Wal-Mart foes rushing to get signatures

SANDY — Foes of a Wal-Mart big-box development on Sandy's gravel pit are scurrying to gather 9,500 signatures needed to take a controversial city decision to a citizen referendum vote.

With a Friday deadline looming, members of the Save Our Communities group have gathered only about 5,000 of the needed signatures in the past month on a petition to reverse a city zoning decision paving the way for a 107-acre Boyer project at 9400 East and 1300 South.

"We're hoping for a blitz here at the end," said Cynthia Long, who heads up the Save Our Communities group. "People have stood out freezing to death to get these signatures."

The group only needs 8,084 signatures to put the item on the November 2005 ballot, but Long said the 9,500 goal gives some cushion in case certain signatures are not accepted.

Gathering the signatures hit a snag, Long added, with holiday vacation schedules and when Albertsons and Smith's grocery stores asked the petitioners not to solicit signatures at their stores. Volunteers have made up for it, however, by gathering signatures at other grocery chains and outside the city library, resident Gary Forbush said.

"City leaders thought it was just 200 people against it, but we're going to prove it with these signatures," he said.

But those signatures may not amount to anything, said city attorney Walter Miller. City officials could reject the petition even with enough signatures because the zoning decision was more an administrative decision, not a legislative one subject to referendum. "I've questioned all along whether this was the appropriate thing to do," Miller said. "If they get all their signatures then I think it needs to come to a head." Long said she expects the city to reject the petition and will appeal to the Utah Supreme Court.

"I think this is a very clear legislative issue. It was not just a little zone change," she said. "It won't be over."

Council member Scott Cowdell, however, said 9,500 signatures would be enough to persuade him to allow the referendum, even though he voted for the Boyer project. "It seems to me that it would be logical that if they can get that many voters to sign, there's quite a few people that want it and I don't know how you can ignore that," he said. But Wade Williams, director of retail marketing for Boyer Co., is counting on a dead end for the referendum effort. Williams is going ahead as scheduled, presenting a master plan for the project to Sandy's Planning Commission Thursday.