I don’t accept on behalf of myself, but on behalf of all the folks who love arts and culture,” Barton said.

He added that he appreciated that the award was not competitive in what can be a very competitive town.

Since moving to Park City in 1975, Barton founded the iconic late-night fast food chain Sconecutter, organized a cow ballet, hosted a drive-time radio show, saved the Egyptian Theatre from financial ruin and, most recently, was seen riding a camel through Main Street at the Miners Day parade.

“I was always involved with the Egyptian Theatre from the day that it was renamed the Egyptian in 1981,” Barton said. “I was never in charge but always there.” 

As a member of the Park City Players, Barton was involved at the theater as an actor and worked concessions at the Sundance Film Festival. 

Over the next few decades, Barton’s involvement around town ranged from television to concert promotion to radio. His TV show, “Park City Faces,” spotlighted the people and personality of Park City every weeknight live for nearly a decade. 

“It was really fun to do that show during the Olympics,” Barton said. 

For two weeks, the program filmed from Main Street instead of the usual studio, and Barton interviewed a horse. 

“I just love that we hosted the world,” Barton said, “and speaking of hospitality, we did such a marvelous job of it.”

After a stint on television, Barton moved to radio.

KPCW ran “The Local View” for four hours a day, five days a week for 20 years. During his time on the radio, Barton was known to make what he called “outlandish” statements. Outlandish, maybe. Radiantly positive, definitely. 

Barton said he would advise people to get out and learn to drive in the snow instead of being afraid of storms. During traffic jams, he’d tell listeners to embrace it, relax and enjoy the music. 

Barton was organizing a concert series in Salt Lake City in the ’90s and wanted to bring the same energy to Park City. In 1997, he started Mountain Town Stages. That evolved into Mountain Town Music, which programs, produces and fosters live music performances in the area. 

“Radio, theater, television, all kinds of at the same time as doing music and concerts. That was kind of my deal,” Barton said.

In 2009, Barton added “Saved the Egyptian Theatre” to his resume. 

“Everybody tells me, you know, ‘You saved the theater. Without you, it wouldn’t be there,’” Barton recalled. “I say, ‘Yeah, but I’m one of many, going all the way back to the 1800s, of people that would rise up and save the theater.’”

As Barton tells it, in the spring of 2009, the theater had closed and canceled all productions because it was out of money. The board of directors had in mind a schedule full of community theater programming, but Barton had a different vision. 

“I told them that was a bad decision for the community and (to) give me 90 days to show you what it should be,” he said. 

Barton luckily negotiated a contract at the beginning of the 90 days; the board tried to fire him three times during that period.

By the end of the three months, Barton had built a model of the theatre that still stands today.

“That is, something on stage every week, building a Pharaoh Club for the support of the theater and making the Egyptian the centerpiece of social life in Park City and a real gathering place,” he said. 

As Barton accepted his recognition, he proudly described the theater as “historic, authentic, intimate, genuine, social and, because of me, slightly irreverent.”

There are many opinions about what makes Park City unique. Is it the skiing, the history, the proximity to Main Street or the culture?

“(Arts and culture) has always been a part of Park City from the very beginning, and it is always what makes Park City a real town,” Barton said. “People talk about going to other ski areas, and what they love about Park City is it is real because of the dining, the arts, the culture, the history.”

If it were up to Barton, Park City would market itself as a “stationary cruise ship.”

“We have all the things that you would go on a cruise for: entertainment, shows, great food,” he said. “Base (the city) on that model. If somebody’s here, they’re going to be entertained.”

Barton is quick to share business strategies, and as a father of three, he’s well-versed in giving life advice.

“You know, I tell my kids and others, be careful with what you decide to do because you just might end up doing that and nothing else for the rest of your life,” Barton said. “I’ve done more than the arts. I’ve done business and I’m a runner. I’m a golfer. I have great joys. Best is being a parent, always.”

He enjoys what he calls “goof-off golfing,” a discipline of the sport where points aren’t counted and improvement isn’t the goal. Unlike his openness toward business matters, his favorite golf course is top secret.

Barton was recognized with a hospitality award, so why all the talk of entertaining? Entertainment and hospitality are one and the same, he said. Barton was born in Hollywood, after all.

“When you say that you’re entertaining tonight, that doesn’t have to mean that you’re dancing or on stage with a mic,” Barton said. “(When) you’re entertaining people, you’re bringing them into your home and showing them a nice time. Hosting is the same thing.”

According to Barton, entertaining and hosting go hand in hand with kindness and openness. 

“The divisiveness of the world is based on a lack of hospitality and ‘I will welcome anybody’ attitude,” he said.

As he accepted the Chamber/Bureau’s recognition, Barton reminisced about the days when he was new in town and faced with the common question: “So, how long have you been here?”

Barton said he feels like he’s on the other side of that question after 50 years in Park City. 

“People want you to talk about what makes you mad or upset, what you hate about the town,” he said. “But I love this town more every year.”

The post Perspectives on hospitality and entertainment from Randy Barton appeared first on Park Record.

