Moving out of the teenage years and into adulthood, the city of Cottonwood Heights will celebrate its 20th birthday on Jan. 14. Instead of celebrating during a single day, city leaders plan to recognize this milestone throughout the entire year with new activities every few months (at a minimum). City Manager Jared Gerber has been working to scour through the city’s history and compile important stories and dates to focus on. 

Starting on the city’s actual birthday, Mayor Mike Weichers will deliver a State of the City address on Jan. 14 (with a reception following at City Hall, 2277 Bengal Blvd.). His tentative plan is to invite former city leaders and state legislators to come speak as well. 

“The whole focus of the State of the City might be…how we have gotten to where we are,” Weichers said.  

Before all of the many activities, recognitions and celebrations commence this year, it might be worthwhile to take a moment to reflect. Readers are invited to come along with this reporter on a quick journey (13-minute read) to visit some of the more significant moments in the city’s 20-year history.

Setting our time machine for Jan. 14, 2005 ‑ the electricity of Salt Lake City residents preparing to become Cottonwood Heights residents (as the 16th city in the state of Utah) charges the amphitheater of Butler Middle School (7530 S. 2700 East). Lights dim and silence falls as then Gov. Gary Herbert swears in Kelvyn H. Cullimore as the first official Mayor of Cottonwood Heights. He celebrates with Gordon Thomas and Don Antczak who will now alter their titles from committee members overseeing the census-designated place to Cottonwood Heights City councilmembers.  

A few days later - Liane Stillman is buzzing as she begins her work as the first City Manager of the city‑jumping from conversation to conversation and from office to office trying to figure out how the beginning of the city she’s been charged to manage.   

Calibrating the month of our time machine to July 24 instead of January – a handful of residents are smiling in conversations with city leaders and volunteers at the very first Butlerville Days Celebration. If we zoom in and turn up the volume on one of those conversations, we may hear one of the most popular re-told stories about how the surrounding area and celebration came to be named. 

Hold on now! We may get whiplash on this one as we travel all the way back to 1849 – dust tickles the nose (not from inversion in this time period, luckily!) as lumberjacks and miners inhabit a small room for an important town hall meeting. Each a member of the eight well-known families who are beginning to grow their homesteads in the area. A vote is happening tonight with the intention of naming the community. Tension in the room tightens as more and more votes are counted. It’s tied between the McGee family and the Butler family. Looking around, hints of smirks begin to fall across the Butler brothers faces as they realize they have one more member of their family than the McGee family. (Per the tale, if the McGees had one or two more members of their family, we would have been calling Butlerville Days the McGeeville Days today.)  

Programming the chronological transporter to February 2013 – zooming into the City Manager’s office, a new face with a contagious bright grin asks “How are ya?” John Park is living in the legacy of Liane Stillman after her retirement last month. He’s not the only one getting his bearings. Panning over to the District 3 name plaque, newly-elected Councilmember Mike Peterson replaces the name of former Councilmember Nicole Omer (elected in 2009 along with Councilmember Tee Tyler). This marks a change in the city’s leadership (council and manager) dynamic as it’s the first time being entirely male. 

Sequencing a montage of every Tuesday night… city staff members begin to pop into the council chambers (on the second and third floor of the business building at 1265 Fort Union Blvd.) in the late afternoon to set up name plaques, drop off important documents and packets, and account for the necessary technology and chairs. Councilmembers, department chairs, and residents begin to filter in, marking the start of the weekly city council meetings. Scene change. A few hours later, all the characters return to their exact positions in the previous set. Hours pass. As the clock strikes 10 p.m., a few human figures begin to filter out. More stand to leave throughout the night until the last several exit around 2 a.m.  

Let’s do the time warp again! Warping back to our 2000’s era to Dec. 15, 2015 – hundreds of Cottonwood Heights residents gather to voice their displeasure to the city council. Tonight’s crowd sets a record for one of the longest public comment sessions in the city’s history (causing an important edit within the city’s policy regarding public comment sessions that is still written today). It’s cold outside. Heavy snowfall covers the streets and begins to melt off of the tightly bundled puffer jackets. The main thread weaving together everyone in the room – snowplowing. 

Fast forwarding through the city council’s decisions and responses through July 2016 – the city cancels their contract with a third-party Public Works company after so many disappointments and failures with their snowplowing services. Setting the foundation for an in-house Public Works team quickly begins as equipment is purchased, leadership is hired and training begins.  

Great Scott! Setting the time machine for Sept. 8, 2016 at the same location resulted in the city offices being cleared out with no one there! This isn’t right! Recalibrating for Sept. 29, 2016 -Blinding light pours into a big open room as blinds have yet to be installed. The smell of new carpet settles with each step of the crowd. We are at the open house of the new City Hall building. The excitement within the voices of city staff members, police officers, and councilmembers is apparent as their plans to have a permanent home for the city has been in the works for years. No longer will they have to work from a leased-out office space on the outskirts of the city. 

Leaping to a date that marks an era-change in Jan. 2, 2017 – a conglomerate of voices and exclamations bounce through the council chambers as the swearing-in ceremony begins. Three new council members raise their hand in oath. This moment is significant to everyone in the room, but for different reasons. Mayor Mike Peterson accepts his responsibilities as mayor, reliving Cullimore of his over-decade-long mayoral duties. This is the first time the city has to get acquainted with a new mayor. Councilmembers Tali Bruce and Christine Mikell accept their responsibilities on the council as well. It’s been four years since the last female leadership. This is also the first time there’s been a majority turnover (as previous elections had only introduced one or two new members). 

