The current rental market is pricing people out who are ending up on the streets. Downtown Salt Lake City homeless camp at 700 West 200 South: Kevin and Brooke are trying to stay hydrated and cool despite the 105-degree record-breaking heat. Both were gainfully employed when they found themselves priced out of the housing market, unable to get into affordable … [Read more...]
The Other Side Academy in Salt Lake City Reforms Criminals, Convicts, Drug Addicts and Alcoholics
David Durocher is the Executive Director of the Other Side Academy. His leadership role has changed thousands of lives reforming ex-felons and ex-convicts and drug addicts to become productive citizens. How do they have such incredible success while taking zero local, state, or federal tax dollars? In a word, Durocher says, “it's accountability”. Holding everyone accountable … [Read more...]
Pioneer Day & Mormon Pioneer History (They Don’t Talk About)
Pioneer Day is upon us. For LDS members this means sparklers, banned fireworks, Jello salad, funeral potatoes; and three-legged races with enormous numbers of cousins. But few LDS members and nonmembers know the details of how and why approximately 25,000 early church members migrated to the hostile Mexican territory in the Great Basin area now known as Utah. Why did … [Read more...]
The Magnolia Apartments: The new Homes for the Homeless are a “Complete Failure” According to an Inside Source
An inside source provides Utah Stories with an inside look into the reality of the Magnolia Apartments. Salt Lake City, along with the organization Shelter the Homeless, have been working to build “permanent supportive housing units for the chronically homeless”. The Housing First Model is an excellent idea in its basic theory: give temporary homes to the homeless first so … [Read more...]
Why “Deeply Affordable” Housing Is Not Being Built in Utah and it Won’t be Built Anytime Soon
Utah’s last state legislative session allocated just $70 million toward deeply affordable housing, despite the state coffers containing a $2 billion state surplus. The affordable housing crisis is likely the most important problem younger and low-income Utahns are facing because today a growing percentage of low-income residents are priced out of the housing and rental market … [Read more...]
Did Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall Lie to the Homeless People?
Salt Lake City’s Unofficial Homeless Mayor to Mayor Mendenhall, “You Lied to Me!” Yet another Salt Lake City homeless camp is “abated” and the unsheltered homeless try to scatter to find shelter in 100-degree heat. The media were not allowed to take photos or videos of what was transpiring just after the health department began its efforts. “I’ve been moved out probably … [Read more...]
Salt Lake City Criterium Race Returns!
As the Tour de France courses its way through the countryside of Europe, the always-exciting and spectator-friendly Salt Lake Criterium is celebrating its third year, bringing its own unique brand of professional bike racing back to Utah’s capital city for a two-day event July 16-17, 2022. What makes the Salt Lake Criterium events—and criterium, or “crit,” racing, in … [Read more...]
Walmart-Style Inventory System at Utah Liquor Stores Squashing Local Distilleries
Under the pretense of the commerce clause, the Utah DABC is intentionally using a system that is designed to suppress the sales of local distilleries and spirits. Why? According to James Fowler, the owner of Sugar House Distillery, the system is designed to “produce the highest amount of bottle turns” for inventory maximization. This elicits the question of why is the bottle … [Read more...]
Challenges and Obstacles to Maintaining the Utah Lifestyle
In the 1840s, a persecuted religious group headed west, braving hostile Indian/Mexican territory so they could control their own destiny. The Mormons designed and built this grid city so that everyone coming could homestead and raise their own food away from the menacing factories and the industrial revolution. They voted for a more simple self-sufficient lifestyle by moving … [Read more...]
Inland Port Ruling: Utah Supreme Court Says Utah State Legislature Can Usurp Salt Lake City’s Authority
The Utah State Legislature determined four years ago that 16,000 acres of land in mostly Salt Lake County would be the best place for a massive inland port. The inland port initiative began over a decade ago when the Wasatch Front was seeking new economic opportunities to build our economic tax base and add high-paying jobs. But the picture since then has completely … [Read more...]