Pettro Gravel battle is not over

PROVO — Scott Pettro is determined to take a licking and keep on ticking — or, mining, as it were.

The owner of Pettro Sand and Gravel Corp. has twice been denied permission by the Utah County Board of Adjustment and the Utah County Commission to continue mining in a critical environment zone — his excavation efforts are currently stopped after he mined the area for several years — but Pettro isn't going to give up looking for another way.

Neither is County Commissioner Gary Anderson, who was the sole vote in favor of allowing a zone change that would have permitted Pettro to continue to dig in the protected area. After the county commission voted May 8 against changing the zoning of Pettro's land to an industrial area — which permits mining — Anderson says he has another plan.

The commissioner says he is going to ask the Utah County Planning Commission to consider changing the land to a mining and grazing zone. If the commission approves the change, the issue will be resolved. If the change is denied, the issue will again be considered by the county commission.

Anderson says he hopes to find a way to allow Pettro to legally mine the land since it has already been scarred by Pettro's operations.

"People thought the Pettros had been violating the law for some time, flagrantly, and not attempting to comply at all, so we should punish him," Anderson said. "Well, I don't believe that. I think Scott Pettro ... has his opinion and sometimes he can be abrasive, but I don't think he's dishonest, and I don't think they thought they were violating the law."

From Pettro's point of view, the company had a long-standing "gentleman's agreement" with the county that allowed his gravel operation to excavate all 22.9 acres of his land, including 13 acres — worth about $1 million in gravel per acre — that are in a critical environment area.

Pettro's company received the property in 1998 through a land trade with the federal government for the purpose of mining, Pettro says.

Back "in the old days," Pettro says, his father had a "handshake and a gentleman's agreement" with the county that indicated the mining would be permissible even in the critical environment zone, "but those days are over now."

Pettro doesn't have any proof of the agreement in writing, thinking it wasn't necessary, but he points to his interactions with the county as evidence of its acceptance of his actions.

Pettro started mining the land in the critical environment zone in 1998.