The Summit County Council will hold a retreat in about three weeks. Council member Chris Robinson says that the likely topics will range from a possible Olympics, more than a decade away, to the current perennial problems like transit.
Robinson said the retreat will be held on February 8th.
“I think we want to talk about how we’re going to be involved in the Olympics. As the state, the host cities, move towards a 2030 bid. As well as transit and transportation are always important topics now. We’ve asked some tax increases to give us the tools we need to mover that ball down the court. Now we need to make sure that we’re on the right court and have the right ball. Affordable housing, I mean these are perennial topics. I think the housing gap is at epic proportions.”
He said he would like to re-look at the county’s transit contract with Park City. That comes while some Basin residents have written Letters to the Editor expressing angst over the changes made to individual routes like the Pink Line.
“I don’t want to necessarily get into the weeds of which routes we ought to be running. My position is we started out many years ago with interlocal agreement where Park City Municipal had a transit system and we became an appendage to it by contract. Now, things have evolved where I believe we need to look at our structure of governance on that and get a right set of governance, so we can be more informed as a county and more a part of the transit district, so we can address concerns like the Pink and the Lime and other things. Where right now we’re sort of just buying services. We’re a passenger on the bus we’re not a co-driver and we’re just buying services.”
He said they may need to move to a more regional system, and he suspects the county may have outgrown their current contractual relationship with the city.
On another item, the county has shelved an idea Robinson suggested last year, to extend Chalk Creek Road to link up with the Mirror Lake Highway. Robinson said he wanted to study the idea, and it could have been a great asset to have another link to Highway 150.
But it was dropped for several reasons.
“One that we have a pretty full plate. Two there were some people who were alleging that I had a personal interest in it and if that’s the case I don’t want to ever see its done. Thirdly that really should be driven by more of a grass roots desire for it from north Summit. If the political leaders and community leaders want to get behind it that would be great, but I didn’t like any talk of it being something to benefit Chris Robinson. That’s not the way to do business and I’ll kill it myself if that’s what the discussion is going to revolve around.”