Draper City Council Meeting July 15, 2025: Station Area Plans, Capital Improvements, Public Hearings
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Draper City Council Meeting - July 15, 2025
The Draper City Council met on July 15, 2025, starting with a study session at 5:30 PM and a business session at 7:00 PM. The study session included a joint meeting with the Planning Commission to discuss the Station Area Plan survey results and draft concepts, a presentation from Jordan Valley Water on a proposed property tax increase, and updates on major road and parks capital improvement projects. The business session featured a public hearing on a hospitality amenity license, a report on the 2025 Moderate Income Housing Plan, consent items, and a Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) meeting.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Steve Kirk (891 E. 1220 S.) requested assistance from Draper City to establish an easement on a piece of land next to his home that was recently vacated and will be sold soon. He stated that the land has been his only access to his detached garage for 30 years and that he needs an easement before the sale to avoid legal action against the buyer.
- Stacy Williams (378 W. 13240 S.) reported ongoing parking issues on her street caused by apartment residents using the street as permanent parking. She requested permit-only parking for residents or a perimeter fence for the apartments. She noted that her family has received tickets despite parking in front of their own home.
- Jeremy Wilson (352 W. 13240 S.) echoed Stacy Williams' comments.
Consent Calendar
- Approval of the July 1, 2025 City Council Meeting Minutes – Approved unanimously (4-0).
- Approval of Resolution #25-38 – Reappointing Nancy Nichols and Christa Hutchison to the Draper City Historic Preservation Commission. Approved unanimously (4-0).
Discussion Items
- Station Area Plan Survey Results and Draft Plan Review – Consultants from Design Workshop and Farron Peters presented the results of the online survey (almost 800 responses) and open house (about 20 attendees) for the three station areas: Crescent View, Kimball's Lane, and Vista (FrontRunner). Key findings: strong opposition to high-density housing (especially over four stories), support for improved pedestrian and trail infrastructure, and concerns about traffic at Kimball's Lane and 7th East. Preferred concepts included a marketplace at Vista, cottage housing and townhomes at Kimball's (maintaining the curve of Kimball's Lane but leaving option for future direct connection to 7th East), and a limited redevelopment vision at Crescent View that preserves the existing grocery store. The council discussed traffic modeling, school peak times, and the need for better east-west connections. The plan is to refine concepts and bring a final draft for adoption by September 2025.
- Jordan Valley Water Rates Presentation – John Richardson (Draper trustee on Jordan Valley Water) and Alan Packard (General Manager) presented a proposed property tax increase to fund over $210 million in capital projects over five years, including a $120 million upgrade and expansion of the Herman water treatment plant (last expanded in 1986). A truth-in-taxation public hearing is scheduled for August 11, 2025 at 6:00 PM in West Jordan.
- Major Road Capital Improvement Projects – Scott Cooley reported on several projects: 146th South advanced warning signal (completed April), Lone Peak Parkway widening (in advance of federal project, delayed due to 123rd South intersection improvements), 138 South reconstruction (third phase, on schedule for October 1 but delayed by pipe supply), 700 East Willow Springs flooding mitigation, 700 West storm drain connection, Suncrest concrete barrier replacement (due to guardrail and water line conflict), Highland Drive sidewalk gap closure, and 2025 pavement maintenance projects. Councilmember Johnson noted a dangerous intersection at Highland and Rambling where drivers often take the wrong lane; Cooley agreed to investigate.
- Parks Capital Improvement Projects – Rhett Ogden provided updates: completed trails at Rattlesnake Gulch, Deer Ridge (three trails), Dobbins Way Trail, and Maple Hollow bridges (four new, one reworked). Ongoing projects: Bubbling Brook Park pickleball/basketball court (final inspection next week), Porter Rockwell Trail phase two (paved trail from 123rd to 114th, now complete), phase three (athletic fields, pickleball courts, bike park, restroom, parking) to be bid in August. Other projects: Highland Trail (Lehi City partnership nearly done), Carpe DM trail (directional downhill bike rebuild), Porter Rockwell trail crossing at UTA tracks (proposed cut through to use existing bridge), Cranberry Hills neighborhood trail access, parks storage garage, Inauguration/Sunrise park consolidation, and a proposed bridge over Spring Hollow on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail (funded by a 50-50 state grant, $100k total, but not yet funded in city budget). Council expressed urgency to fund the bridge to prevent trail closure.
