County Council - Regular Meeting

Welcome everyone. Thank you for coming out. Today is June 30th, 2026. It's 530 p.m. We are located at the county building on the third floor in the council chambers. We appreciate everyone being here. We'll be led and pledge allegiance by Nikki Rush from the clerk's office. We all please stand.

of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, Nikki.

As far as roll call, we have our county attorney, Scott Brighthead, present. We have as far as Councilman, Councilman Hoffman, Councilman Thomas, Councilman Stromberg, Councilman Hamner, and Councilman Wardle. From the Manager's Office, we have our County Manager, Andy Welch, Assistant County Manager, Brittany Lopez, present. From the Clerk's Office, taking copious notes, we have Nikki. We just had us lead our pledge. That will bring us down to public comment in the audience. By the raise of hand, is there anyone that would like to make a public comment? Seeing none. Oh, one. Seeing one. Go ahead, come on up. Would you state your name and where you're from, and will you make sure that that Hit that button so that turns green. There you go. Thank you.

Hi, I'm Jake MacArthur. I'm one of the applicants for the rezone that got tabled May 19th, I believe it was. First of all, I just wanted to thank the planning and zoning staff, Rochelle, Millie, Tonya, and Stephanie. They put a lot of work into this. and uh this has been a long kind of drawn out thing we're hoping to come to a resolution but i just wanted to mostly say thanks to these guys and it's been a long road so thanks to them and hopefully we can come to the resolution i can build a home out there so thank you guys

Appreciate it. That will bring us down to minutes for the June 2nd, 2026 business meeting. Is there any corrections or additions to the minutes that we received? If not, chair, entertain a motion.

I make the motion we approve the minutes.

I hear a motion from Councilman Stromberg. Is there a second?

Second.

Hearing a second from Councilman Thomas, all those in favor of approving June 2nd, 2026 minutes, say aye. Aye. All those that may oppose, say nay. That is adopted. That will bring us down to contract, contract, excuse me, contract for the Sage Construction. I'll bring up our director, Jed Bell.

Good evening, Council. This is a contract that we put out to public solicitation on the state procurement website. It was on out for solicitation for three weeks. We did receive four bids. We then graded those four bids and came up with Sage Construction as the most responsible offer that we received. I believe it was also the lowest bid that we received. And this is a contract for the Ibupa well house, which is to provide a housing structure, some fence, a couple water tanks, and culinary service out in Ibupa to pair with phase one, which was the well that was drilled earlier this year. The price came in on budget of what we expected and it's under the budget that was approved for the project. As you guys might recall, this was a Bureau of Reclamation grant that we received. It's called the Water Smart Grant back in May of 2024. My recommendation would be that we award the contract to Sage Construction.

Okay. Is there any questions or comments to Jed?

One clarification. This isn't their primary water system. This is a backup for the individuals out there. Is that correct?

Correct. It will serve as a backup water supply in case any of the wells go down. They can come and pull water from it. It will also serve as uh water that we can use for construction and maintenance activity that we have out in iupa as well as two five thousand gallon tanks that a fire department can draw from to work on any kind of fire that they have out there currently we don't have a county supplied water system so that's why we put in for it okay any other questions or comments

Not chair to entertain a motion.

Mr. Chairman, I make a motion we approve the contract for Sage Construction for the construction of the Iva Paul Well House. Second.

Hearing. Motion from Councilman Thomas. Second from Councilman Wardle. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those who may oppose say nay. That is adopted. Thank you, Jed.

Thank you. You guys have a good evening.

Will do. Contract list out. Partial jail emulation. Jason?

Good evening, Council. Before you this evening, we have a contract with Stout Building Contractors. It is a contract to tear down a partial demolition of the old jail as well as rebuild of the part we're leaving up. We put it out for bid on the state website. We received nine bids. Those were all scored. And Stout came out on top as far as any of the scoring goes. So we would like to award the contract to Stout for the partial demolition of the old jail.

And just one clarification as well is, as you recall, the state will be providing a check for, I think, $1.5 million this year and then some more money next year as they're buying the property that the courthouse is on. And so we kind of have the funding source to help tear it down, which is a requirement of the state to redo their sally port.

Yes, this is for the state. The total bid on this, I don't believe I told you, was $472,272, which was not the lowest bid. The lowest bid didn't meet all the requirements. These guys did score the highest out of any of them.

When's the demolition going to start? It'll start the first week of August.

Any other comments or questions or

At the disposal, is they going to pay to dump it out of our landfill?

They get to decide where to take that.

That's on them.

