The small farming community may officially ring in the new year by becoming Utah’s newest city.
Erda farmland seen on Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2020.Erda’s future status of becoming a cityAt an emergency hearing Wednesday, 3rd District Judge Dianna Gibson ordered Tooele County to finish reviewing a plat map that is a critical last step to Erda’s incorporation. And County Recorder-Surveyor Jerry Houghton doesn’t have a lot of time to approve the document. Gibson gave him until 10 a.m. Thursday to have the map signed and ready to meet a deadline with the lieutenant governor’s office.
“I do feel for Jerry,” Bird said. “I know he is an honest man and that this is all just a big misunderstanding brought about by ambiguities in the law. But I saw no other way to get the map approved in time other than to bring it before a judge. ... We’ll see what happens in the morning.” Attorneys for the county argued that the split-parcel rule did indeed apply, because Erda submitted its plat map after it became law. Erda’s incorporation also didn’t face “irreparable harm,” the county argued, if the city’s sponsors did not meet the lieutenant governor’s Thursday deadline to submit all its documents.
Gibson, however, ruled the new split-parcel law “does not apply to Mr. Houghton’s review of the final plat map for purposes of Erda’s incorporation.” The judge did not weigh in on whether Houghton’s fee for the plat map review was reasonable. But, Gibson said, “nothing” in state law allows the surveyor “to withhold his approval ... based on a failure to pay any fee.”
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