Our Government Leaders Are Now Responsible for the Outcome of Mountain Accord
Last night the Summit County Council, like the Park City City Council before them, approved an agreement that keeps our community in the Mountain Accord process for the next three years. The decision will likely prove to be very courageous, very stupid, or perhaps both. No matter the outcome, one thing is clear, our governments have signed themselves up for the responsibility of ensuring a positive outcome for the people of the greater Park City area.
During last night’s meeting, council members Chris Robinson, Claudia McMullin, and Kim Carson voted in favor of signing onto a Mountain Accord interlocal agreement that will continue the study (and likely begin implementation) of plans to help mitigate transportation issues and environmental impact related to recreation and tourism in the central Wasatch. This will cost Summit county $150,000 in hard costs over three years. When accounting for soft costs, such as time from legal, planning, engineering, sustainability, and council personnel, that number probably doubles or triples.
The reasoning behind the “yes-votes” can be summed up as:
- We need to stay at the Mountain Accord table in order to have a say in what goes on.
- Staying in the Accord allows us to learn about alternatives that may be useful in the next 30 years.
- By working with partners across the region we form better relationships in order to solve mutual problems that may or may not be part of the Mountain Accord.
- Our own transportation needs are going to be so costly, that we don’t want to upset those people who have the money to pay for it — Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT).
I’ve been a fairly harsh critic of the Mountain Accord, but the logic Ms. Carson, Ms. Mc Mullin, and Mr. Robinson provided is sound. Mountain Accord showed people just what it is willing to do when it attempted to include a land swap in Utah county, when Utah County wasn’t even involved in the Mountain Accord. By having a part in the Accord, we get to watch the project like a hawk. While the “learning” and “friendship” arguments seem a little soft to me, the argument over needing funding from UDOT isn’t. Summit County effectively wasted spent over a $100,000 on a transportation study that said “use buses.” What do we think a solution to transportation on 224 and 248 is going to cost over the next 20 years? I have no idea, but lets say at least of tens of millions of dollars (Maybe a $100 million? Maybe more?). We don’t have that type of money. Who does? UDOT. When you’re hungry it’s not wise to spit in the face of man who has the loaf of bread.
Yet, the opposing views of Council Members Dave Ure and Roger Armstrong are solid too. They can be summarized as:
- Mountain Accord takes away focus from our other issues and just confuses us.
- The wrong organization (UTA) is managing the process, if the Mountain Accord is really about the environment.
- $150,000 could better be spent on solving our own problems.
- The studies that will be implemented from Mountain Accord will likely make development happen faster.
- Wasatch front issues will be the focus of the Accord.
When you look at the two opposing viewpoints one really represents HOPE that we can all work together to solve problems and that our (hopefully) benevolent benefactor (UDOT) will kindly look down on us in a god-like-fashion and shower us with a solution to our car-mageddon problems. The other viewpoint is the FEAR that we will lose control of a process that will ultimately waste money and more importantly impact our community’s quality of life.
So which is the stronger in the battle of HOPE versus FEAR? As they say, the outcome is all in the execution. Our leaders have chosen the path of engagement. Given that path, we as a community should expect the following things:
- There will be no tunnel between Big Cottonwood Canyon and Park City planned or conceived of in the next 10 to 20 years. If in 20 years, things change, then great. The people will have to decide at that point. But for the foreseeable future, there can be no tunnel.
- A detailed transportation plan that encompasses I-80 and Highways 224, 40, and 248 with practical, but out of the box solutions, will be developed in conjunction with us. If we get another plan that says increase busing, and adds three more daily runs to the Park City SLC Connect bus schedule, it will be a failure.
- Tens to hundreds of millions of dollars should be invested by the Utah Department of Transportation, during the next 10 years, with the goal of easing traffic problems around Park City
- Water quality and levels in Salt Lake City must be preserved at today’s levels indefinitely. If I recall, one of initial environmental issues in the Accord was the watershed serving Salt Lake. This always seemed like little impact in the short term to Park City, but we do care about the entire Wasatch and California has shown us that water troubles in one spot, impact everyone. Therefore, we need to measurable improvements in water coming from the Wasatch to Salt Lake.
- Nothing should be put in place that inhibits wildlife crossing freely into Summit County. One of environmental arguments of Mountain Accord was that it would ensure that wildlife could move freely across the boundaries of Salt Lake and Summit Counties. While this may seem minor, it is one of the few environmental impacts that seem to directly impact Summit County.
I’m sure there are a plethora of other “promises” that have been made that different interest groups desire, from protecting back country skiing to reducing pollution and I’ll be glad to add those to the list if people let me know.
