Scenic Byway 12 Committee Meeting Minutes DRAFT April 18, 2017 1:00 pm Tropic Heritage Center Conference Room 20 No. Main Tropic, UT, 84776 Attending: Name Organization In Attendance VOTING YES NO Bill Geil / Keith Watts Boulder Town X Deanna Moore Bryce Canyon City X Vacant Escalante City X Vacant Henrieville Town X Jeff Stock Cannonville Town X Lowell Mecham Tropic Town X Vacant Torrey Town X Kim Soper Panguitch City X Vacant Garfield County Commission X Falyn Owens Garfield County Travel Council X Adus Dorsey - proxy Wayne County Commission X Nycole Durfey Wayne County Travel Council X Sue Mosier Escalante/Boulder Chamber of Commerce-Chair X Alice Wolf Bryce Valley Business Association X Leslie Fonger USFS X Allysia Angus BLM/GSENM X Kathleen Gonder NPS X Mike Nelson Utah State Parks X Josh Peterson Utah Department of Transportation X Cody Clark Member-at-large X Robert McElaney Member-at-large X Susan Nelson Member-at-large (Sue Mosier proxy) X NON-VOTING or Proxies and Public John Holland Byway Coordinator X Lori Veater Garfield County Tourism X 13 voting members present Welcome, Approval of Minutes, and Adoption of Agenda Sue Mosier welcomed everyone. A round robin of introductions took place. o Proxies there were no proxies submitted. The minutes were approved unanimously by motion Alice/second by Kathleen. Adoption of agenda - motion by Falyn /second by Susan - Agenda approved unanimously. 1
Byway Coordinator s Report Submitted a marketing co-op grant application to Garfield County to assist in paying for the scenicbway12.com website improvements. Looking forward to Utah Outdoor Recreation grant program workshop in Tropic May 10 and the grant application will open soon. Working with SB12 website design firm to repair and update the SB12 website. Replaced interpretive panel between the tunnels in Red Canyon. Received several calls and emails regarding the gravel pit planned in upper valley. ----------------- End of Coordinator s Report Open discussion to the previous item of the gravel pit proposed in Upper Valley: Mike asked to discuss the subject further. o The Coordinator deferred to Lowell Mecham who is a member of the County Planning Commission and who participated in the County Planning process: o Lowell talked about the Planning Commission field trip to the site of the proposed gravel pit. o The gravel pit will be considered by the Planning Commission in their 2 pm meeting on April 19. o Some of the possible issues with the gravel pit may be road safety, aesthetic/visual distraction for travelers, dust hazard, water use and wastewater management. It was agreed by general consensus that the Coordinator should write a letter recommending if the gravel operation is approved by the County that we recommend the disturbance and extraction activity take place as far from the road as possible to limit the possible impacts to safety and traffic and that if the site is abandoned the operator be required to rehabilitate the site. Josh Peterson, UDOT recused himself from agreement in this discussion as a State representative. John will prepare the letter, email it to the Committee membership and deliver it to the County Planning Commission. The letter will specify Josh Peterson, UDOT recused himself and UDOT did not determine to support the letter. Financial Report o Beginning Cash Jan. 26, 2017 = $2,694.54 o Income $1,336.25 $1,316.25 grant funds from Garfield County for website $20 donation from sb12 website. o Expenses $1,273 $1,000 - coordinator fee for January $85 2017Utah State Business Registration fees $188 - Transportation expenses from Byway tour with UOT and ODOT in January o Ending Cash April 18, 2017 = $2,757.79 2
Bylaws Review and recommend changes to SB12 Foundation organization John passed out copies of the Bylaws A draft of several changes will be sent to the committee for review including: o Keep the Byway Coordinator position but change the status to vacant o Modify Section 2, Objectives as follows: Remove item a. To develop and act upon strategies and actions for the management of Scenic Byway 12. o Change Memberships as follows: From GSENM to BLM From Bryce Canyon National Park to National Park Service From Dixie National Forest to National Forest Service o Modify Article Three, Meetings from 5 to 6 meetings per year starting January then every-other month through December. o Make all members Voting members, eliminating the non-voting status. o Strike (completely remove) the existing Article Six, Section 3 (non-voting related) John will draft these changes and send them to the Committee for review. The changes will be adopted in the June 2017 meeting. Looking ahead to nominations for Committee Chair and Vice-Chair Election of officers takes place this summer so everyone is asked to consider accepting a nomination. We will elect a new Committee Chair, vice-chair and Secretary this year. Route Guide reprint Garfield Office of Tourism will reprint the Route Guide mid-may to June. If anyone has a change to recommend let us know before May 15. Scenic Byway 12 Partner Reports National Park Service For the Easter weekend the shuttle started operating in the Park. Over the Easter weekend the shuttle carried 8,517 visitors compared to the opening weekend last year when they carried 1,338 visitors. Visitation in the park is growing. The park needs to meet the President s initiative for reducing federal government so now waiting to hear from the departments how that will be carried out. (Hiring freezes or central office reductions etc.) The parks are on hold but have been able to advertise seasonal positions. All others on hold except health/safety related positions. Last year there were 2.36 million visitors, in 2015 1.7 mil., 2014 1.4 mil. Visitors are coming and it is anticipated that 2017 will bring another increase. 3
