2 candidates share Avenues' concerns

Phil Carroll and Stan Penfold both want to keep property taxes down and McMansions out of their Avenues neighborhood.

But the two Salt Lake City Council candidates don't necessarily see eye-to-eye on the city's proposed nondiscrimination ordinance and alcohol reform.

The two former Greater Avenues Community Council chairmen, who emerged from the Democrat-dominated primary last month, squared off in a recent debate hosted by KCPW at the Salt Lake City Main Library.

With the city already eyeing an overhaul of its alcohol laws, including the possibility of allowing neighborhood pubs, Carroll said officials should go slowly.

"What is normal for Portland may not be normal for Salt Lake," said Carroll, the founder of Community Housing Services, a nonprofit group that purchases and preserves affordable housing in the state. "That big of a change just isn't appropriate for the Avenues. I'm really against having pubs and bars in our residential neighborhoods in the guise of walkable communities."

Penfold, however, said he is open to the idea of small pubs in some places.

"I think it's worth exploring," the director of the Utah AIDS Foundation said.

Both candidates expressed support Thursday for Mayor Ralph Becker's proposed nondiscrimination ordinances, which would provide housing and employment protections for gays and lesbians.

"It is what proactive and progressive communities do," Penfold said.

But while Penfold "completely" supports the ordinances, Carroll had some reservations about enforcement issues.

"When we're creating a special, another protected class, we run into some issues about how it's going to be enforced," he said. "We need to make sure it's fair and it works. … People have complaints issued against them, and they don't even know the status of the person issuing the complaint."

Both men, meanwhile, expressed an interest about historic preservation and had concerns about "monster homes."

"The city needs to be proactive," Penfold said. "It won't be long before we see people buying one, two, three lots, tearing down all the houses to build one home. We should be anticipating that."

e-mail: afalk@desnews.com