Plaza legal battle revived (downton protest rights) | Salt Lake Tribune

[Ediacara]

Plaza legal battle revived

By Heather May and Christopher Smart
The Salt Lake Tribune

Barely a week after Salt Lake City vacated the public easement on the Main Street Plaza, the deal is under legal attack.

The American Civil Liberties Union is expected to file a lawsuit today against Salt Lake City and Mayor Rocky Anderson in U.S. District Court, alleging the city violated the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech and the Constitution's establishment clause that requires the government and churches to remain separate.

The Salt Lake Tribune obtained a copy of the legal brief Wednesday.

"We're asking to look at this as a whole, look at the manipulations that went on, look to see if there was a secular reason for vacating the easement," said Dani Eyer, executive director of the ACLU's Utah chapter. "We hope the city is forced to do what it should have done -- that is to regulate the competing uses with time, place and manner regulations."

The city vacated the easement July 28, nine months after the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the city could not retain an easement and allow The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to limit speech on the plaza. In exchange, the city got 4 acres of land and $5 million to build a west-side community center.

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[Sean Reynolds]

1. This is one of the only things I don't agree with Mayor Anderson on!

I feel the plaza should go back to the city and not the damn LDS Church. I understand Anderson is trying his best to make peace, but I feel the city should have never sold the block to the LDS Church - it breached public trust IMO.

[kainah]

2. The problem with trying to make peace with the LDS Church is

that, as soon as you give a little, they simply want more. I've seen this over and over during our fight over preservation of the historic emigrant trails in central Wyoming. The church asked for a special permit to camp on a state land section while trekking across a section of trail. We protested granting this but the state said OK. They told the church to write down some proposed terms and set a date to negotiate the lease. Instead, the church simply wrote a full lease agreement, sent it to the state and is now complaining that the state is "dragging its feet." Their level of arrogance in dealing with public lands/public sites is really amazing to me.