Okay. If no more comments, chair, entertain a motion.

So moved.

Hear a motion from Councilman Hoffman. Is there a second?

Second.

Hear a second from Councilman Stromberg on the contract with Stout for the partial jail demolition. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

All those may oppose, say nay. That is adopted.

Thank you. I appreciate you.

Thank you, Jason. That brings us down to the 2026-2027 grant agreement, state of Utah. Scott Broadhead.

Counsel, this is the... Is your mic on? Just to make sure. I think so. Thank you. Counsel, this is the annual grant agreement with the Indigent Defense Commission that helps partially fund our public defender program. It is the exact same contract terms for the exact same amount as the last, I think, two years now. So I don't know if there's anything else to comment about.

Any other questions or comments from the council or from the manager's office? If not, chair, entertain a motion.

So moved.

Hearing a motion from Councilman Stromberg, is there a second? Second. Hearing a second from Councilman Wardle, all those in favor say aye. Aye. All those may oppose say nay. Sounds unanimous. That is adopted. Thank you, Scott. That will bring us down to the State of Utah contract. Court Security Services, Paul Wimmer. Doesn't appear he is here.

Nate, can you fill in? I think you did review that.

Yes, I'm happy to step in. So one of the things that we get from the site, Quite a substantial amount of money as we get money from the state for the services that are our deputies Provide over at the courthouse as bailiffs. And so this contract I believe I don't have it in front of me. It was I believe three hundred three hundred fifty thousand ish And so we just wanted you to know that we are getting this money The state doesn't actually have to give us any money That was one thing that share former and I talked about and they kind of do it out of the out Kindness of their heart if we can say that but they do help subsidize those bailiff services if they Decided that there wasn't any funding the code still says that we have to provide bailiff services And so the sheriff would still be footing that bill, but at least we get some money Okay, there we go so wonderful is there any questions or comments from the

Okay.

Chair, do you entertain a motion?

So moved.

I hear a motion from Councilman Hoffman. Is there a second? Second. I hear a second from Councilman Stromberg. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those who may oppose, say nay. That sounds unanimous, and that is adopted. Thank you. Nate jumped in. That will bring us down to contract with strong for the peak phase for construction Thank You Corey.

Yeah, good evening This is for phase four of the master plan for the peak sports entertainment complex The next two are for or for this the first one We sent this out to bid in two packages. The first package is basically earthwork, utility work, a lot of underground stuff. So for the next little while, you'll see a lot of dirt, tons of dirt, literally tons of dirt moving. But you won't see a lot of structures coming up. So the first one was awarded to Strong Excavation after we received four bids. They were the lowest bidder for $7,291,751. So we'd like to enter it into a contract for them to do mid-package one on phase four.

Any questions or comments from the council? If not, from the manager's office.

No? Oh. No. Andy, if you have a comment, I was going to make a motion. Mr. Chairman, I make a motion we adopt the contract.

Hearing a motion, Councilman Wardle, is there a second?

Second.

Hear a second from Councilman Thomas. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those who may oppose, say nay. That is adopted. Thank you, Corey.

Do you want me to do F?

Go ahead.

Keep going. So F is the second part of that bid package. It's actually what you'll see above the ground. Just so you understand, you guys were gracious enough to fund the entire project. So we'll have four new projects. natural turf fields, full-size athletic fields, multi-use athletic fields, four synthetic full-size athletic fields, new horse stalls, an RV park, parking lot, and parking lots, restroom building and shower building to help with those fields that are there. BHI won that contract. There were three bids that came in on that. BHI was the lowest bid for $12,201,157. So we're asking to enter into a contract for bid package two on phase four.

So the first one's underground, first one's above, second one's above ground. Any questions or comments from the council?

Can I just make a comment? Go ahead.

I'm just going to say it. I brought it up lots of times, but I'm going to do it one more time here. As we put in those synthetic fields, we just want to make sure we think about the fireworks. Right.

Right behind the rodeo arena is the RV park and the parking lot, which is the perfect spot.

I'm just bringing it up one more time. We've talked lots. I know you're thinking about it, but it's on my mind along with everything else fireworks related right now. You've got fireman DNA in you. I do. I just don't want to put this down, and then we light fireworks, and we watch it disappear. Okay.