The point is that our leaders have chosen to go along for the ride because they think it will make things better. This is courageous. Sticking your neck on the line is hard. Yet, that’s what they’ve signed up to do. So, we as citizens need to hold them to fighting for the above items every day. Every Mountain Accord Executive Committee meeting that one of our representatives attends should be focused on ensuring our interests are protected. Every planning document created by the Accord process needs to show that the other Accord participants are still willing to help us solve our problems (while we help them solve theirs).
If at the end of three years we look at the situation and it looks promising, we owe a debt of gratitude to the people who took on this task and managed it to fruition.
However, if we look back and don’t see measurable learning, broad based relationships, transportation solutions for our area, earmarked dollars for Summit County, and concrete environmental-saving impacts, this whole affair and those who pushed it will seem pretty foolish.
Worse yet, if a tunnel to Park City starts to be dug, as many people still fear it will be, then WE’LL ALL look pretty stupid. Yet even more, we all know who took on the burden of protecting our interests, and therefore, who let it happen.
Summit County Council Votes 3-2 to Continue To Be Part of Mountain Accord
The Summit County Council is visiting about the Mountain Accord and signing an interlocal agreement committing the county to $150,000 over 3 years. Here are some of the item stated during the meeting…
- Utah County request deferral of any actions impacting Utah County
- 1100 acres that snowbird was giving up to get 400 acres in Utah County (American Fork Canyon) are now in question
- Changes Summit County requested were not controversial
- Chris Robinson hopes to get direction from Council on how to proceed during next Monday’s meeting
- Was to be a 21st July formal signing ceremony but that has been postponed for a few weeks because of Utah County issues
- Chris Robinson says the interlocal agreement has been signed by many people and he would like us to sign that as well
- Carl Fisher Save Our Canyons, wrote email to Summit County Council
- Fisher says Save Our Canyons is behind Mountain Accord:
- Fisher says Mountain Accord isn’t perfect but it provides things otherwise hard to obtain
- Sierra Club representative says they hope Summit County will stay involved and hopes the Mountain Accord will come to fruition. They also approve of the Federal Land designation of the open space along the ridgeline between Summit County and Salt Lake County
- Citizen, Vern Greco, says he doesn’t represent any special interest group says that he feelsit is important that the county stays involved:
- Devil is in the details
- It’s going to be a long process and has fear that non Summit County interests impact us
Council Members Made Comments on Federal Land Designations:
- Roger Armstrong said he has concerns that the open space lands that may get federal designations, would take an act of congress to change. He wonders how things like climate change that could make skiing at low elevations hard, may make us wish we could allow it to be used differently in the future.
- Claudia McMullin and Kim Carson say they have few concerns with Federal Designations.
Council Members Made Comments on Interlocal Agreement:
- Roger Armstrong says still has concerns about Interlocal agreement. He has concerns about who helms the Mountain Accord.
The Council voted 3-2 to approve the funding agreement.
- Claudia McMullin voted for it. She says it is critical for us to stay at the table. She says it has highlighted transportation issues and she doesn’t want to alienate partners who could help us pay for transportation solutions.
- Dave Ure voted against it. He says he believes we will be disappointed in the Accord when it is finalized. He would prefer us to concentrate on our own issues. He asks if we will be able to address our issues because others don’t care about Summit County. He believes the studies will do nothing more than make the development happen faster. He wants to develop a transportation resolution to solve our problems. He says Mountain Accord puts false hope in our way and confuses us.
- Roger Armstrong voted against it. He says he has wrestled with it for a long time. He says he is not happy with the process. He feels Wasatch front interests are compelling in tapping into Summit County and thinks those interests won’t go away. He feels that the fact tunnel is still going to be studied that it is still in play. He feels having UTA still in driving seat means that transportation will still have focus. He worries that Summit County lands showing up at the end of the discussions, at such a late date, is problematic. He wonders why they showed up. He feels $150,000 spent on Mountain Accord could be better spent on our own transportation plan.
- Chris Robinson voted for it. He says that most people have heard his opinions on the topic. He says this will help us long term by getting partners together. He thinks it will be good for Summit County.
- Kim Carson voted for it for the same reasons as Claudia and Chris.
in Environment
Should the Recycle Utah Move Out of Town?
I arrived early today to a County Council Meeting and to my delight they were discussing the Recycling Center in Park City. Recycling Center personnel were presenting on the status of the program. What was interesting is that they are looking to move out of town into the Basin. It appears that in 2005, they were told by the City that they would need to move but that hasn’t been forced on them yet.
