Other firms have already moved, including another venerable downtown business, Bennion Jewelers. The company, which has roots back to the 1860s, had been in a building adjacent to the ZCMI Center on Main Street. After negotiations and a move to the southeast corner of First South and Main streets, owner Bill Bennion told the Deseret Morning News recently, "I'm not just happy to be here; I'm thrilled."

He gives much of the credit to Zions Securities and Property Reserve Inc., the LDS Church's real estate and management arms. "It was a win-win," he said. "The win for them is they can knock down the building early; the win for us is we'll be here for at least 20 more years."

LDS Church spokesman Dale Bills would not comment in advance of Tuesday's discussion with the City Council. Dave Buhler, the council's chairman, invited Bishop Burton to speak at the meeting. The council will also have a briefing Tuesday night about updating its master plan for downtown.

The LDS Church isn't the area's only stakeholder, even though it owns roughly $1.6 billion of property downtown and in the southwestern Avenues neighborhood. Wasatch Real Estate Partners owns the Wells Fargo Center, the Ken Garff Building and the Chase Tower downtown. Wasatch, along with Hamilton Partners, announced in February that it will build a 21-story building at roughly 200 South and Main Street.

That investment, the Salt Palace Convention Center expansion, and additional construction at The Gateway west of downtown have kept Salt Lake City alive without visible progress on the downtown malls. "Even though people would magically like to see things happen immediately, I don't think the delay has stopped other things from happening," Buhler said.

Rumors that the Key Bank tower over Crossroads Plaza will be demolished, leaving less office space downtown, have boosted business for Vasilios Priskos, a commercial real-estate broker who specializes in downtown space.

"The office market has just gone through the roof, and things are doing extremely well," Priskos said. "We have a lot more buyers than we do sellers. We haven't had that for a long time."

The combination of the LDS Church's billion-dollar investment and the Taubman company's development experience has drawn great attention from investors throughout the country, Priskos said. "You spend that kind of money anywhere in the world, and people are going to want to be around."

Despite the many dark storefronts in the two malls, several business owners say that they're doing just fine, and they give credit to out-of-town visitors who stay in hotels near the downtown malls and have few other shopping options.

"When the conventions and the tourists come, they don't know the mall is empty," said Azita Nejad, owner of Ypsilon in Crossroads Plaza. "We get great business, and that's why we keep it open."