I suspect that there is a fair amount of money at stake here.
I also wouldn't be surprised to learn that in the preceding months, there have been land purchases made by those "in the know" surrounding this location in hopes that they can make a fast buck by re-selling that land to mormons who want to live close to the temple.
The meeting scheduled for the 24th has been cancelled as the church pulled its petition.
The church then served notice it will resubmit the exact same petition asking for an approval meeting in June.
Presumably the church hopes by playing this game, resistance will die down and they'll get what they want including an exception to the height requirement and the dark sky laws.
For an organization that says they respect the laws of the land they sure do go to great lengths and expense to get exceptions.
The Newport Beach CA citizens had to get confrontational with the mormons on the Mormon temple built there. The city wanted them to do some minor changes to the color, height and lighting. Of course the mormons WHINED and complained to no ends about the changes. In the end the church quietly built the steeple higher than they had agreed to.
Mitt Romney acted the same way when La Jolla would not let him make the beach between his house and the ocean private property. He built a monstrosity on the property that is a cliff with the view of the ocean but he just HAD to have his beach private. The city said "no".
Frankly, he and Ann ruined the whole neighborhood--- long time residents couldn't see the beach at all.
Good for Cody. Put up the good fight and tell them to be respectful of the citizens already there.
Erda, UT did the same thing. They fought back hard since the area was zoned for 1 Acre lots, dark sky's, and horse property. The church wanted to build a bunch of small lots and townhomes around the Temple to the tune of over 200 new homes. Since the church owned all the land, it would have been a huge cash windfall for them.
However, what is interesting is they moved the Temple to Tooele, UT onto land that was "suddenly" donated to them. Building it on a dead end street, deep into a residential neighborhood, with no direct main road access. Now it towers over everything, and looks way out of place. But behind it is lots and lots of open land.
That be true, but I should have added "Lots" and "lots" of money.
Sure bet the person who donated that parcel to the church for the temple, owns all that open land behind it, and plans to make Lots of Lots, and Lots of money.
For the Church its Lots of Lots of people on Lots who pay Lots of 10% tithing.
I remember the Belmont Temple fight. The neighborhood was furious.
Mormon towns get all tingly when a temple is announced. Most of the rest of the world considers them to be an imposition at best - too tall, too big, too ugly, wrong scale for the neighborhood, too much traffic for residential streets, yada yada. All valid points.