It remains a mystery where the LDS Church plans to build its fifth temple in Salt Lake County, despite media reports this week saying it would be built in Bluffdale.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints isn't saying anything more than what was said in its semiannual general conference in October: The temple is planned for the "southwest" part of the valley.
"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has made no comment on temple sites in the Salt Lake Valley beyond what President Gordon B. Hinckley announced at the October 2005 semiannual general conference," a church statement released Wednesday said. "Announcements of new temples are made only by the First Presidency of the church."
And the developer of the reported site in Bluffdale issued a strong denial Wednesday of those reports.
"Sorenson Real Estate has no knowledge of plans by (the church) to build a temple in Bluffdale. Nor is it the decision of Sorenson Real Estate or any of the Sorenson companies to determine where or when the temple referred to by President Hinckley will be built, or when or how to make this information publicly available."
Those decisions are made by the church, the statement said.
But news reports Wednesday based on the statements of two former Bluffdale city officials have sparked a frenzy of speculation and a lot of interest in a piece of land caught in a legal dispute between the city of Bluffdale and landowners, including Sorenson. The land is currently in Bluffdale, though a lawsuit may see it break away and become an unincorporated part of Salt Lake County or join nearby Herriman.
Former Bluffdale Mayor Wayne Mortimer said developers told him the church plans to build a temple in the Rosecrest development on donated land along the proposed Mountain View Corridor. Morris Clark, a former city councilman, also said developers told him of the church's plans. Neither man has discussed the plans with church officials.
Sage Builders, which plans to build homes on Sorenson's Bluffdale land, has been telling prospective buyers that their lots are in the shadow of the future temple. Marketing director Cameron Jackson said that has been based entirely on the news reports — reports that have brought an increase in the number of interested buyers.
"We've probably had three or four different people in that have asked about it" Wednesday, Jackson said.
The boost in interest is partially behind Sage's plans to increase prices on all six of its house plans by $20,000 today, Jackson said.
President Hinckley announced in October that two new temples would be built in the Salt Lake Valley. One of the temples was announced for South Jordan's Daybreak development. The other was said to be in the "southwest" part of the valley, but church officials have not been any more specific than that.
Despite the church's statement, Mortimer said he believes the church has not made its announcement yet because of the pending lawsuit, filed in December 2003 by landowners Sorenson Real Estate and Development Associates seeking de-annexation from Bluffdale after the City Council denied a zoning change that would allow the extension of Rosecrest, already being built in Herriman, into Bluffdale.
Opposition among residents to the development — planned for a rural chunk of Bluffdale's west side — led to Mortimer and Clark's defeat in the November election. Both had tried to negotiate with the developers to avoid losing the disputed land — about 40 percent of Bluffdale's total area.
The lawsuit is set to go to trial Jan. 30, and Mortimer believes his successor, Mayor Claudia Anderson, and the City Council, which includes two newly elected members, need to settle with developers quickly or they risk losing the land to unincorporated Salt Lake County or Herriman. Residents, he said, will not want to lose the chance to have an LDS temple in their city.
Clark agreed that the temple is one more reason that the city needs to fight to keep the land in Bluffdale.
"For the people who are now in the position to do the negotiating to try to keep this land in Bluffdale, I certainly hope they will look at that and understand what the consequences are if the land is disconnected," he said.
Temple sites are typically a draw for people. When the LDS Church announced in October 2004 that a temple would be built in Draper, property values more than doubled around the site.
And while talking openly about a proposed temple site could have saved Mortimer and Clark's re-election bids, both said they believed it should not have become an election issue.
"It's been out in public," Mortimer said of talk about a planned temple in Bluffdale. "It's been talked about in our community. I wish it would have gotten to this level so we could have gotten a little more serious about the negotiations. But without it being confirmed it would have looked like it was political (if he had talked about it). And I was mayor at the time, so anything that wasn't confirmed, I had to be careful with my opinion."
Utah billionaire James LeVoy Sorenson of Sorenson Real Estate has a history of generous donations to the LDS Church. Recent donations include more than $30 million for restoration of the Nauvoo Illinois Temple, dedicated in June 2002. In 2001, Sorenson formed the Sorenson Legacy Foundation, through which he donated $5 million to the church's Perpetual Education Fund.
The Sorenson Legacy Foundation was established primarily for the purpose of giving to the LDS Church.
E-mail: dsmeath@desnews.com