Hideout won. In the great annexation kerfuffle, the Utah Supreme Court decided in Hideout’s favor. My email blew up when the announcement came out. What in the world? 

For starters, unlike other Supreme Courts that have become corrupt partisan tools, the Utah Supreme Court is still on the up and up. Nobody’s buying them motor homes. 

If you haven’t been following this like “American Ninja Warriors,” here’s the scoop. The town of Hideout, on the east side of Jordanelle in Wasatch County, was approached by the owner of property in Richardson Flat. That land is in Summit County, and is generally above the old tailings pond. The land owner was getting nowhere with Summit County on the approval he wanted, so he approached Hideout. The first attempt to annex didn’t work because of technical objections raised by Summit County. 

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So the owner did what any Utah developer would do — he approached the Utah Legislature for a special favor. Unlike the Utah Supreme Court, the Utah Legislature seems to be rotten to the core, which is to be expected after a generation of one-party rule. It’s worked so well in China and Russia, for example.  The landowner got his cronies in the Legislature to slip a provision into boring housekeeping bill on land use that allowed a town to annex land in another county without that county’s consent. Done deal, Hideout did it, and off to the courthouse.

The special deal law was in place for about 100 days. When the rest of the legislators realized that once again they had been bamboozled by corrupt “leadership,” the provision got repealed. But it was there long enough to work its mischief.

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If you are keeping score at home, it’s Hideout 2, Responsible Government 0. Hideout itself exists only because of similar legislative shenanigans that allowed the incorporation of towns with no people in them. The property owners in the new towns could write their own zoning laws, which in Hideout’s case got them past some difficult Wasatch County regulations. 

Hideout is an egregious example. Bryce Canyon City is another example. In that case, almost all of the sales tax revenue in Garfield County is generated out of Ruby’s Inn at the entrance to Bryce. But the population of Garfield County lives in Panguitch, and the county spent all the sales tax money there.  After incorporation, Bryce Canyon City was able to keep the sales tax it generates. 

The Supreme Court’s decision wasn’t that the Hideout annexation (or Hideout itself), or the legislative skullduggery, were good ideas. It simply decided that as the law was written, for all of 100 days, the Utah Legislature said that Summit County had no legally recognized interest in the annexation process.  In other words, it was none of Summit County’s business because the Legislature said it wasn’t. The Court was awfully polite, and never once called the Legislature a cesspool full of crooks. But they were thinking it.

So where do we go from here? I assume that Hideout will complete the annexation that has been held up by the litigation. That may or not be terrible. In the debate between density and sprawl, Hideout has enthusiastically said “yes.” The great irony of Hideout is that in a town where the developer wrote the zoning, he neglected to allow anyplace for a grocery store. It’s impossible to buy a cup of coffee in Hideout except maybe the golf course, let alone groceries. So the annexation area likely will include a clone of every mistake made at Kimball Junction. Whatever happens will surely make the traffic on 248 worse. 

On the plus side, there’s an opportunity to build some less expensive housing out there, a place to put some of the necessary, but not pretty, businesses a community needs, like a place to get your oil changed. Maybe the Harmons store that got shot down at the outlet mall finds a home in Hideout.  Trader Joes? Target? Or a pile of fast food outlets.  

If there’s a bright spot, and that’s a low bar, it’s that the ownership appears to have changed. The Larry H. Miller Group purchased most of Richardson Flat. Park City annexed that. The Hideout annexation property is in the name of Hideout Community Advancement and Development LLC, which sounds as benign as the Sisters of Mercy. That was the group behind the legislative sleaze that made all of this possible. Who could object to “community advancement?” 

But since all of this started, the Miller Group has also bought either all or at least what seems to be a controlling interest in Community Advancement. So it’s all under one ownership, split between Hideout and Park City’s jurisdictions. The last time we had a parcel of land that size in one ownership was Deer Valley. There are planning opportunities there that wouldn’t exist with multiple owners and property lines.

In a perfect world, or even a marginally functional one, there would be some regional discussion between Hideout and Park City.  Even the two counties. There is huge potential out there in the wasteland for solving a lot of regional problems, not the least of which is getting a grocery store to serve everybody living around Jordanelle. It will take some diplomacy and cooperation. The Miller Group is a competent and financially solid developer. It could work. 

Or we can just let it rip, because what could possibly go wrong in Hideout?