One year later – Park fully accepts his passion for cultivating unique relationships and makes a move to government work outside of a single municipality. Tim Tingey slides on over from Murray to fill the City Manager position for the city. He will continue in this role for six years. 

Sequencing a remixed montage of every Tuesday night… echoes of conversations initiated by Councilmember Tali Bruce and City Manager Tim Tingey rotating around mental health, burnout, time management and overtime pay narrate in the overture as we see city staff members begin to set up biweekly city council meetings in the early afternoon (at the new city hall building on Bengal Boulevard). Three hours pass before there is a scene change. As the clock strikes 7:30 p.m., staff members begin to trickle out of the shot with the last figure exciting the council chambers around 10 p.m.   

Calibrating the apparatus to Oct. 15, 2019 – Mayor Peterson is in the middle of reading a Resolution to Gayle Conger, Jim Kichas, Don Antczak, Carol Woodside, Allen Erekson, Paul Brenner and Melinda Hortin. They’re excited and nervous to start their work as the first Cottonwood Heights Historic Committee. They will play an important role in documenting, preserving, sharing and publishing the city’s history. (In 2025, they will ask to help with the city’s 20-year anniversary celebrations.) 

Adjusting the temporal devices for 2020 – the Cottonwood Heights population is recorded at 33,617. It makes Cottonwood Heights one of the biggest “little” cities. The tensions between continuous worry from state committee leaders about how the population is still expected to double by 2050, routine comments from city engineers about how the city is technically “built-out” and repeated priority from residents to preserve the “Cottonwood Heights character” weigh on the city council and staff members more and more. 

Taking a breath before traveling to an event that shakes the city’s history forever: July 2023 – the announcement of Councilmember Doug Petersen’s passing is shared. The city scrambles to figure out how to move forward. It’s the first time an election needs to be called outside of the routine voting schedule. 

That’s all the time we are going to dwell today though. Because if we remember Petersen, he’ll want us to live in the positives as he did. His knack for finding the positive in any situation, no matter how unlikely, sets a standard for daily interactions and mindsets. His bright smile and unfaltering understanding is his legacy. 

It’s probably about time to get us back to our own time, huh? There are still a handful of important dates to visit that have had a lasting impact on this history of Cottonwood Heights and has helped to shape it into the city it is today. Twenty years is a long time to sum up in just one article. How about we rapid fire through some of these snapshots? 

•      10-year anniversary celebrations for the city were held on Jan. 16, 2015. 

•     Residents protested in droves to the first ever property tax increase on Aug. 28, 2018. 

·      Canyon Centre development began in May of 2018. 

·      Residents petitioned to save the Walsh Farm from high-density development in March 2019.

·      Explicit conversations about how to account for and enforce Accessory Dwelling 

Units began in July 2017 and continued through May 7, 2019.

·      The Parks, Trails, and Open Space Committee was formed on Aug. 28, 2019. 

·      The most significant protest the city has seen occurred on June 15, 2020.

·      Tension between city officials and police officers spiked when responding to 

another protest on Aug. 2, 2020.

·      Storm Drain fees are initially implemented on June 15, 2021 with funding going towards 

improving and maintaining the city's water infrastructure. 

·      UDOT’s Gondola for Little Cottonwood Canyon was determined as the preferred 

transportation alternative on Aug. 31, 2022. Cottonwood Heights opposed it 

formally on Oct. 17, 2022.

·      Ferguson Park opened during Summer 2023 - complete with an attached off-leash dog 

park (the first in the city!)

·      Councilmember Suzanne Hyland was sworn in on Jan. 4, 2024. She was the last to join the 

current city council of Councilmember Ellen Birrell and Councilmember Shawn Newell 

(along with Holton and Mayor Weichers). 

Adjusting the temporal devices to risk future travel, in 2026 we see a shadowbox protecting the original printed article covering the incorporation of Cottonwood Heights displayed at city hall: following the precedent of this Historic Committee, additional historic signage has been strategically placed throughout the city. Now, that signage includes QR codes so the youths can quickly scan and read more about the area. 

(Councilmember Matthew Holton may have even spearheaded the sign along Danish Road as one of his favorite historic stories about the city involved the family who homesteaded in the area. They were immigrants from Denmark, hence the name of the road that now passes through what would have been their homestead.)  

I missed our correct time! We are a few days off venturing into Jan. 16, 2025 – walking into Market Street Grill, a silhouette of a  councilmember in the periphery is familiar. Leading into one of the restaurants’ meeting rooms, residents border the outskirts of the dining table, listening, as city councilmembers discuss with the city’s department chairs how to divvy the expenses within their $5 million budget (after accounting for operating and holding costs) during their annual council retreat. 

Returning to January 2025 – it is now time, dear traveler, to end our journey. There is risk that you are still filled with questions and memories. I will be taking my time machine with me, but if you wish to share your memories from a specific moment in time, please scan the QR code below with your electronic device (so 2020s of you). I will be happy to view and pass along your memories. They may even impact future city celebrations this year. Who knows? (I do – “Back to the Future” mantra fades in the background.)