City approves zoning change

At last week’s regular meeting, the Sundance City Council hosted a public hearing for the rezoning of a portion of land belonging to Jay Pixley.

No comments were provided from members of the audience during the hearing, prompting the council to approve the request. The rezone will be of 43.13 acres from industrial to highway business.

Council Member Callie Hilty explained that the request has been made to make the land more congruent with the buildings Pixley would like to see on his land. The change, she said, would facilitate more shop-type construction on the land in the future, similar to the buildings that are already there.

Theresa Benevidez approached the council after the hearing to address the public notices published by the council, which she said can sometimes be a little “generic”. Mayor Paul Brooks questioned her motives in approaching the council, and whether she was accusing the body of wrongdoing.

Benevidez explained that she had researched the cost of advertising and found that ads of the same size will all cost the same amount no matter how much wording is contained within them. She asked the council to consider putting a little more information in their notices about what such things as the Pixley zoning hearing are all about.

Mark Hughes of the Land Use Planning and Development Committee approached the council to report that several residences in town have recently been placing industrial-type equipment in their yards. Brooks assured him that there will be no need to explore ways to prevent this from occurring, as it is already prohibited in two city ordinances: the nuisance ordinance, and the zoning ordinance.

Brooks asked Hughes to compile a list of residences in which this has been observed to be happening so that he can reach out to them, which he said he would prefer to do before the city sends them a letter regarding these actions.

In departmental reports, Sheriff Jeff Hodge stated that Rally week was “pretty uneventful”, while Public Works Director Mac Erickson reported that projects are now being wrapped up for the summer, including fencing at the Sundance Kid water tank. The new tank is online and functioning well, he said.

Grant applications have been submitted for several projects eligible for American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding, Erickson continued, expressing hope that some will score highly enough to move forward in the highly competitive process – particularly a project to fix a serious leak in the waterline along 3rd Street.

Karla Greaser of Trihydro spoke to the same topics, describing the Sundance Kid tank as “up and installed, levels adjusted and operating well.” She presented a change order to extend the contract date for Trihydro to allow time to complete the necessary report for the Abandoned Mine Lands funding contract and said a final financial change order would be coming next month to reconcile the quantities actually used in the installation.

Regarding the ARPA applications, Greaser said, “Fingers crossed as we wait to hear”. Brooks responded that he, too, is particularly hopeful about the 3rd Street project as it would “stabilize our water system”.

Fire Chief Gari Gill announced that the department has applied for a 100% grant to replace radios and expects the rules to be released this week for the type of ARPA grants that he hopes to apply for in order to expand the fire hall. As soon as those are released, he said, the plan is to submit an application.

Gill also briefly spoke to the Fish Fire, and the overall success of the battle to contain it.

“Nobody got hurt, no houses were lost, but it was an expensive fire,” he said.