Oakley City halts all new developments due to water shortage

Oct 6, 2022, 5:00 PM

A ranch is pictured in Oakley, which has a moratorium on water...

Thousands Peaks Ranch is pictured in Oakley, Summit County, on Thursday, Dec. 2, 2021. (Shafkat Anowar/Deseret News)

(Shafkat Anowar/Deseret News)

KSLNewsRadio

OAKLEY, Utah — Oakley, a small city east of Park City, has stopped all new development projects due to a lack of water.

Oakley Mayor Zane Woolstenhulme, told KSL NewsRadio’s Dave and Dujanovic that the city was using 9 million gallons of water more each month than they were receiving.

“[It] made it impossible for us to meet our fire flow requirements and everyone understands the importance of this.”

Mayor Woolstenhume said they also restricted residents from watering their lawns more than twice a week for the last two years, which allowed the city to meet its water needs.

Woolstenhulme said the moratorium started over a year ago.

“The initial moratorium was put in place in May of 2021 and renewed last November and is indefinite.”

Woolstenhulme said the moratorium will stay in place until the new well the city is drilling starts producing water — which could take a couple more years.

Related: Val Verda moves closer to annexation into North Salt Lake

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Oakley City halts all new developments due to water shortage

Related: Val Verda moves closer to annexation into North Salt Lake

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