County planning staff to destroy decades-old nonfinal land-use records under state retention rule

Duncan, a planning department staff member, told the Duchesne County Commission on July 28 that county planners found 28 nonfinal land-use plans and mylar maps that are more than 10 years old and that the Utah Division of Records retention schedule allows local governments to destroy such records 10 years after final action.

"The policy for the state of Utah is to retain these for 10 years after final action and then destroy the records," Duncan said during the meeting. He added that the county plans to keep a destruction log for four years after destroying the originals and that the staff will send a reminder notification to applicants after one year of inactivity and again in the ninth year before destruction.

Duncan told the commission staff had attempted to contact applicants; in some cases the original applicants are deceased or the proposed transactions never completed. He said some of the documents are older than 20 years and that retaining all such large-format mylars indefinitely imposes storage costs and management burdens; his back-of-envelope estimate for replacement/retention cost was about $87,000.

Staff said the nonfinal plans did not contain protected personal information and that the county27s next step would be to proceed with destruction unless a claimant demonstrates administrative value for retaining a record. The planning staff said they would continue outreach to applicants before destroying records.

Why it matters: destroying nonfinal and abandoned land-use records follows state retention policy, but owners or applicants who expect future validity may lose a stored set of plans; planning staff said they will notify applicants ahead of destruction and keep a destruction log.