New Park Superintendent is Linda Mazzu. (Came from Yosemite as Chief of Resource Management.) Projects for the summer include North Campground, Loop D, site remodeling to add 11 accessible sites. New pavement in the campgrounds and waterline repair in Sunset Campground. Bryce Point remodel (last year) is finished and open. The Bryce movie for the visitor center is still in production and will be ready beginning Spring 2018. The visitor center entry plaza and fee stations will be redesigned and remodeled. A firm has been selected to do this work. BLM/Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument There are a lot of visitors to the Monument and the Easter traffic was busy Escalante and Cannonville visitor centers are open 8 am to 4:30. Prospect for extended summer hours are unclear at this time. Calf Creek improvements EA should be signed in the next week or two and construction for some of the work may be able to proceed in the fall. Public review of proposed changes at Dry Fork (Peekaboo) trailhead may be published by June. The artist-in-residence photographer will be here for 3 weeks in May. Small interpretive projects including a Protect and Respect campaign to encourage appropriate behavior related to cultural sites are in progress. Conceptual design phase for Escalante visitor center exterior, trip planning info panels are in progress. Vandalism is on the rise. The new signs on the south end of the Cottonwood Road and Glendale Bench have been damaged, driven into etc. Please inform people that this is a waste of taxpayer money and the cost of repairs is always over $1,000 per sign. SRP permits (outfitter and guide permits) are being processed. The Henrieville waterline is under construction. South Central Communications is also adding fiber lines in conjunction with the Henrieville project and also into Calf Creek and across the hogback in and adjacent to the road. Dixie NF Red Canyon VC is open for weekends and will open for the summer mid-may. Easter weekend there were 2,400 visitors that stopped by the visitor center. The hiring freeze is affecting the forest office too. The public affairs officer is temporary and will go back to their job in a month. There is a new video on the web and in circulation introducing the Dixie including red Canyon and Scenic Byway 12. There is a link to the video from the County travel website. There are two other videos in production. One focuses on the multi-use path in Red Canyon and the other on Red Canyon generally. 4
The Red Canyon campground will open mid-may and Kings Creek around Memorial Day. Kings Canyon is open for dry camping now. UDOT Region 4 SR12 landslide - two lanes will be open again in one to two weeks. The permanent solution is still being considered. Kim Hazlewood is the new public information contact 435-612-2323 Paving mid-may to October. Henrieville to Escalante then outside Escalante to across Hogback. New TODS signs in Escalante (2) and Tropic (1). Enhanced blinking lights will be installed at the SR12/US89 intersection. SR12 tunnels rehabilitation. Torrey bike path from town to business at east end of town should be paved by mid- May. Josh will email John with the contact information for the SR12 public information contact and instructions for inclusion on the public information weekly emails. John will forward this information to the Committee. Fiber optic conduit is currently being installed in a saw cut down the middle of the outside lane to be sealed and done before the paving project. This will enable cameras to Hogback and Calf Creek. (Eventually to Boulder). Turn lanes are being installed at The Pines in a partnership with Garfield County and UDOT. (Lanes at Chevron, Pines and State rest area.) Utah State Parks State Parks a celebrating their 60 th anniversary this year. Mid-June there will be a celebration. Heritage Festival takes place weekend of July 15. Music, Food, etc. This week there are volunteers doing stabilization work on some the 1,000 year-old pottery. Channel 2 came in and did an interview, Magnolia s food trailer has upgraded to a bus and they are open daily 9 to 4. Escalante SP has 2 bids on a new bike trail. New utilities installed at the maintenance shop. Park has motorized and non-motorized access to the old waterline road west of the park that will allow access to a remote section of the park 60 th anniversary will be celebrated in Escalante on July 1 and with a ribbon cutting on a new petrified tree display. Cities and Towns Bryce Canyon City is planning the Canyon to Canyon bike ride. More details in June. Tropic New event is Mule days May 4 6. Cannonville New Town Council person (Trish Thompson) and new clerk/treasurer (Michele Nelson) have been chosen. Escalante Chamber of Commerce working on a new brochure. 5
Garfield County 2017 event rack cards are printed and ready for distribution. Customer Service training was held in Bryce and Escalante. 122 participants. Feedback was very positive. The print materials from the training are also available for distribution. The training info and test will be available on line next week. Last March ytd TRT collections were $117,191. This year, same period is $138,494. Vacation rentals are increasing. Motion to adjourn: Mike motion and Sue. 3:15pm. Next Scheduled Meeting Tuesday June 20 in Escalante. Location TBA 6