No fireworks and no campers on the synthetic fields. Just so that you're aware, we had a contract with MOCA who's been helping us through this whole process. I think it's been invaluable for them to look at this, kind of work through everything up front. And so I think they've been working with our architect. And they'll be working with these two companies to make sure that they stay on time. And so we're very pleased with that. One of the things that you'll see, just as you recall, when we initially started the PEAK project, we had enough, we think we had enough funding to do everything and then the pool fell apart. And we kind of at that point had to take some of the money that we had allocated, but we wanted to make sure we finished the project. And so this past year we allocated $14 million to Phase four, we spent a little bit finishing up the other phases, I think about $300,000-ish. And so we know with the price tag with these two contracts, we'll probably in next year's budget have to allocate about eight, eight and a half million dollars to complete the project. But because of the money that we had to spend on the pool, which I think was $14, $15 million. We hadn't anticipated that when we started, but we'll be taking that from, as you recall, last year in the budget, we moved about $18 million from the fund balance into capital projects. So as we go into budget this year, we'll be taking some of that money, probably. That would be a recommendation to help pay off the rest of this. But we won't need it until next year, timing-wise, and so we'll have to make sure we budget for that going into next year's budget.

Wonderful. Thank you. Any other questions or comments? If not, chair, entertain a motion.

Make a motion we adopt the contract.

Hear a motion from Councilman Wardle to adopt a contract with BH Inc. Is there a second?

Second.

Hear a second from Councilman Stromberg. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

All those who may oppose, say nay. That is adopted. Thank you. Now bring us up to number seven, resolution and ordinances, resolution

2026 dash one nine amending increasing the 2026 Tooele accounting budget our auditor Allison Coyne Council had three budget adjustments for you tonight first one is from the attorney's office This will be for additional funds for the u.s. Magnesium Bankruptcy and other anticipated matters throughout the year and this will be for a hundred thousand dollars and the next one that we have is for Parks and Recreation this is for sixty eight thousand dollars for a loader that needs some repairs and And then the last one that we have is for some grant funding that was received by the EOC. This is for a BLM community assistance grant for $200,000. Thank you.

Is there any comments or questions?

Just so we can put it on the record, how much is the loader?

I'm not sure exactly how much the loader is in total. So the repair is $68,000. The loader or the repair to the loader?

Whatever we're adjusting.

The repair is $68,000.

Yep. No other questions? Chair, to entertain a motion, go into public hearing.

So moved. Second.

Hearing a motion from Councilman Thomas, a second from Councilman Stromberg, going to public hearing on Resolution 2026-19. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those who may oppose, say nay. We are now in public hearing for Resolution 2026-20. Excuse me, 19, amending increasing the 2026 Tooele County budget. Is there anybody by the raise of hand in the audience that would like to speak on that specifically? Seeing none, chair to entertain a motion to close public hearing.

So moved.

Second. Hearing a motion from Councilman Stromberg to close public hearing, and a second from Councilman Wardle, all those in favor of closing public hearing on Resolution 2026-19. Say aye.

Aye.

All those who may oppose, say nay. Public hearing is now closed. If there's no other comments, Chair, entertain a motion on Resolution 2026-19. So moved. Hearing a motion from Councilman Thomas for approval of the Resolution 2026-19, is there a second?

Second.

Hearing a second from Councilman Stromberg, All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those who may oppose, say nay. Resolution 2026-19 is adopted. Thank you. That will bring us down to Resolution 2026-20, declaration by the Tooele County Council declaring that an emergency drought exists in Tooele County. Bucky Whitehouse.

