By David Baker

February 17, 2006 | PARADISE -- Differences in city and county development procedures complicated discussion at Wednesday night's Town Council meeting.

"The best would be if county and cities have the same procedure," Councilwoman Margaret Obray said.

These procedural issues came up during a discussion the council had with Ty Haguewood, a developer representing landowners Joe Gappa and Tom and Helga Dyson. Haguewood wants to put a subdivision north of the cemetery and needs to secure road access to the location. Although the land is just outside the city limits, the council has to approve road access to the potential subdivision.

That's where the problems come in.

Mayor Lee Atwood says Paradise's procedure for dealing with subdivisions requires three phases: sketch, preliminary and final approval. The sketch is approving the concept on paper. By the preliminary phase, the town requires the property to be surveyed and have survey markers in the ground.

But Atwood says Cache County's procedure only calls for preliminary and final approval. The process continues on paper until the final approval when a survey is done and markers are placed.

"What you have on paper may not be what you have in the field," Atwood said. "You may have more or less ground, and that can change the lot size. It is important that that doesn't happen."

Differences may not cause future problems, Atwood said, because there are "changes in the wind at the county." But they didn't say what those changes would be.

Such changes may affect Haguewood's subdivision down the road, but for now the procedural differences are still causing some hang-ups in the process. Since the county doesn't require it at this point, Haguewood hasn't had the property fully surveyed. Without the survey, the council raised questions about the actual amount of property and how that may affect the city's right of way and the lot sizes.

The council sent Haguewood to the Planning and Zoning Commission so it could review the plans and make a recommendation.

"We can't give anything to you until we have their recommendation," Obray told Haguewood. "We have to go off their recommendations."

Haguewood said he is scheduled to have the plan reviewed by the county on Feb. 23 but will have to push that date back.

Also:

-- the council closed the meeting from 9:05 to 9:25 to discuss issues concerning a lawsuit between the town of Paradise and the Upper Stream Water Rights owners Vere Johnson, Merv Weeks and Andy Johnson. The lawsuit came from a water usage dispute between the town and the property owners.

-- the representative from the Cache Chamber of Commerce, who was scheduled to give a presentation about Cache Valley in 2020, wasn't able to attend because of snowy conditions.

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