Plaza opinions divided by faith

Eight months after Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson proffered his solution to the Main Street Plaza issue — a community center on the city's west side in exchange for easement rights on the plaza — residents' opinions on the plaza are still divided along religious lines, according to a new Deseret Morning News/KSL-TV poll.

Deseret News graphic Poll results Requires Adobe Acrobat.

While it is clear the rhetoric in the city has toned down — the City Council no longer has a public comment hotline to field angry telephone calls about the plaza, and Anderson is no longer flooded with calls and e-mails — a religious divide still shapes public opinion, according to a Dan Jones & Associates survey of 415 Salt Lake City residents conducted Aug. 19-21. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percent.

Overall, 53 percent of city residents disagree with the American Civil Liberties Union's claim that city leaders, including Anderson, were overly influenced by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when the city passed the community center solution.

Conversely, 39 percent of those polled agreed with the ACLU's federal lawsuit that alleges the community center solution was overly influenced by the LDS Church and violates the constitution's establishment clause, which calls for degrees of separation between church and state.

Nine percent of those responding had another opinion or didn't know.

Breaking down the poll by religious affiliation shows 84 percent of those claiming to be LDS Church members said the community center solution was not a violation of the establishment clause. Only 8 percent of LDS Church members thought the deal violated the establishment clause.

However, 68 percent of those who claimed Catholic, Protestant, other religious affiliation or no religious affiliation said the community center deal did violate the establishment clause. Roughly 24 percent of non-LDS Church members said the deal didn't violate the establishment clause, the poll showed.

Jones found roughly 45 percent of Salt Lake City residents claim to be LDS, while 55 percent claim another religion or no religion.

Other questions similarly showed that religious affiliation shaped opinions.