In January, Ivory Homes filed two parallel development applications on behalf of landowners in Browns Canyon.
One was a rezone request with Summit County — seeking a new zoning category — and the other petitioned the state of Utah to create a new town.
Ivory Development President Chris Gamvroulas said the company would prefer the rezone, and not to be in charge of its own town.
“We filed a preliminary municipality application as a contingency,” he said Jan. 30. “We've had prior experience, and we have real concerns about whether a project of this size can be processed in a timely and predictable way.”
The rezone request, which KPCW obtained through a public records request, is larger in size and scope than the development described in Ivory’s incorporation petition.
The rezone covers 600 acres, 400 of which would be developed with about 2,300 to 3,000 units of housing.
Gamvroulas likened the look and feel of the neighborhood, dubbed “Lost Creek,” to another Ivory project: Park City Heights.
“Drive through that, and that's the types of land uses, the types of lot sizes, the types of homes, including the architecture and design that we're envisioning for this location,” he said.
The area is about three miles up Browns Canyon Road from state Route 248, and centered around the large white barn of Goldstone Ranch. The land to be developed is owned by LLCs associated with the Garff and Rogers families.
Browns Canyon is mostly zoned for agriculture and one home per 80 acres.
Ivory has proposed a new, specially tailored zoning category called the “Lost Creek Community Zone” to allow for more density.
As drafted, the new zone would only allow properties with at least 100 acres and within one mile of Browns Canyon Road to apply for it. The properties don’t need to be contiguous.
Summit County planners and state incorporation officials are currently reviewing Ivory’s dual development applications to make sure they’re complete.
The application for a town includes 510 units on 491 acres, half of them nightly rentals.
The advantage of creating a town is the landowners’ appointees would decide the zoning, not the Summit County Council.
But the county’s top planner, Community Development Director Peter Barnes, says it makes sense why developers wouldn’t want some of the headaches associated with incorporation.
“Running a town is a lot more complicated than just becoming a homeowners association,” he said on KPCW’s “Local News Hour” Feb. 4. “There's things you have to do as a town, responsibilities, services to provide it makes it much more expensive.”
Summit County has already seen another company pursue development while keeping incorporation in its back pocket.
Dakota Pacific Real Estate will build up to 885 units of housing in western Kimball Junction. But after its approval, resident outcry and a push to block the development at the ballot box, Dakota Pacific also applied for its own town, which it too framed as “plan B.”
Citing the Legislature’s desire to push the controversial project through, some Summit County councilmembers said they voted to approve it because it was the best deal they could get.
The company’s incorporation petition is still pending while it moves through Summit County’s planning processes.
The state hasn’t accepted Ivory Homes’ petition yet.
Utah law only lets two so-called preliminary municipality applications proceed each calendar year. The Utah Lieutenant Governor’s Office is expected to decide which petition or petitions it will certify before the end of February.
Preliminary municipalities are different from traditional incorporations, which require a vote among residents to create a town.
Preliminary municipalities, on the other hand, can be created by up to three landowners on mostly undeveloped land — and without a vote.
This year, GOP Rep. Tiara Auxier, who represents Summit, Morgan and Rich counties, has proposed a reform bill designed to let counties weigh in on or audit a preliminary municipality’s feasibility study.
It also would require developers to notify a county before applying for a town and build it exactly as it's described in the application.
Developers would also have to post a bond to pay a county for damages if incorporation fails.
Auxier told KPCW Feb. 9 parts of her bill would affect existing preliminary municipality applications, but it’s unclear what that means for the Lost Creek project if it proceeds.
The 2026 Legislative General Session ends March 6.
