As a licensed broker in Utah I can sell any property any where in the state. Most agents are members of one Board of Realtors, but I am lucky enough to belong to both the Salt Lake Board and the Washington County Boards and just listed a home in Sun River in Bloomington. On my travels south to meet with the family I stopped to see my friend Julie who owns a flower shop in the old part of downtown Hurricane. I hadn’t been to that place in decades and thought for sure I had gone the wrong way from St. George to Hurricane because as soon as I headed out of one place I was at a Walmart and wall to wall housing! The patio-home retirement lifestyle has pushed out of St. George and is quickly eating up developable land like. The buzz tho among locals is not so much the growth of homes but a new type of temporary housing that has been quietly and now loudly coming to private property nearby. Many folks who travel to Zion National Park come through Hurricane and stay there because hotel and motel options are few and far between outside of the park. And if you don’t want walls there are glamping options at Zion Ponderosa Ranch and Moonlight Oasis in the area. The quiet beauty of the area is a treasure to locals and travelers alike and we’ve done a great job letting people know about our parks and landscapes so that now visiting them can be a nightmare of traffic and overcrowding. Glamping resorts are popping up to meet demand but one project called ‘Above Zion’ is being proposed on 1,700 acres in and around Kolob Reservoir and Kolob Creek, which could host up to 4,000 people at a time IF their game plan of 2,000 sites comes to fruition He wants to offer glamping sites, RV pads and primitive sites for more tourists to come to Southern Utah and to do so will have to bring in utilities, water and sewer as well as roads to his various planned locations. Locals have gotten wind of the plans and are justly concerned what such massive development will do to the roads, water system and ecosystems/nature in general. There has been one meeting already with local officials but there were so many people who wanted to chime in they had to end the meeting to regroup later. Above Zion’s owners will have to get a conditional-use permit issued from the local Planning and Zoning Commission to build what they need to get glampers up and above Zion to see the wonders of Kolob. It’s not a year round access area due to the high altitude (8000+ feet above sea level) and winter snows but it is a great place for night sky watching. Kolob is a star or planet described in the Book of Abraham, a Latter Day Saint text that was supposedly translated from an Egyptian papyrus scroll by Joseph Smith-and you might be able to see it if you look hard enough when you camp or maybe glamp up there this summer.

With the whirlwind of news about racism these past few weeks I paused when I read a blurb that Salt Lake Mayor Mendenhall reportedly keeps an old map of ‘Red Lining’ at her desk. I had not thought about that topic since I was in real estate school 36 years ago, as the topic is covered thoroughly in licensing classes and discussed regularly in continuing ed.  Housing discrimination against African Americans was so intense in this country that in the 1930’s the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation happily created color-coded maps of neighborhoods that they considered were the highest risk of loan defaults. Why would a bank want to grant a home loan to someone who wanted to live in a ‘red’ area if the odds were (according the HOLC) that the buyer would default?The redlining maps weren’t just unique to Salt Lake-there were 238 cities that used these maps as a basis where home loans should NOT be granted because of high risk. Here in Utah the maps specifically noted where ‘negros’ lived, which were the areas that were coincidentally red-lined. The ‘best neighborhoods’ where lenders easily gave out loans were upper Sugar House, property around the University of Utah, the Avenues and Sugarhouse itself.  The main red or ‘negro’ areas where lenders ‘should not’ grant mortgages were Rose Park and the west side (picture Poplar Grove) and Liberty Wells. Each block of the map had related information as to the education, average income, percent of vacant homes/owner occupied homes and yes, the racial makeup of each and every street.We certainly have problems in our capitol city and in Utah with home ownership, specifically affordable home ownership. Economic segregation is obvious if you take a driving tour of your city. There are neighborhoods full of blight and run down and areas of obvious wealth, and all in between. President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act in 1968 as a follow up to the same act of 1964. It added language that prohibited discrimination concerning the sale, rental and financing of housing based on race, religion, national, origin, sex (and later amended) handicap and family status. It had one hell of a time passing through Congress and was carefully watched by civil rights activists like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It ended up flying through congress after Dr. King was murdered in 1968 and the country fell into shore to shore riots. The first African-American ever to be elected to the U.S. Senate helped after he testified that he returned from WWII and because of his race could not buy a home in an area of his choice. The ‘Red Line’ maps were banned and any lender caught using them or anything like them would face Federal crime charges. Those rules still apply today and as REALTORS we continue to help enforce overt discrimination in housing. We can’t control housing prices, but we can make sure our buyer’s lender of choice is not steering them away from any given neighborhood where they want to live by denying them a loan because of their race.                https://cdn.filestackcontent.com/qjEaoEvgQnaA6m7CT6SA

