Pub. 4 2014-2015 Issue 2

20 A Roundtable Discussion How to Work with Cities How did S.B. 29, School Planning and Zoning Process, all come about? Senator Vickers: It started a year ago in the House between those involved with school construction and the members of the House who were involved. Over the summer I had a situation arise with the city of Washington, which I represent, and they had a charter school that was going in and there was some concern about the process taking place. We had multiple meetings working with the legislative research, getting the language the way we wanted. The result after a lot of collaboration was a clean bill we were able to present to the Legislature and the early part of the Legislature’s latest session. What is S.B. 29? Senator Vickers: Essentially what we were trying to do was to put the best practices into place. S.B. 29 would require the school district or charter school to go to the local city government prior to the acquisition of the site for the school to provide information on potential community impacts, lot size, building size, the estimated student enrollment, proposals for traffic, safety and emergency services access, building footprint, and the location. After purchase, but before construction begins, the school district or charter school representative would meet with the local city govern- ment to review the proposed site plan and then submit it to their design and review committee. The design and review committee would then provide comments back to the entity within 30 days of that action. U APCS recently had the opportunity to speak with Utah State Senator Evan Vickers, who represents District 28, to discuss S.B. 29, School Planning and Zoning Process. Gary Crane, City Attorney for Layton City, Chris Bleak, Director of Ascent Academies, and Royce Van Tassell, Executive Director of UAPCS each sat down to discuss the new process in place for building a school in Utah and the best practices to accomplish it. What makes legislation for a bill like S.B. 29 necessary? Chris: What this hopefully does and will do in the future is create a good set of guiding principles that charter schools can follow to best interact with a city and create a win-win solution. Any time you do any kind of planning and zoning issue, whether it be a school, a house, or anything else you’re going to create some kind of impact on people and sometimes those people aren’t going to be happy, but this creates a really nice set of principles on how to get in, get in early or as early as you can, and start planning jointly with the city so that each side understands one another. Gary: This is the ultimate pre-planning tool. Nobody is bound by the things that are placed or the requirements that are placed within the document, but at the same time, it gives both sides the opportunity to come together and both take a look at the time of the acquisition of the property. What are some of the processes and pressures cities have that charter schools need to be aware of? Gary: Don’t get lost in the excitement of the construction of the school that you don’t take local impact fees into consid- eration. When you go in advance, find out what types of local impact fees won’t be charged and what types of fees would be best. These include items such as: the type of utilities that will be needed, storm water facilities, and the type of water