Yeah, good evening, Council. Appreciate it. Again, Bucky Whitehouse, Emergency Services for Tooele County. I've got just a couple of quick slides tonight to kind of punctuate the point that the declaration is making. At the present time, as you can see on the first slide, Tooele County, 80% of Tooele County is in what we call an extreme drought. meaning that obviously we were less than 25% of our normal precipitation throughout the course of the year, and it's really created some challenging circumstances for us. Next slide. Next slide just shows kind of as a larger demonstration where we fit and the county fits in terms of what it means to be in an extreme drought. For all intents and purposes, over the course of the last month, we've received or not nearly received the amount of moisture we need, and it's just caused our drought status to escalate overall. Next slide. This is a heat map, and everybody's probably really familiar with this after the last couple of days. Right now, Tula County, for a 30-day profile, we are at 25% of the normal precipitation level, as well as being 5 degrees above normal. So what that means is our vegetation is degrading at a faster rate than we might normally expect. When the vegetation degrades so rapidly, it puts us at enhanced risk for wildfire, as I know everyone in the council and probably in this room is aware. Next slide. Just gives you kind of an idea of where we sit with our water coming through the irrigation channels. Settlement Canyon is currently at 61%, which is 19% below the median for this time of the year. Grantsville is currently at 67%, which is 17% below the median. And what that technically means is both of these reservoirs, which provides the majority of the irrigation water for the valley, are already in a drawdown status. And normally they're still filling at this point in time, believe it or not, around the June timeline. So, what we expect to see with this is a faster than normal reduction in their levels for the remainder of the year. Next slide. This is from Willow Creek stream gauge. As you are probably aware, we do monitor the amount of moisture that we see or the water levels that we see coming down through the creeks. This is the lowest flow on record for this date that we have seen in quite a significant period of time. And so it's really startling to us to see where we sit in comparison. And the last slide. This is from the NRCS, data from the NRCS. You probably remember we had quite an interesting rainstorm that hit us last October. During that one rainstorm, we received what was known as a 1 in 500 year storm or a 1 in 100 year storm, which means we got over 300% of our normal rainfall for that time. Earlier this year, our moisture level in the ground at the 20-inch mark was over 200%, and it has obviously reduced significantly. Our current values are between the lowest 10th and 25th percentile for this date after hitting that extreme high. And so everything has just obviously been lost to evaporation or been used by the vegetation that is currently out in the environment right now, which just makes this an extreme risk. for fires as well as it decreases our ability to be able to deal with different aspects of the environment, as an example. I know you're all aware of the fact that the Cherry Fire is still something that we're dealing with. We are currently at around 34,000 acres with the Cherry Fire, which currently we're very happy to say is about 69% contained. However, with the Vernon range, we were less than 25% of its normal precipitation. We had a challenge with the grazing lands and the vegetation growth out there. We add the effects of the fire on top of what we had experienced with the drought in the first place. And it really puts us in even a tougher situation right now for our cattle and any of the ranchers and livestock in the area. So the accumulation of all of these factors has kind of is the impetus behind us asking for the drought declaration this year. What does a drought declaration do? It allows us to move and be able to handle the effects of the drought, both at the governmental level. It calls for the decreased amount of use in water when it's possible. One of the biggest things it does is allows businesses and property owners to apply for small business administration grants and loans to be able to handle the effects of the drought more easily. So anyway, this would put a drought declaration in effect until we see that we're coming out of that. I will tell you, we have an additional challenge with this with The monsoonal flows appear that they're going to hit us in the August timeframe. The challenge we have is when the soil is this dry, it will not absorb like we like it to, and it will flow, meaning that it's not going to be efficient in a way for us to recharge these areas. And so all of these accumulations really create this challenge for us right now. Any questions?

Any questions, comments? You mentioned livestock. Were there any livestock lost in the Cherry Fire? Yes.

We're going through an assessment right now trying to figure out what that number looks like. We do know that we have lost livestock during the fire. We are meeting with the owners in the area right now, along with the Department of Ag and others. In fact, they have just today scheduled a meeting any of the livestock owners in, I believe it's in Santa, or Goshen, actually it's Goshen, on July 9th at 6 p.m. for any of those cattle owners to be able to attend a meeting to determine what we can do with the rangelands. We were on a call earlier today with the governor's office and several other entities that are actually working with areas in southern Utah that currently have range space available for any of these cattle owners to be able to potentially move their cattle down there for the summer activities. Right now, we do know that they're concerned that they're already using their fall and winter feed to take care of their animals. And then we are seeing a water challenge with them being able to supply water for them in certain areas of that range as well.

By doing this, will this help speed up the process for them to get reimbursed by the fans and stuff?

Yeah, this will help from our perspective to speed up the process in helping them, but then also in just both our response to the fires that we've been dealing with and then any other aspect of what it means to be in a drought situation.

thanks for your work on this bucky yeah thank you yeah one other thing jared please went out to a community meeting out to vernon was it friday or saturday this latter yep and it was out of zoomed out of eureka believe and vernon elementary was picked up on it and on that zoom but lots of compliments to uh to bucky to sheriff wimmer uh recognized for their commitment and support and to the great teamwork and it's great to be recognized as a county for the good work that's happening.

So to you. I'll speak for him that just in the fact that we have tremendous staff and they all really did a great job for us, both our regular staff as well as our volunteer staff to help us deal with this event. And so from my perspective, I can't thank them enough. And they're just an incredible asset to Tooele County. was really good the community come out and there wasn't a whole lot of questions because they've done such a well job informing them along the way but not sure that you're aware but the fire incident management team assigned to the iron fire actually absorbed the cherry fire at the same time and last total we had four hundred and About 20 firefighters work in the Cherry Fire and 300 and something still on the Iron Fire. The reason for the reduction in the Iron Fire is about 95% contained now. So all of the activity and the attention was focused down to the Cherry Fire to deal with that. Thanks, Mike. Thank you.

