Walker plans to take the additional closed-meeting provisions out of the bill. Brian Allen, lobbyist for east-side Cottonwood Heights city, says it's not needed, as the law already provides for real estate negotiation strategy, which he believes would be rare, to be discussed away from the public eye.

But Walker will keep another contentious part in the bill.

The west-side transition team wants to take school buildings and everything in them in each of the districts off the negotiating table, mainly to streamline the workload. What's west is west's, east is east's, Haws said.

But the east-side team wonders if that's fair. "We have 40-year-old buildings, they have brand-new buildings," Allen said. "Is that a fair distribution of the assets?"

Walker says the law's always intended to have everything on the table for division. She says the bill clarifies that.

"They have very real modifications to make (in east-side buildings) to make sure they are safe and up to date. In order to be equitable, you have to consider that," Walker said. "There's just some hard-core people who don't want the split to happen and they're throwing out a red herring. This simply is ... an effort to be fair and equitable."

But Mascaro says the appraised value part is an attempt of the east side to be compensated by the west side for having older buildings. And that, he says, isn't right. The west side's booming growth and inability to immediately pay for needed new schools without the east's hefty tax base spurred a bill to equalize money available to growing, tax-poor school districts.

"What we're saying on the west side is hey, you wanted the east side and the issues of the east side, then you should deal with the issues on the east side, and we'll deal with our issues on the west side," Mascaro said.

Allen says the east side isn't interested in appraisals — maybe just agreeing on the value of buildings that may be in dispute, Allen said.

"We are trying to make this fair," Allen said. "They're making this a lot more cantankerous than it needs to be ... people on both sides," he said. "This should be harmonious."

---

E-mail: jtcook@desnews.com