Mark Twain once said, “Buy land, they’re not making it anymore.”  Around the Wasatch front raw land to build on is about as rare as a victory for common sense!  I always have a steady number of calls from old and young hippies who want to “find a lot in the city so we can build a tiny house, have chickens and farm.”  Again, buildable residentially-zoned land in the tri-city area is virtually unheard up and generally is swooped up by full time investors and builders who can squeeze in high density townhomes (where allowed). Two BIG landholders here are the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and Rio Tinto. I recall when I was a Planning and Zoning Commissioner for Salt Lake City when Rio Tinto came to meet with us and discuss their vision for the far west side of the Salt Lake Valley. Basically, the multi-national company owns from the smelter smokestack on the north end of the Oquirrh mountains to past daybreak. As the mine ore taps out the Rio Tinto plans to build communities. Most important, they own the water rights to support those communities (like Daybreak) and one employee pointed out “By the time we’re done building we’ll need 90 schools to support the families that will live there!”  Rio Tinto is NOT building the 900 acre ‘Olympia’ project just west of Herriman, but their land virtually abuts that project. Just south of Daybreak and Olympia is Camp Williams, a training site for Active and Reservist National Guard as well all sorts of covert and overt military specialists.  The military with cooperation of private and public landowners is planning to put an open space plan around certain parts of the 23,000 base, which is smart because again, vacant land is being bought up to build housing projects. If you drew a circle with Camp Williams in the middle of it, the ‘Sentinel Landscape’ project would have Lehi and Draper on the north, Herriman on the east, Eagle Mountain and Saratoga Springs on the west and Utah lake to the south. As a homeowner you don’t want errant bullets and shells ending up in your new bedroom and so it’s good to have a buffer zone that will also help protect wildlife and our unique ecosystem. If you flew north west over the Oquirrh range the Church is building a new Temple in Tooele. Their real estate arm (Suburban Land Reserve) who built the City Creek project has announced that they will now build a massive housing project of homes to surround that edifice. Why not add green space, rec areas and walking paths and housing that looks good with the Temple as a focus. As I’ve also told clients over the years “If the Church announces they are going to build a Temple, buy any land you can around it because the value is going to skyrocket! If not land, a home. It’s logical that a Temple is going to add value to the neighborhood.”

My industry has been protected in Utah since Covid-19 struck and I’ve been able to leave our home and to work-going to the office for paperwork, close escrows for buyers and sellers, and show homes (virtually, usually). There haven’t been that many folks out on the roads and it’s interesting to get on I-15 and see how many people are speeding. I find myself in the fast lane going 90 mph and realizing soon after that I am the one speeding, too because I’m not paying attention and just going with the flow. Slow the F down! I’ve noticed that there are less cars attached to the TRAX trains yet UTA is still getting people where they need to go. Bus and train drivers are part of the huge group of unsung pandemic hero’s working to keep our transportation system going. Sure, the schedules may be different with less options, but you will eventually get to your destination. Uber and Lyft are working and as are cab and limo drivers. My go-to taxi company (Ute) told me that so many of their drivers have little kids at home or are older and can’t drive, and that many haven’t been able to get unemployment benefits. You just don’t see these kinds of companies on the road because YOU’RE not on the road with our suggested stay at home orders these past several weeks, but as regulations loosen, you’ll be calling them again for rides. One alternative to moving people that hasn’t stopped is a new program offered by UTA that was at first an experiment and is now may be a permanent fit for public transportation if UTA votes it in during their November planning meeting. “Microtransit’ is the minivan option that offers shared rides along the southern section of the Wasatch front for the same price as a bus ticket. Ridership for all service providers-public and private-have dropped as much as freeway traffic. Given that fact it’s a good time to be working out the potential bugs of getting people too and fro for UTA. Basically, you use your smart phone and app (UTA ON DEMAND) to request a ride or you call from a landline. They’ve partnered with demand rider sharer ‘Via’ to connect multiple riders heading in the same direction into a Mercedes Benz van to save riders money and provide more transportation options.  You book the ride and the app or person at the end of the land line will let you know where the van will meet you. The real point is to get riders to TRAX or Frontrunner stations from areas where bus service is limited.  It’s a pilot program that other large cities are also trying and so far, people seem to like the option. Just like Uber and Lyft you can rate your ride from 0-5 while the program is being tested. For more information, go to rideutah.com/services/UTA-on-Demand-by-Via or call 385-217-8191. Yes, their drivers are masked, and they are not cramming six people into a van at this time due to social distancing recommendations.

Women have two celebrations going on right now in Utah: 1) how we got the right to vote on local and national ballots 150 years ago and 2) that Girl Scouts was established here (in Ogden) 100 years ago!  You might be hearing a lot right now about Suffragettes and the Equal Rights Amendment in the news or even see women standing outside the Utah State Capitol building dressed in 1800’s garb with green and purple sashes with the words VOTES FOR WOMEN across their chests.  If you’ve missed all of this, here’s a bit of history that’s relevant today in so many ways: Suffragettes were the militants of their day (early 20th century) who fought for the right to vote in public elections. They were most noticed in first world countries because they had the best press coverage of their marches, heckling, hunger strikes and civil disobedience. Women were brutalized by police and arrested for organizing and then held hunger strikes in prison where they then were force fed with metal funnels shoved in their mouths to keep them alive. It was an ugly time for women and the men who loved them, and after decades and decades of protests and through perseverance, Congress ratified the 19th amendment to our constitution in 1920 giving women the right to vote. Huzzah!  Utah has a different legacy though, women in the Utah ‘Territory’ were unanimously granted the right to vote in 1870, one year after Wyoming women received the same right and then again by Congress in 1920-twice!Utah women are rising up to say we want the U.S. Constitution changed to say that women are guaranteed equal rights regardless of sex (the Constitution’s wording only uses the MALE pronoun). That battle started in the 1970’s and according to recent poles over 70% of Utah women want the Constitution changed.  This voting battle is happening all around our country now, so pay attention, people! Elect representatives who support the ERA!When I started my career in real estate, women had only recently been able to buy a home without a husband as a co-signer or get a credit card in their own name. Federal Fair Housing laws were passed in 1975 that struck down sex discrimination in lending and home buying, but even into the 1980’s it was still hard with some lenders for women to get loans. And God forbid, if TWO women wanted to buy a home together? Most lenders could barely stand the thought of loaning to lesbians or even to a mother and daughter! They had grant loans to women by law, but many files got pushed to the bottom of the stack. I had one client who was a lesbian and African American back then, unmarried, who the lender at the time put through the ringer to get her home loan. She finally got approved but it seemed like her loan took 10 times longer than other clients I was working with at the time (both male or female). Through the feminist movement in the 1970’s and the wave of vocal advocates for women’s rights we can buy homes and get credit on our own today.