The personnel mentioned that they are averaging about 500 cars a day into their dead-end location. They also said that their “donating” population has shifted out to the Basin and would like to be able to move to a space with between 3 and 8 acres.
So, if you happen to know of a few acres cheap in the Basin, Recycle Utah would love to hear from you.
in Schools
Your Kid Should Drop Out of High School and Make $250K as a Programmer…. Sure.
My personal opinion is that the Park City School District should go into damage control mode, per recent meetings on their Kearns Campus Rebuild, the likely decision to move Treasure Mountain to Ecker Hill, and realigning grades. Their current proposals seem rushed, not thought out, have conflicts of interest, and are opposed by citizens at every meeting. Yet, as one might expect, they can’t seem to help themselves.
In today’s Park Record and on KPCW, we witnessed the full onslaught of the idea that all Park City elementary kids should learn to “code.” Yes, your kid could create the next Facebook!!! If you watched the movie The Social Network you may not be quite as excited about that concept. That said, you have to feel the rush of excitement that your child, in 17 years, could be working for MySpace.
First, I want to note that I am biased. I develop software for a living. However, that also provides me a background that I feel makes me competent to enter into this discussion. Let’s start with a Park Record quote by Ari Ioannides, CEO and founder of Emerald Data Solutions, who appears to be the guy who will be implementing this plan at Park City Schools:
Now let’s look at some basic code related to an “iphone app” that prints out the words Hello World on screen:
// First program example#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>int main (int argc, const char * argv[])
{
NSAutoreleasePool *pool = [[NSAutoreleasePool alloc] init];
NSLog (@"Hello, World!");
[pool drain];
return 0;
}
I’m sure all of my Realtor friends completely understand this “coding” line for line — at least the successful ones. I’m sure my developer friends probably use this type of “language” every day when they are planning and negotiating the next deal.
The point is that “coding” sounds great, and sexy, and money making, and… I suppose in some circles it sounds cool (not in my High School). Yet, it’s no different than any other profession. At times it is fun and other times it’s a drag. It’s for some people but not for most (like any job).
I’m frankly afraid that the School District is being taken advantage of — not in some sort of money making scheme but in a “mind-share” sort of way. Those of us in IT often see technology as an absolute SOLUTION and that is validated by success stories like Bill Gates, Sergey Brin, and Mark Zuckerberg. We think that if we can only get others into this fabulous realm we are in, they will experience a better life.
Yet, I keep coming back to what the Park City School District often repeats. They are RESEARCHED FOCUSED. Yet, I’ve tried to find research that substantiates that teaching a Kindergartner the Basic programming language has any sort of positive impact later in life. I can’t find it.
That leads me to the obvious conclusion… The School District thinks this SOUNDS GOOD and therefore they’ll proceed with it without any regard to cost or impact.
Perhaps the better question, brought up by a friend of mine, is what are they planning on taking away from the curriculum to teach “coding” to our elementary school students?
I almost don’t want to bring up the interview of Mr. Ioannides (the person behind this initiative) on KPCW this morning. I don’t think it could be described as anything other than a sh*tshow. Yet, I think statements from Mr Ioannides, Grant Smith (Technology Coordinator for Avondale Arizona Elementary Schools who are doing this program), and the answers to KPCW’s Leslie Thatcher’s questions were instructive. So, let’s go for it. We’ll begin with an opening comment from Mr Ioannides about why he wanted to do this:
Mr. Ioannides: I had no desire to help rich white kids learn how to code. This is, to me, to help underprivileged student Because its the fastest way to get successful. But Park City stepped up [and we are going forward].
Leslie Thatcher: So what’s going to happen? We have the curriculum?
Mr. Ioannides: We have the curriculum. Well, it’s technically a curriculum guide. It’s 200 pages. But it’s not really a curriculum.
Leslie Thatcher: So Grant, your district [Avondale Arizona] is already running this?
Grant Smith: Right, so we just finished our first year teaching all of our students from kindergarten to eighth grade teaching them every day. We replace our tech speciality classes and we used resources that were out there already. As Arie said, this isn’t difficult to do. We didn’t spend any extra money on it. But we are kind of cowboys out there and doing our own thing. That’s why we wrote this curriculum so we could stay true to ourselves. [We hope this become a national curriculum].
Leslie Thatcher: Grant, why do you think its something important that we teach?
