City attorney: Salt Lake won't renegotiate easement

The Associated Press

06.15.99

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	Salt Lake City's Main Street as it looks now, near Mormon Temple.

SALT LAKE CITY — The city's sale of one block of Main Street is a done deal, with the church having paid the $8.2 million — and the city having spent it — and there's no way the parties are going to renegotiate the public easement, says City Attorney Roger Cutler.

In a letter to American Civil Liberties Union of Utah legal director Stephen Clark, Cutler said if a judge required the city to rewrite the easement's restrictions to protect free speech, he would abandon the easement. Theoretically, the church then could close off the block altogether.

Cutler believes a court would uphold the restrictions on public access, but, if not, "it is more than probable that, if forced to choose, the city would elect to deed the easement to the purchaser, rather than face" the prospect of having to refund the church's money.

"We have no plans to give (the easement) up and nobody's discussed that," Cutler said on June 10. "But we're not giving the money back. It's already been spent." Cutler was quoted in a copyrighted story in The Salt Lake Tribune.

Artist's conception of how Main Street would look in future.

Besides, he said, the Mormon church "didn't pay $8 million for nothing."

On April 13, the City Council approved selling Main Street between North Temple and South Temple to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The street has since been closed and construction of a plaza is under way.

In exchange for $8.1 million and a perpetual public easement, church attorneys drafted restrictions on behavior that outlaw boomboxes, signs, protests, riding bikes and various other activities. The church will be able to broadcast conference talks and music and distribute literature.

Clark has questioned the constitutionality of the city-sanctioned restrictions on public behavior and speech and the protections for church activities. Cutler has dismissed Clark's arguments.