A judge is drafting a proposal to reform the trust that holds the real estate assets of The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Judge Denise Lindberg said in 3rd District Court Monday the civil and religious aspects of the United Effort Plan trust need to be separated. She said she's been working on a reform plan so "the Board of Trustees can administer the trust, receiving nonbinding input from the priesthood line."

Lindberg said she hopes to complete her reform proposal within two weeks.

The trust was established in 1940 to hold the collective assets of church members. Comprised only of property in Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., it includes most of the homes inhabited by the church's estimated 10,000 members. Its value is estimated at roughly $100 million.

In recent years, FLDS Church leaders are said to have used the trust to establish social controls over members, dictating who lived in which homes.

The FLDS Church is one of several offshoots of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and split from the main faith nearly 100 years ago after it abandoned the practice of polygamy. Members of the FLDS Church continue to believe that plural marriage is a condition of salvation.

In May, the Utah attorney general sought court control of the trust, saying its Board of Trustees was liquidating assets for personal use and had left the trust vulnerable to seizure by refusing to respond to lawsuits filed against FLDS leader Warren Jeffs. The court officially removed Jeffs and the other trustees in July and appointed accountant Bruce Wisan as temporary manager.

Some 23 people — both in and outside the church community — have been nominated to replace the ousted trustees, and Lindberg had been expected to announce which of those she had selected for the job on Monday.

Instead she announced her own reform plans and said that for now she only intends to appoint a temporary advisory board to work with Wisan. Under Lindberg's proposal, the board would meet 12 or 16 times over the next year and would be compensated with a per diem rate of $150-$175 and for travel, she said.

The temporary board will allow for a test run of the reformed trust and will aid Wisan as he continues to determine how the trust has operated over the past 60 years, Lindberg said.

She gave the proposed trustees 10 days to either withdraw or restate their interest in working in an advisory capacity. Lindberg also stressed that she is considering applicants individually, not in the clusters proposed by various attorneys.

"I am looking at individuals, not at slates," Lindberg said, adding that she's not ruling out the possibility of permanently placing the trust in the hands of a professional manager.

On the stand, Wisan said he supports Lindberg's proposal and reiterated the difficulties he's found in assessing trust properties. Wisan said the trust has only been managed by "lay people" using unsophisticated accounting practices.

In particular, Wisan expressed his concern for paying more than $1 million in taxes due this month on property in Mohave County, Ariz., and to Washington County, Utah. Less that 50 percent of what's owed was paid by the church earlier this year to Mohave County, Wisan said. And nothing has been paid in Utah.

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Wisan said he's not inclined to pay the taxes until a professional survey of the community can be done. No survey documents appear to exist for either Hildale or Colorado City, he said, so it's difficult to determine what individuals owe.

And Wisan is not getting any help from FLDS Church leaders. He said he's aware that tax notices were sent to the church earlier this year, but since the state took control of the trust, church members have been ordered not to cooperate with authorities.

"I have reasons to believe that great sums of money on a monthly basis are passing to the church," Wisan said. "The funds are there (for taxes) but they are choosing not to pay them."

Wisan said after the hearing he thinks the money is being diverted to build an FLDS ranch in Eldorado, Texas.

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