Salt Lake City Council OKs cemetery deal

Rowland Hall St. Mark's private school can move forward with plans to purchase land from a cemetery after a Salt Lake City Council vote Tuesday night.

The council changed the zoning on 13 acres of cemetery land, which clears one hurdle Mt. Olivet cemetery faced in trying to sell the land to Rowland Hall. The cemetery wants to sell in order to finance the graveyard's ongoing operations, and the school wants the land for a future expansion that would bring its middle and upper school campuses to contiguous sites.

The council voted for the rezone 5-2 over the objections of some neighbors — who say the school will increase traffic and gobble up natural open space — and two council members, who said a lack of natural open space in the surrounding neighborhoods persuaded them to vote against the rezone. Council members Nancy Saxton and Sren Simonsen opposed the rezone.

"Do we lose open space here? I say 'no,' " said Eric Jergensen, who voted for the rezone. "We receive the benefit at no cost to city taxpayers. This is a tremendous pro-open space opportunity for our city."

Before the vote, Saxton and Simonsen gave speeches about the importance of preserving open space for future generations.

"I would be willing to change the zoning on this parcel of land if there were no other options for a worthy recipient as Rowland Hall," Saxton said. "This is the wrong decision for this council that has made a commitment to open space."

At least one-quarter of the land will be open space as a condition of the council's approval. In a draft development agreement between the school and the city, the school tentatively agrees to maintain a trail easement between the cemetery and Sunnyside Avenue, and to contribute $100,000 for traffic safety.

The cemetery also has proposed to donate $250,000 to the city for future purchases of open space. The school has not yet decided whether it will contribute or how much it might add to that sum, said Bob Steiner, a member of the school's board of trustees. Many neighbors had expressed concern that the current open space — a fenced field of weeds — would be lost without replacement elsewhere.

Salt Lake City School District objected to the sale in a formal letter to the City Council. The school district leased land from Mt. Olivet in 1993 for the East High School football stadium and track because the cemetery said it couldn't sell without federal approval. Now that a similar process seems to be progressing for Rowland Hall, the public school district said it thinks the sale violates its own 70-year lease agreement.