Grant Smith: So, we teach all of our kids to code because it fulfills our district’s mission to develop thinkers, problem solvers, and communicators. It’s just an added bonus to us that it could bring our kids out of poverty… Why we really teach it is when you have to break a problem down and then construct a solution for it you have to know how to think logically and you have to know the problem solving process. So, now with Google you don’t need to memorize facts like you used to. Everything is on the Internet. What we need to do is analyze the information and make solutions that nobody has come up with before. So, solutions that we can’t Google like we have self driving cars. We have holograms. We have jobs and technology that are coming out of nowhere that we can’t keep up with but if we teach our kids Code, the underlying language, they’ll be useful in the workforce.
Leslie Thatcher: What can a kindergartner learn about coding?
Grant Smith: We have the view that learning to code is just like another language. We think teaching them this separate language is something to learn at a younger age so it gives you something to build on.
Mr. Ioannides: If I told you an education system neglected to teach the pervasive language what would you say about that? And you would say it’s a travesty. It is shocking. You can’t go a minute without touching technology and interacting with code. Yet the fact that we are graduating students in reading and writing music, which is just as easy to do, is horrible. As a coder, I can pick up almost any piece of code and read through it. We need to be teaching this language. Coders that know just basic Javascript can make $150,000 a year without a college education. I know a programmer who makes $250,000 a year and doesn’t have a high school diploma.
Leslie Thatcher: [Asks question about the business side of Mr Ioannides company”]
Mr. Ioannides: We aren’t asking for any money here. It is being run through the Park City Educational Foundation. Once we pilot here, it will be run through an inner city school and validate the findings. Then we will give it away. We are also working with Sundance Film Makers to tell the story.
Leslie thatcher: Certainly you can give away the curriculum but you have to have the people in pace to teach it.
Grant Smith: What we did was retrained our teachers. A good teacher is a good teacher no matter where you put them. Our teachers consists of a PE teacher, a 2nd grade teacher, and an art teacher. We use the grandmother strategy. If you don’t know what the answer is [to a question] so you would say, “I don’t know what the answer is to that question, can you go figure it out?” In that way, the teacher is no longer the expert in the room. It’s fostering project based learning. Children work with themselves and their peers to figure it out. That’s a great model…It’s student paced. A kindergarten student and a 4th grade student could be working on the same project depending on how fast they go.
Mr. Ioannides: We are teaching the ABC’s of the language in the first two levels and anyone could teach it. Leslie, you could do it. Just like you could teach them how to read, anyone could do it. These teachers don’t have to be coders [to teach].
Grant Smith: The good thing is that the state legislatures haven’t designed any standards. This is easy to do. We don’t have to write to any particular rules. What’s the end result? We have to teach them how to code. That’s the great thing, because we can do what we want because there is no testing. At the same time, there is no teacher preparation because there is no testing.
The interview then continued but that was the gist.
So, what do I take from this interview?
- If you don’t know how to program you can’t function in the current world.
- Kids shouldn’t memorize facts.
- Reading and writing music is easy.
- Your kids should drop out of
elementary school, middle school,high school and program Javascript and make $250,000. - I should stop writing this blog and focus on Javascript and make $250,000 per year.
- You should stop doing whatever it is you do and focus on computer programming and Javascript to make $250,000 a year (unless you already make $250,000 a year… then can I come over for dinner?).
- Your kids, too, can be useful in the workforce.
- Your kid’s current teacher will teach them to code.
- If you’re a teacher, you’ll find it easy to teach all your kids to code.
- There are no standards.
- Your donations during Live PC Give PC are probably paying for this.
Wow. That seems like a well thought out plan to me.
You may say, “Parkrag, it’s easy to criticize but harder to do. What will you do with your kids to make sure they are up to date on technology?”
Good question. I’ll try to expose them to all disciplines. Logic without understanding people is useless. I’ll try to expose them to graphic design. Unless a program is user friendly it is unusable. When they are in 7th grade, I’ll see if they have any interest in programming. By that time they may actually understand the concept of a variable. If they show interest, I’ll buy them a book. That way they actually understand what this means:
for i = 1 to 100
print i
next
Then, I’ll let them decide. Perhaps they’ll decide to be a plumber. You can’t outsource that to India at $10 an hour.
I Hope Park City Isn’t Counting on those Chinese Visitors
Random Shower Thought…
Park City’s much loved, and previous Mayor, Dana Williams took at least 3 trips to China during his tenure. These were sometimes billed as an attempt to drive the Chinese market to Park City as a vacation destination.
I hope we aren’t counting on those visitors. Here is the stock chart of the “Chinese NASDAQ” stock market for the last month. It’s down 40% during the last 30 days — and the decline is continuing.
