Plans for Change

What is at stake

At Mayflower, MIDA—not the county—sets land-use rules in its area of jurisdiction. Its board approved a site plan that modified an eight-story, 120-foot height standard for three buildings of nine, ten, and thirteen stories above grade. Residents still live with traffic, water demands, and public costs, while MIDA receives 75% of the new property-tax increment in its project area under its county agreements. MIDA board decision ↗ County tax explanation ↗

• Defend the county’s general plan and local oversight.
• Put development agreements, tax arrangements, and the cost of roads and services in public view before a council vote.
• Make local growth pay its own way. Shifting a private project’s costs to the public is corporate welfare in disguise.

MIDA’s priorities are not necessarily Heber Valley’s. Alex will keep the council answerable to residents on decisions involving MIDA.

What Alex would pursue

Utah’s 2024 SB 258 created a preliminary-municipality path for landowners to form a town through a different process from conventional incorporation. Wasatch County has already called for its repeal. County repeal resolution ↗

• When state and local priorities conflict, scrutinize any county-controlled water, road, or development approval that assumes a proposed town is inevitable.
• Put repeal or strict-limit legislation before the county’s legislative delegation before January 2027.
• Build a coalition with Summit County and other rural counties.
• Ask county counsel to evaluate joining or supporting the existing legal challenge to the law. Filed complaint ↗

Alex believes a resolution is a start, not the finish.

What Alex would require before a vote

• Independent analysis of the full cost of roads, water, wastewater, emergency services, and long-term maintenance.
• Binding agreements and financial guarantees so developers fund the costs their projects create.
• Phasing or delay when the needed capacity is not ready.
• A public explanation of who pays and who benefits.

Public bonds and tax increases should not be the default way to make a private project work.

What Alex would push for

Across the Wasatch Back, residents have watched housing commitments change into fees, amendments, or higher income caps.

• Strengthen county ordinances and development agreements with on-site, deed-restricted homes where feasible, firm deadlines, and enforceable clawbacks when builders fail to deliver.
• Make any fee in lieu rare, public, and reserved for housing.
• Make room for modest homes where water and roads can support them. Five-acre gated lots are not a solution for local workers.
• Direct county incentives toward homes local workers can afford and occupy.

The county should close that loophole in the agreements it controls.

Conservation and a local economy can grow together

Before major approvals—especially when state priorities conflict—Alex wants independent studies of water, traffic, and taxpayer costs.

• Support conservation and carefully scaled agritourism that keeps working farms, farm stands, and our agricultural way of life viable.
• Look to growth rooted in the landscape. A Utah Department of Agriculture and Food study estimates statewide agritourism visitor spending generates about $44.8 million in annual economic activity. State study ↗
• Measure proposals against their effects on water, farmland, views, and the valley’s long-term future.

Development that drains the aquifer and paves the fields is not prosperity. It is an exit from the valley we know.

There is much we can learn from our neighbor to the north. A network of pedestrian tunnels across Park City and the Snyderville Basin helps people cross busy roads on paths connecting neighborhoods, schools, and parks. Basin crossings ↗

A practical path

• Improve traffic flow. Review signal timing, turns, and business access. Model promising changes and pilot feasible fixes.
• Make crossings safer. At 100 North, 250 South, and around 790–800 South, review pedestrian counts and crashes. Have engineers assess accessible underpasses and their construction and upkeep costs.
• Compare the full costs. Publish the traffic results, land needs, and long-term costs alongside UDOT’s preferred corridor. UDOT’s preliminary estimate is $760.5 million in 2025 dollars. Draft EIS cost method ↗

If smaller fixes meet safety and traffic needs, move them forward. If they cannot, show residents where they fall short.