Any other questions or comments? If not, Chair, entertain a motion. So moved. Hearing a motion from Councilman Hoffman, is there a second? Second. Hearing a second from Councilman Wardle. On Resolution 2026-20, declaration by Tooele County Council declaring state of emergency drought exists in Tooele County. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those who may oppose say nay. That resolution is adopted. That will bring us down to Ordinance 2026-04, rezoning land, Millie.

cute pups i have it on my screen but i don't know why it's not sharing oh there we go sorry i do apologize okay thank you councilman um for having me here today uh so um this ordinance would be to rezone the land um allocated uh east of rush valley Similar to when we previously tabled it, it's still Chris Thompson, the applicant, along with other property owners that are requesting this rezone. So since the tabling, we kind of went back and talked to the applicants, and the applicants did a revised request. And then we let them know that the planning staff was going to do a staff-recommended revision as well. So version A is the applicant's request that still does MU40 to A5, and then staff-recommended is MU40 to A10. And you can see here, this is the revised rezone boundaries for the applicant. And so still it would be to agricultural five acre minimum approvals would be site and parcel specific. When we shared the staff report with the applicant, they requested a revision. and that was to exclude parcel 06-056-0-0024 from their version A. This is the 7.15 acre parcel. By removing this parcel, the proposed rezone area for the applicant version A would bump up the properties from A5 to A10. So instead of getting potentially 105 acre you would get approximately 47 under the new 10 acre lot. With staff's version recommended, it's MU-42810. Staff recommends adding the following recommended parcels. Parcel 25-001-0-0002. This is a 40 acre parcel, so including it in the staff recommended would give you about four lots for that 10 acre possibility. And then parcel 06-056-0-0027 is a 33.16 acre parcel, which would give you about three lots under that 10 acre. Staff recommendation comes from advisory of the FEMA and state of Utah special flood hazard area. The parcels that are furthest to the west here, the one that's furthest to the west currently has a home. And this property went under extensive approval process to be able to put a home on there. If you go down to the site, the home is actually elevated, so compared to the surrounding area, it's kind of like up on, high on a, looks like a pedestal, but yeah, they were able to get all the necessary and required approvals to be able to get a building permit for that one. So similarly, the property to the east would need to go under the same, if not, depending on what's changed between then and now, would still require to get the same approvals similar to the parcel to the west. So before any permits could be issued, the property owners would, again, still need to go through the extensive agency approvals to be able to get a billing permit issued by the county. So together, this is the revised applicant and revised staff revisions. And so we ask... After the included applicant revisions, version A would request to rezone 12 parcels, which would be potentially 47 10-acre parcels, and version B would be bumping it from five to seven parcels, potentially creating 18 10-acre ones. And so we come here today to ask that the county council review the information contained in the staff report prior to making a decision. Thank you.

Questions or comments from the council?

Question.

Chair recognizes Councilman Thomas.

Thank you. On the home, the property that has the current home, they're going to be able to go ahead and get their current grade that they're looking for? on their permit as they make application to move forward with their new home.

So all of the properties that are contained in the staff recommended, the reason would allow them to enter the, start the subdivision process, which would rectify their noncompliance and thus be able to have them apply for building permits, whether that be for the parcels that don't already have a home, a home, a shed, a barn, any kind of permit that they would connect to power things like that, they would need first the rezone, then be able to correct their property lines so that they could then apply for the building permit.

Okay.

Thank you, Millie.

Any other comments or questions? That's under version B. Stack report, yes.

Stack report recommended. Not all that's appropriate, but is it okay to hear from the property owners that are affected and...

The applicant is here today, if you guys have any questions for him.

OK. We have another. Chair recognizes Councilman Wardle.

I know that this has been a process for you guys. And that's hard. Government sometimes is incredibly difficult to work with. And being in government, we recognize that. We thank you for your patience, though, to get this right. There are concerns about multiple concerns on multiple levels might have been satisfied The staff report and I don't know if you have you looked at the staff reports Do you see those said that the council should review these staff reports and the recommendations and and Millie you and and Rochelle your your crew has done an amazing job on that and Extremely thorough which I really appreciated. My concern is not about today. We have a dry lake bed and My concern is in 10 years when the cycle switches because I believe it will switch. As much as everyone says we're going hotter, we'll go colder. I mean, we've had an ice age. We've not had an ice age. We've had deserts, these sort of things. I just don't want you guys coming back and saying we did the wrong thing for your families and your future families, your kids, and if that passes on. I think the second thing is that I wanted to say is I appreciate everyone who's been involved with this process, even in the tension of it. I'm someone who likes tension. I think that you get good policy out of tension. And I think that the conflict of ideas allows us to get to better solutions. So thank you. Those are just my statements, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. OK. Any other questions or comments? Then, Chair, to entertain a motion.