- 2025 Moderate Income Housing Report – Todd Taylor presented the annual report required by the state, due August 1. Key data: 4,194 entitled housing units that had not received building permits (as of last year, with 299 will-serve letters), 35 recorded accessory dwelling units (ADUs), 10 ADU permits issued last year. Progress on strategies included: reducing ADU regulations (text amendment passed November 2024), partnership with Salt Lake County for moderate income housing (resolution through June 2027), adoption of Town Center Station Area Plan (March 2025, certified May 2025), and ongoing comprehensive code update. Workforce housing partnerships: 7 units with Ivory/Big Willow (2 occupied, prices $390k-$475k) and at least 30 units required from Edge Homes development. Council noted that the majority of entitled units are in the Vista Station area (about 1,600 units).
- Public Hearing: Hospitality Amenity License for Draper Hotel Holdings LLC dba Homewood Suites – The property is located along Banger Highway. Staff confirmed the hotel meets distance requirements from community locations (over 3,000 feet pedestrian route, well over 200 feet straight line). No public opposition. The council approved the license unanimously (4-0).
Key Outcomes
- Consent Items – Approved unanimously (4-0).
- Hospitality Amenity License – Approved unanimously (4-0).
- CRA Meeting – Approved the June 17, 2025 CRA meeting minutes and adopted Resolution CRA #25-05 adopting the 2025 annual report (unanimous 4-0). The CRA report highlighted seven active project areas, with three still collecting tax increment. The council discussed the need to address Plural Site's non-performance on job/wage benchmarks in the South Mountain project area, and agreed to work with staff and consultant to resolve the issue. The Gateway project area is being dissolved, and Sand Hills and West Freeway will be dissolved once fund balances are expended. The council also noted the five-year deadline to spend remaining fund balances in inactive project areas per state legislation.
- Adjournment – The meeting adjourned at approximately 8:30 PM.
Meeting Transcript
Let's get our study session underway. First item we have on our agenda is a discussion on the stationary plan survey results and the draft plan review. And then I will have a presentation after that by Jordan Valley Water. We're going to start off with the stationary plan. Jen, you got that. Go ahead. I do have consultants here with Fair Imperials and Design Workshop to go over the results of our the open house and the survey as well as the preferred con draft preferred draft concepts that staff and the consultants have come up with given the comments that we received from the survey and the open house. Our goal tonight is to get feedback from you guys on those concepts so that we can go back and refine those as we uh finalize a draft stationary plan to bring to you guys for review and adoption. And Jen, let me before I start, I should have done this. I want to note that we're in our study session. We have a joint this is a joint meeting with our planning commission. So I like to recognize our planning commissioners for all being here. It looks like you have well a fair number of you, if not all of you almost. But uh anyway, we do this a couple times a year, and so we're glad to have you. Thank you for coming. And uh we look forward to talking together. Go ahead, Jen. Sorry. Okay. So I'm gonna turn it over to Chris Geddes with um design workshop to kind of go through the the doc map. Thanks, Jennifer and Mayor, Council. Good to see you, planning commission, good to see you all as well. Um can I operate this with this mouse? Yes, I can. All right. Um, so uh just a short agenda. Um, we'll give a bit of a project update. Just again talking about the open house and the the online um survey results that we received, um, talking about the three preferred comments as Jen uh mentioned, and then have time for discussion with council and planning commission. Um as I'll just skip this slide. Um so engagement, we've been doing engagement in three um different and distinct windows. The first one was uh the March to April window, where we really met with um met with folks who had um some say in in the n in the station areas, and again we're talking talking about Crescent View, Kimball's and Vista Station. Um so uh in that early stage we really started talking about vision. What should the station area is um be thinking about what what do we want the future to hold? So talking to stakeholders and project partners as well as city leadership. Um, after that, we did a design charrette uh in this room uh around all the three stations where we had people really do some hands-on activities about really thinking about the future of the stations. Um so that again that was the client team, those key the same key stakeholders were invited. Um, and then we had a workshop with council and planning commission at that time. That was again uh back in April. Um in May and June, we moved into window two, uh, which was uh the online survey and the open house. And we'll go through the results there again. Um, but that really is the the bulk of how we got uh information that were will lead into recommendations uh for this plan. Uh we are currently in an engagement window three where we're doing uh leadership presentations, that's why we're here tonight, um, and getting ready to hopefully get this set up for adoption by council uh yet this fall. Um, as a reminder, we are required by the state to have the these plans adopted or adopted uh this fall so that they can be certified by the state uh by the end of the year. Um so it is a pretty fast process. Um we think that we've been doing the right touch points and are getting some good feedback on this. So again, what we've heard the open house uh we had uh back in June, June 5th. Um it wasn't the most well-attended open house we've ever seen. We had about 20 people come through, um, but there were some really positive conversations that that came out of that um that that open house, I think. We got some great feedback, had the opportunity to have some in-depth conversations with neighbors. Um, the mayor here was here the entire time, and we appreciated that just to so that he could hear the thoughts the folks that that brought to the table.
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