Not good.
in Schools
Colorado’s early childhood education focus bumps student test scores ahead of Utah’s
The salt Lake Tribune is reporting on a study done by the Utah Foundation showing that Colorado’s adoption of public pre-school and full day kindergarten has made positive strides in reducing the achievement gap. The study highlights that Utah used to be ranked higher on national tests than Colorado but that’s not the case any more. It also shows that only 13% of 5 year olds attend full day kindergarten in Utah while almost 75% of 5 year olds do in Colorado.
This article is interesting in light of some of the recent changes Park City schools have made with relation to offering Pre-K and full-time kindergarten at each elementary school.
Here is the report, if you are interested.
Citizens Question Objectivity of a KPCW News Report on Rebuilding Schools
I received a call from a friend last week. She, in a somewhat exasperated tone said, “Have you ever heard anything as biased as that story on the Randy Barton Show (KPCW) about the School Board’s First Public Master Planning Meeting?” She was referring to a recorded segment by a KPCW reporter that aired during Randy Barton’s show last Tuesday or Wednesday. My friend felt that the report was extremely biased toward the School Board’s committee plans and didn’t accurately reflect the tone of the meeting, which was one of a very concerned populace. She said the reporter basically took each topic and said “a few people were concerned with [insert negative here]; however [insert person’s name here] doesn’t think so. [Insert one minute audio clip of the person saying why the plan is so good].
My friend’s closing comment intrigued me. She said, “If KPCW is so obviously biased on something I know a lot about, are they just as biased on everything else they report?”
The honest answer is that all media has biases, just like every person. The people who report for the Park Record can be biased. KPCW can be biased. I can be biased (obviously, since the Park Rag is a lot of commentary). Yet, what we are really talking about here is trust. Because we can’t all be at every meeting and draw conclusions for ourselves, we all depend on our community news sources like the Park Record and KPCW to tell us what happened. We trust them. However, when people know what happened at a meeting, but it’s reported very differently, that trust begins to erode. It makes people like my friend start to question everything they hear.
Lest you think this may have been a rant from just one person, I have heard other people in the community bring up this same news report and question its objectivity.
Unfortunately for KPCW it appears they had a bad day, but it’s going to take many good days in a row to change the perception from that one piece of reporting (in many people’s minds). In my opinion it doesn’t signal some change in attitude or lessening of the value KPCW provides, but again it highlights that we all need to seek out as many sources of information to educate us on the topics we care about. It’s not enough to simply peruse an article in the Park Record, listen to a story on KPCW, or read something here. We also have to verify that information, too. Or as one elder statesman said, “Trust but Verify.”*
This incident on KPCW serves as a good reminder of that fact.
*Yes, I did just use a Ronald Reagan quote, which means that many of you will likely no longer trust me either.
in Economy
What’s Wrong With Park City’s Hotel Occupancy Rates?
I was reading tomorrow’s Park Record (I love the fact that the online version shows up the night before) and it was educating people on taking buses to the 4th of July parade. Toward the end of the article, hotel occupancy was discussed. It said:
Occupancy rate is the percentage of hotel rooms rented each day.
While Park City’s 34% rate doesn’t sound good, I wondered if perhaps it wasn’t too bad. So I searched Statistica (the Statistics portal). I found the following average occupancy rates by month/year and region around the world:
It appears our occupancy rate this week is a little under half the average of U.S. hotel. I’ve always heard our rates are low. This seems to confirm that.
Utah County Tells Mountain Accord to Hit the Brakes
Provo’s Herald newspaper is reporting that Utah County has told the Mountain Accord to back off on plans to incorporate American Fork Canyon into the Mountain Accord process. It appears that Mountain Accord officials planned on incorporating American Fork Canyon into the project but that they hadn’t fully consulted Utah County, its cities, and other stakeholders.
The article says:
That sounds about par for the course, with the way the Mountain Accord has operated so far. It also highlights why we in Summit County need to have constant vigilance on the Mountain Accord and why it is so important that community members have taken an active role in the process.
I had heard the Mountain Accord had considered making a grand loop with transportation through American Fork. I guess I has assumed that they would have consulted with officials there first. It looks like that was a bad assumption.
in Skiing
Annual Heads Up on Buying Vail’s Epic Pass
Last year I noticed that Vail tacks on $20 to an Epic Local Pass in a sort of underhanded way. This year they’ll quote the price at $579 but in your cart it will be $599. This is because they add $20 pass insurance to it. Now, pass insurance could be good. It covers things like cancelling before the season, pregnancy, job transfer, etc. However, if that doesn’t apply to you, you may want to save $20.
To do that, add the pass to your cart. In the cart, click the plus (+) sign. It will show you the extra $20 charge. You can then remove it.
Parkrag
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