So moved.

second hearing a motion from councilman thomas second from councilman wardle to adopt the rezoning land oh on b that's what i thought it was okay so the motion is for version b staff uh recommendation on ordinance 2026-04 and the second is also for that okay so um Let me just repeat that, that we have on ordinance 2026-04. It is version B of the planning staff recommendation. We have a motion from Councilman Thomas, a second from Councilman Wardle. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those that may oppose, say nay. That is adopted. That will bring us to D, that's ordinance 2026-06, amending and selecting the 24-5-1. Millie.

Thanks so, as part of the project area, the applicants have been coordinating efforts to attract a loves travel stop. Uh, during the review of the proposed signage package that loves brought the applicant and planning stuff identified that the current code does not permit. freestanding signs within industrial districts and so in order to accommodate the proposed sign love sign package as well as similar future developments the county kind of wants to get be ahead of the game and amend the code to allow freestanding signs in industrial districts wonderful any questions or comments on that from the council or from no I'm sorry

Oh, I apologize, Milly. Yell at me if I cut you off. If there's no other questions, the chair would entertain a motion.

So moved.

Hear a motion from Councilman Hoffman on ordinance 2026-06. Is there a second?

Can I just clarify here for a moment? I'd like to kind of hear from the applicant. Is that appropriate?

You're asking.

I'd like to hear and see if they've got any comments they'd like to address this before we vote.

I was still celebrating the last vote we did on the results with the broccoli. I was still celebrating in my brain.

If we could hear from the developer if they'd like to. Chuck?

Thank you very much, counsel.

We appreciate it. It'll be very short. This has been an interesting process that we have gone through in working with LUVs. And we've all learned a lot about signage. And not only is signage important, obviously, to get people into their travel center, but they take into consideration the safety hazards, which is why large signs that are tall gives the truckers the opportunity to change lanes without creating hazards on the highway and when they get into the property Loves has for years had specific signs that separate cars from trucks and so forth so that the whole apparatus here is a safe apparatus we've we've worked very closely with millie and uh and our our staff and we're very very satisfied with what you're going to is presented to you tonight unless you have some comments we do have a guest here this evening mr uh kim van dyke who is a senior officer with loves if you have any questions of him he'd be more than happy to respond to them but i just wanted to tell you that i think we've We've come to the point where this is really a good resolution that has been put together by staff.

Thank you. So I have a motion on the table from Councilman Hoffman. Was there a second? Second. We have a second from Councilman Strongberg. All those in favor of the ordinance 2026-6, amending section 24-5-1. I'm not going to go through all that. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those that may oppose say nay.

Mr. Chairman, may I make a comment? I've been through the iterations on sign ordinances in my time as a city council member. Most of them caused PTSD, post-traumatic sign disorder. This one was wonderful. Thank you to the staff and those involved. And we look forward to that corridor developing. That's going to be the next corridor. I really believe that we're going to see a lot of commercial and business, industrial growth. So I think this is really good.

Thank you. will bring us to ordinance 2026-7 amending section 2-2 really

Thank you. So over the years, Stansbury residents have looked at ways to conserve water and see if there's available funds to replace grass with water-wise landscapes and to qualify for a program like this, the slow flow rebate program. And so they brought the concern up to us. And it turns out that the residents of unincorporated Tooele County have not been able to qualify because we don't have an ordinance to address kind of the four elements that are required by the state. So the county recently adopted the water use element to the general plan. The council actually denied an ordinance that was presented a few years ago. But since then, the planning director has been working with the contractor that completed the water element to bring to you this new ordinance. And so planning staff finds that the request is consistent with the Tooele County General Plan. It has since changed from the past version to be more specific and cater to Tooele County. And so we just ask that

Is there any questions or comments from the council I've got a question Is there a way to make we just thought? Councilman Wardle just mentioned the cycles of weather changing and I think that's probably gonna happen Obviously, I think we need this now, but if there's a time we don't need this can we put verbiage in here that we're not gonna enforce it and

I think it's not forced, it's an opportunity.

It talks about the ways they will enforce it and stuff like that within this.

Chairman, if I may?

Please.

In order to do that, we would have to have an action of the council to suspend the ordinance. It would not qualify for the water efficient rebates if we were to put verbiage in there that says we may or may not enforce this code.