J.R. Smith Elementary School teacher Brandi Leavitt’s fifth-graders were abuzz with baffled excitement as a procession of mysterious adults, one holding a large cardboard check, marched into the classroom on Friday morning, interrupting a lesson by school counselor Kristi Davis about self-motivation.

“Is it a family reunion?” one student asked.

“It’s your birthday? Happy birthday!” shouted another.

Dispelling the confusion, Principal Alex Judd explained that Davis won the 2026 School Counselor Impact Award. The honor was bestowed by the Wasatch Education Foundation, the nonprofit supporting the Wasatch County School District through scholarships, faculty awards and food security programs like the high school’s food pantry. 

The award is a belated celebration of National School Counseling Week, which is recognized in early February. An anonymous donor with the Wasatch Education Foundation began awarding $1,000 annually to a school counselor in 2025 to ensure counselors knew their value.

Judd described Davis as committed to her position, always willing to stay late to ensure students are mentally, physically and emotionally ready to learn. 

“When kids have struggles, she will reach out to parents and engage in really crucial conversations in such a positive way. And even when parents push back sometimes and are maybe concerned or frustrated, she stays with them to support them and make sure that they’re taken care of,” he said. 

Wasatch County School District Business Administrator Jason Watt, who is a former school counselor, asked Leavitt’s class how many had been able to visit Davis’ office for one-on-one conversations. Most of the students raised their hands.

“What do you feel like when you leave her office?” Watt asked.

“More confident,” one student chimed in.

Superintendent Garrick Peterson said he loved that comment because building confidence is key to getting back up again and learning from the series of “little failures” that make up life.

But Davis’ work doesn’t only center around students who are struggling. She’s also required to train teachers and implement school-wide systems to ensure all students are well-rounded.

“How do you stay in the moment and work through things? How do you resolve conflict? How do you be a leader? How do you stay motivated when you don’t want to?” Judd said. “Those are the skills that aren’t necessarily assessed, per se, on the academic side of it, but are good indicators of whether kids are going to be able to have skills longer and beyond the classroom.”

Davis’ family members said her counseling instinct has always been there. As an older sister to four brothers, Davis was always the peacemaker amid the roughhousing. She helped one of her brothers learn how to read. Her mother, Robin Knight, described her as “a better mom than I was.” 

These days, Davis’ own children are the guinea pigs for the lessons she teaches at J.R. Smith Elementary School. Her counseling instincts bleed through in parenting, too.

“She’s a really good listener. Every time I have a problem, I tell her about it, and she always solves it,” said her 13-year-old daughter, Kinzi.

Davis never thought she would work at an elementary school like her mother, a former teacher, did.

She was resistant to all the “sing(ing) silly songs” involved in making lessons accessible to young students, but she’s grown to love it these days. She’ll happily teach anyone methods like “Darth Vader breathing” — pushing out negative feelings in a heavy exhale.

Davis joked that she’ll probably spend the $1,000 award on Lifesavers, which she uses during mindfulness exercises to help students focus on their five senses. 

Davis joined J.R. Smith Elementary School nine years ago. Her previous employer was Independence High School in Provo, which she described as “at risk.”

“At the alternative school where I taught, it was just sad. I was just like, ‘Where was someone when you were young who could have helped you?’” she said. “My favorite part of being here is more prevention and helping them get skills now.”

Peterson echoed that sentiment.

“People like this don’t just make our school better,” he said. “They make our entire society better over time.”

The post Kristi Davis is Wasatch County School District’s counselor of the year appeared first on Park Record.

Park City was still finding its feet in the summer of 1985 when Sally Cousins Elliott’s daughter took a tumble biking home from day camp near the underpass on Deer Valley Drive. Ramshackle buildings lined Main Street, every other door boarded up.

Sally was away from home at the time with her husband, Torch, building cabinets for their new kitchen in the shop room at Hill Air Force Base when the news came in. Eight-year-old Cat needed stitches, 10-year-old (future) Dr. Libby declared. A trained professional was inclined to agree, though there was no promise that the kids could pay up.

As a thank you, Sally wrote letters to the doctor and day camp director saying she would do anything to repay their kindness and trust. That gesture led to a call asking her to join the city’s parks and recreation advisory board — forging the start of a 40-year commitment to the Park City community.

This week, the Park City Chamber/Bureau honored Sally for her contributions with the Myles Rademan Spirit of Hospitality Award during its annual meeting at Pendry Park City.

The honor is bestowed upon residents who embody the vision of Park City and aspire to make the community a better, more inclusive place. It’s named after Rademan, who served as a city planning director in the late ’80s and is the brain behind City Hall’s leadership program. 

“What started as a kind of mentorship quickly turned into a partnership,” he said during the award ceremony on Wednesday. “So many of the amenities that we take for granted in our town have her fingerprints all over them.”

It wasn’t intentional on Sally’s part. She just wanted to help bring people together. After all, she knows how to work a room, and she hates being bored.

Sally skipped her senior year of high school in Muskogee, Oklahoma, to study sociology at the University of Oklahoma. She met Torch there in 1961, becoming best friends and eventually sweethearts before he departed with the Army for Vietnam.

