Utah state officials last month approved the creation of a new city near Moab that has been the focus of intense scrutiny and controversy, ostensibly paving the way for the new locale in the outdoor recreation mecca to take shape.
“We’ve held our first meetings, appointed a town clerk, town attorney, town engineer, all of the things required by statute,” said a spokesman for the developers, Kane Creek Preservation and Development and G&H Miller Family Holdings.
Foes, though, filed a lawsuit late last week against the project sponsors to halt development of the new municipality, Echo Canyon, charging that they don’t have the needed water rights. They also maintain that the new city, abutting the Colorado River, would “diametrically change” the character of the zone. Echo Canyon, when fully developed, would contain 430 housing units, a 102-room hotel, and 67,000 square feet of commercial space spread over 176 acres.
“Enjoining defendants from continuing with the development is in the public interest, as demonstrated by the passion and vigor of Grand County community members and others from near and far, who have come together through (Kane Creek Development) Watch and other groups to oppose the development,” reads the lawsuit. The area, according to the lawsuit, serves as “critical wildlife habitat,” contains “important and irreplaceable archeological sites” and serves as “one of the last remaining green spaces” around Moab.
While the city’s potential impact on the nature of the area — a major recreational draw in Utah — is a big point of concern for project critics, the suit, filed last Friday, June 27, in Utah’s 7th District Court in Moab, focuses on water rights issues. More specifically, Kane Creek Development Watch and Living Rivers, the nonprofit groups behind the suit, charge that the developers’ water rights have essentially lapsed due to lack of use and the passage of time. “Development, even the preliminary bulldozing, cannot legally continue without a water supply,” reads a press release from Kane Creek Development Watch and Living Rivers.
The developers haven’t yet responded to the lawsuit, but their spokesman rejected the water argument.
“It’s just simply not true, frivolous,” he said Tuesday. He requested that his name not be used, given the backlash he has experienced due to the strong sentiments the development plans have sparked.
Beyond that, he countered the concerns put forward by the project critics about the potential impact of development to the character of the area, home to Arches National Park and a popular tourist destination. The vast majority of land in Grand County, he said, is publicly owned and subject to stringent development restrictions. “There’s already so much public land that it’s a bit ludicrous to say we shouldn’t develop our private land in a county that has such a constraint in private land holdings,” he said.
At any rate, sentiment against the project is strong among many, like Dave Closser, active in Kane Creek Development Watch and a Moab resident. The development, he said, could draw up to 1,000 people, as configured.
“The project will overwhelm our community in so many ways, I can’t list them all. And it will really only benefit the developers, bringing little good for our community. I would like to see it stopped entirely, as would much of our community,” Closser said.
He maintains that because the developers haven’t used their water rights for more than seven years, they have effectively forfeited them. “There may be some way for them to obtain other water rights, but most likely losing the water rights they had planned on would halt the project altogether,” he said.
The first preliminary municipality
Aside from the debate about development sparked by the Echo Canyon plans, still in the early stages, the proposal has also spurred wrangling over the relatively new mechanism developers are tapping to pursue their plans. After hitting roadblocks in talks with Grand County officials to secure support for the plans, they opted to create a preliminary municipality, outlined in 2024 legislation, SB258, to push the efforts forward.
Under the preliminary municipality route, developers can bypass the scrutiny of local leaders and instead process their development plans through the Utah Lieutenant Governor’s Office. The Echo Canyon developers filed their initial request with state officials to go the alternate route on May 1, 2024, and on June 9, Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson formally incorporated Echo Canyon as a preliminary municipality, the first in Utah.
Critics worry the preliminary municipality route undermines local oversight. As described by the Echo Canyon spokesman, however, Grand County officials wouldn’t work with the developers, despite their plans conforming to county zoning guidelines, forcing them to take an alternative route. At any rate, he said the developers are still in talks with county leaders and, at least for now, pursuing “two parallel tracks of development.” At this early stage, he said, the Echo Canyon developers could still abandon the preliminary municipality route and develop under county zoning guidelines instead.
John Weisheit, of Living Rivers, said in an interview with KSL.com that the preliminary municipality raises “constitutional” questions, given the power it gives to developers. But the issue wasn’t raised in last week’s lawsuit. “That’s a separate issue, and we will probably address that in a different way,” he said.