Okay. Any other questions or comments? Okay. Chair, do you entertain a motion?

Mr. Chairman, I move to approve ordinance 2026-07, water efficiency standards.

Hearing a motion from Councilman Thomas. Is there a second? I'll second it. All those in favor of ordinance 2026-07, Say aye.

Aye.

Aye. All those who may oppose, say nay. That is adopted unanimously. That will come to Ordinance 2026-08. Thank you, Millie. Thank you. Appreciate you. Enacting Chapter 9, County Emergency Tax of Title II. Nathan.

Thank you, Chairman. So this is a new energy excise tax. We briefly touched on this a few weeks ago as one of the new ordinances and rules that we were gonna put in place. And so currently, well, now counties can have these energy excise taxes that you can choose to impose. Cities have been able to impose these for quite some time, but the law just changed this year and allows counties to impose this tax. And so what this does is under Utah code section 59-37202, you can impose this energy excise tax on high impact consumers that are located in the unincorporated county areas. The rate, you can put a maximum of a rate at 6%. And then what you can do is you can use that tax rate as kind of an incentive to try to bring some people or some larger impact consumers into the county. So this is a point of sale, right? It's always just going to be on that end user. It'll actually probably be collected like any other sales tax that would be on energy. Rocky Mountain Power is going to be responsible for that or whoever is providing that energy to that high impact user. And so this adopts a new section of code because to enact a tax we needed to create a new part of our county code. In Title II, it's taxation. We've created Chapter 9, which is called the County Energy Excise Tax Ordinance. And it says that, hey, we're allowed to do this under Title 59 of the Utah code. And we're going to impose it. So if you have the rate is kind of up to you guys. I think everything else would kind of stay the same in the ordinance. But if you didn't want that 6%, you could lower it. But the 6 is the max. And that's what I've defaulted to just in drafting.

Wonderful. Is there any questions or comments from the council?

So is that up to 6%?

So are we going to set that rate tonight? If you would adopt this as is, you would be imposing a 6% energy excise tax.

Councilman Hoffman. Well, I'm just wondering if it's going to be passed on down to the taxpayers one way or another by... by the corporations and those that this is put onto. You know what I mean? Are they going to be able to pass this down to the local taxpayer?

Yeah, I mean, I can see that as a possibility.

Let's say that- Because usually that's what happens with corporations is they just pass it on to their- Well, let's take the example of a data center because that's not a topic.

So we have a data center that comes in. If they meet the thresholds and are a high impact consumer, they may pass those costs of that tax on to whatever consumer is using their product. Yeah, I can see that happening. I think that's very possible.

I mean, it sounds great that it's going to be the big corporation doing it or whatever, but essentially it's going to be the...

It all runs downhill.

I think with that, it's the end user, which may not really be the local residents.

Yes, and whoever buys that product.

Right, you're buying a product. Paying that's a little bit different, right? You're buying, you're using and buying their product if they raise their rates because of it. You choose whether or not you want to continue to pay it as opposed to, it's not a, you know, in the case of like property taxes where you have a choice, right? The consumer can decide if they're okay with that increase.

Do we have any reports, we may not, where this has been enacted, what has happened to rates in that area?

There was a meeting three weeks ago on Monday with all the USAC representatives in which this was discussed. Utah County had talked about it, Washington County had talked about it, that in high energy users, it returns substantial amounts back to the local entities and that it is one way to mitigate some of the issues that come in with data centers, specifically because they're not as high of job creation after they're established. And so the excise tax is similar to what we would do with other

businesses i i think kendall you would love to do that to gravel pits we wish we could get them to that point but this is an opportunity to well i think upnl pays the excise tax for the pulls and stopping tools they already do it they do mr chairman i make a motion that we approve ordinance dot ordinance 2026 may i just ask a clarification

Real quick Nathan is 6% are we are we establishing it this at the max rate right now?

You can put it anywhere the 6% is the maximum that you could impose Okay, so that's why I asked the question clarification.

I'm all about let's just put it right on right now.

So when people come in businesses Okay, we have a motion on the table councilman Thomas is there a second I Second here a second councilman Stromberg on ordinance 2026-08 all those in favor say aye aye all those who may oppose say nay that is adopted thank you Nathan that'll bring us down to boards and committees we don't have any to renew or to vote in and that will bring us down to council updates Councilman Wardle, any council updates?