The couple married in 1967 when Torch returned, spending the next 20 years traveling the world for his military career. They spent two years in Korea, a stint in Alaska and some time in Texas before Torch decided to retire from the military and attend graduate school. But it was up to Sally to decide where.

Snow was the only thing Sally cared about. Skiing was an Elliott family passion with all three children, including son Chip who was attending West Point and competing on racing teams. Initially, they only planned to stay until Torch completed his PhD. But two months in, after that first Miners Day parade, they were hooked.

“We sat down with a drink and looked at each other like ‘Why the hell would we ever leave a place like this?’ and we decided OK, we’re staying,” she said sitting on the back porch of her Prospector home. The Elliotts purchased it for $95,000 two years after they moved to Park City. “When you’ve lived all over the world, you pretty much know a good place.”

Sally said the family came at the right time. Only a couple thousand people were living in the city then, and everyone knew everyone. 

It didn’t take long for Sally to become a standout figure with her magnetic energy, firecracker spirit, fierce determination and sharp wit. Her unvarnished honesty and unexpectedly colored vocabulary added to the charm, too.

Sally also dove headfirst into challenges despite not always having experience and never shied away from asking questions. As an Army wife, she always liked to research the history of the new places her family was living in to help them connect to their new home, so she did the same thing in Park City.

Parkites took Sally for tours around town, and eventually her work on the parks and recreation board led her to become connected with City Hall staff such as Rademan, former City Manager Toby Ross and former Park City Mayor Brad Olch.

Her inaugural task was to help “green” Park City. 

“This is an old community. We can’t talk about firsts, right? Because things have happened, and then they’ve fallen by the wayside, and then they’re rehabbed,” Sally said.

She was in charge of collecting donations to benefit the cemetery, though she confessed she had no idea what she was doing. Sally found discounted lilac shrubs for sale through the Lone Peak correctional facility and purchased 50. Olch contributed a portion of wedding officiant fees to the mayor’s tree fund, which helped beautify the lawn.

Sally went on to become chair of the parks and recreation board and started the city’s garden club. Yet she felt like there was still work to be done, particularly at the south end of City Park.

“I decided if nobody else was going to clean it up … I better run for office and make sure it happens,” Sally said. 

So, she did. Voters elected her to the Park City Council, and Sally served from 1990 to 1994. During that time, she said she “didn’t get one damn thing done.” Others, however, might disagree.

Park City Municipal purchased the McPolin Osguthorpe farm the year Sally took office, to ensure the open space was permanently preserved. The City Council also started a committee to tackle land issues, which later broke off to become Utah Open Lands.

Two years later, Sally was a part of negotiations to create what is now the Historic Union Pacific Rail Trail. She employed “40 fabulous felons” who worked alongside her from April to October.

At the end of her term, Sally decided to forgo reelection in favor of running for the Utah Legislature. As a woman and a Democrat in the mid-1990s, it didn’t work.

Instead, Sally started a destination management company that she ran for 10 years called Utah Escapades. However, she was called to service again in 2004.

Summit County operated under a three-person commission style of government in which elected officials held both the executive and legislative power. Former Commissioner Shauna Kerr, the first woman elected to the panel, planned to retire, and Sally felt like there needed to be someone to represent trails and open space.

Voters elected Sally to represent them. She served with former Commissioners Bob Richer and Ken Woolstenhulme until Summit County Proposition 1 was approved in November 2006, creating a five-member council and county manager position. Sally served another term as a county councilor in 2008 to help with the transition and share institutional knowledge. 

The county mostly dealt with infrastructure issues such as the landfill and recycling center. Otherwise, the most pressing issues then were mostly the same as they are today. 

Sally is most proud of her work on trails, open space and affordable housing. Her biggest regret is that she was never able to see stronger preservation ordinances approved in the county code.

She’s also been instrumental in historical preservation efforts across Utah. Sally has served on numerous boards over the years, including the Utah Quality Growth Commission, the Utah Heritage Foundation, the Park City Chamber/Bureau, Mountain Trails Foundation, Utah Women’s Political Caucus, Park City Historical Society and Recycle Utah.

Whenever there’s a problem in Park City, Sally said somebody rises to take charge. For her, that often occurs in the kitchen. 

She learned to help her mother entertain guests when she was a preteen, collecting recipes from McConnell’s magazine and Better Homes and Gardens. She’s since become an expert in “Scotch whisky diplomacy,” though she isn’t afraid to break out her secret weapons: soup and lots of bacon.

That’s how the Friends of Ski Mountain Mining History, her most recent passion project, formed, as it turns out.

“If you’re sitting at somebody’s dinner table, the fact that there are four different opinions at the table and pretty much two sides to everything, you can sort of get a pickle off the tray and put it in your mouth and suck on it for a minute,” Sally explained. “People are much more willing to share if they’re sitting in a home.”

And to Sally, that’s exactly what hospitality is. It means bringing people together, taking care of one another and everyone pitching in for the common good. It’s sharing the same warm welcome she received when she moved to Park City with newcomers as well as passing on, and preserving, the good things the community has to offer.

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