Sugar House Community Council Convenes

By Travis Barton | [email protected]

The Sugar House Community Council (SHCC) convened for their monthly meeting on Wednesday, May 4 at the Sprague Library to discuss items involving the Sugar House community and hear presentations and updates from various people and organizations. 

Crime Report

Detective Joshua Ashdown, the community intelligence officer for the area, reported to the council an increase in tickets for drivers not stopping for pedestrians at the crosswalk at 12th East. 

“That is like Frogger,” Ashdown said during the meeting. 

Ashdown said he sent a few officers to cover that spot for an hour and the officers wrote 24 tickets. He suggested members of the community go to the Salt Lake City Police Department website where they have an option called Speed Watch where people can report on speedy drivers that goes directly to the motors department. 

Ashdown also reported on a transient camp on the west end of the Country Club golf course that he was alerted to. A request was put in to clean up the camp, but due to the backlog in transient camp cleanups, it has not been cleaned up yet. 

Sugar House Farmers Market

Three members of the Sugar House Farmers Market appeared to update the council on the on the Farmers Market preparations. Starting on June 8 until October 26, the market will run Wednesday evenings from 5 – 9 p.m. at Fairmont Park. 

Amy Buchanan, member of the board, said they were still looking for sponsors and have reopened the application process. 

Buchanan also said they intend to include educational opportunities to have families interact with farmers as well as monthly free yoga classes during the market. 

Seven Canyons Trust 

Brian Tonetti, co-founder of the Seven Canyons Trust, gave a presentation on daylighting, or the uncovering of buried underground creeks or rivers bringing them back to the surface and restoring it’s natural stream channel. 

Seven Canyons Trust is a non-profit organization working to daylight and rehabilitate the seven creeks of the Salt Lake Valley. 

Tonetti said there’s more than 21 miles of buried creeks in the Salt Lake Valley. He said he hopes daylighting can occur or at least enter the thought process of developers in the area. 

“As developers approach the Sugar House Community Council…we encourage the community council and the residents to urge these developers to pursue daylighting projects in this neighborhood,” Tonetti said. 

Tonetti said a potential demonstration project in the Sugar House area could be a Parley’s Creek at Monument Plaza where a creek would be painted on the ground at Monument Plaza. 

“This would help culturally daylight the creek for the residents here and its continued existence underneath this plaza,” Tonetti said. 

Elevate Buildings 

SLC Green, the city’s division of sustainability, gave a presentation on their new project Elevate Buildings to address poor air quality asking members of the community to take a survey on their website. 

Peter Nelson, of SLC Green, said the project is aimed towards reducing the energy consumption and emissions released from large scale buildings. 

The Sugar House Community Council meetings transpire the first Wednesday of every month at the Sprague Library.