Yeah, I did write something down. First of all, I had the pleasure and displeasure on Sunday to see the fire start in Lake Point right by several homes and appreciated the... I got to see firsthand the response. Not that I started it, but I was driving our daughter to the airport and... I think after the last three weeks, just an incredible shout-out and thank you to the firefighters, their families, the public safety officers, whether they have been our sheriff's deputies, DPS, the wildlife officers who have all had to work several hours away from their families. And it's my hope and prayer we get rain. because it's not good. And in talking with some of the irrigation companies in the last week, we got to get back to normal somehow. And so my hope is that we can get there.

Thank you, Councilman Wharton. I'll suspend the Councilman Stromberg.

So, just a couple things. First, again, you know, following along with what Councilman Wuerl just said, I do want to pass my appreciation to both Bucky and Brittany for keeping us updated on the events that are happening, particularly what we've seen over the last week with the fires. It helps as we have other individuals within the community reaching out to us and asking what's going on and get those updates. So, and then also, if you'll allow me, We don't have any appointments for boards, but we do have a vacancy because of a gentleman that passed away from Grantsville, and I want to take just a minute to recognize him. It is Pat Hardy who had served two terms on the Council of Aging. And with that, I'll just share something that Amy, who is the Aging Director with the Health Department, shared. She said, Pat was a valued member of the Council of Aging and someone I greatly enjoyed getting to know over the years. He was an exceptionally intelligent and talented man whose interests and accomplishments seemed endless. Pat served as the Chair of the Council of Aging last year, providing thoughtful leadership and a sincere commitment to improving the lives of older adults in Tooele County. Behind his services on the council, he supported aging services in many ways, including attending the governor's wise listening sessions and sharing his love of history through presentations for older adults on topics such as the Dust Bowl and the Pony Express. He had a remarkable ability to engage others, spark curiosity, and make learning enjoyable. Pat will be deeply missed. His wisdom, kindness, and dedication made a lasting impact on the council eating services, and the community we serve. With that, I'll just share, right? So while Pat may not have actually been a lifelong resident of Grantsville, Grantsville was his home. I actually grew up next to his parents and the house that his daughter lives in now. And I can remember for years growing up, you know, this mentioned the Pony Express. I can remember as a kid, 4th of July, Pat out there saddling up his horse, getting ready to represent that group on the 4th. And My mom would always call out as they would go past on the parade route, hey, Pat, you know, because it was a face she knew. So one other little thing I'll share, he and his wife had planned a trip to go to Hawaii with all their kids and grandkids just a few weeks ago and right before he became ill. And he was very insistent that... His family still go, and they did, and actually was talking to his son, Jeff, just the Sunday before he passed, and they were talking about what great memories they had on that trip, and they would make phone calls back and share back here at home what the day was like. They made that part of it to try and include Pat and his wife in as much as possible. So that was the kind of man that Pat was. He didn't want his family to miss out on for some of them would have been a triple lifetime. So he is someone that truly will be missed. So thanks, Chair.

Thank you, Councilman Stromberg. Councilman Thomas.

Hey, I know we're partying 250 years. Deseret Peaks had great drone shows, done lots of fun stuff. But on July 16th at 1 o'clock in the afternoon at the Tula Senior Center, They're going to become the first recognized, the certified One Kind Act Today program. They've taken a whole year to work on it, and they've had lots of fun doing it. So I'm inviting you all to come to it. It's going to be a big celebration. The foundation from One Kind Act Today is coming out to recognize us all. Come and enjoy it. It'll be fun on July 16th at the Senior Center.

Thank you. Councilman. Just want to say thanks to all the first responders. It's been a busy month for them. Absolutely. They're the heroes, and they need to be recognized. Thanks, you guys.

Thank you, Councilman Hoffman. That'll bring us down to the manager update. Andy.

Just one quick item. I just want to call out somebody as well. She's sitting next to me. And so one of the things we found out today, well, we've known about this for a while, is that we needed to do some additional training that the trust offered for us to get a discount. And because we're working on improving our safety program, And one of the things that we had to do was get 70% of our employees to the Franklin Covey training. We were kind of the guinea pig for the trust, and Brittany has spent a lot of time with them telling them what would work better than the way they're doing it. And she's been training some of the other communities that are going through that as well. So we finally hit, I think, 71%. Well, we hit 90. Yeah, we had to get 70% on the feedback, and so we did get that. So we should be getting a check for $300,000 in a couple of months because we were able to complete that. So thank you, Brittany.

Wonderful. That's all I have. Thank you, Brittany. With that, we don't have a closed session, so I'll ask for a motion to adjourn.

So moved.

Hear a motion to adjourn. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Aye. We are adjourned at 6.29 p.m.