Mona planning panel weighs water options, variance to allow five-lot subdivision

Mona City Planning and Zoning held a work session April 1 to review water needs for a proposed five-lot subdivision and to consider whether the city could approve a temporary solution while change-of-use applications for irrigation shares are processed.

Planning staff Jonathan Jones presented a spreadsheet used to estimate irrigation demand, saying he subtracted 0.25 acre for a house/driveway/outbuildings, assumed two-thirds of the remaining area would be landscaped, and used an irrigation duty of 4 to calculate roughly 1 acre-foot for the landscaping footprint in the model. "At a duty of 4, that would be 1 acre foot," Jonathan Jones said, noting the figure matched the approach used in a past High Meadows approval.

Why it matters: the proposed subdivision’s ability to move forward hinges on water-rights processing and how the city treats culinary credits and variances. Jonathan Jones and the applicant agreed the main constraint is timing: whether change-of-use applications and transfers of irrigation shares can be completed before the developer needs to proceed with construction. As one participant put it, "the timing... that's really what it's coming down to," describing months-long variation in state processing times.

The panel discussed numeric needs and code constraints. Staff estimated the subdivision would require about 8.29 acre-feet of irrigation water under the presented assumptions. Panel members also noted culinary-credit rules have changed: the per-lot culinary credit was previously 0.5 acre-feet and is now 0.45 acre-feet under state law, a change the group said affects how many credits would be needed if culinary water were used for irrigation.

A recurring option was whether the city could temporarily accept culinary credits that currently sit in private names so building could proceed while applicants file change-of-use paperwork. Staff said such a step would require a formal agreement and a City Council vote. "Assuming those [credits] are available, it’d be up to the City Council if they want to allocate their assets in that way," a city staff member said, adding that any interim arrangement should be formalized in writing and tied to completion of the change application.

Several commissioners urged caution about making exceptions. A planning commissioner warned, "We're very stingy with our variances... This is an exception. It's rare," emphasizing the risk of creating a precedent that others could cite. The mayor told the group the council would prefer granting a variance to allowing a pond-based irrigation workaround: "We would just much rather go that route than do a pond," the mayor said, citing maintenance and liability concerns.

Safety and neighborhood concerns surfaced as well. Commissioners raised mosquito and drowning risks tied to on-site ponds, and noted the city code already restricts certain pond uses and requires reliable irrigation sources.

Next steps: the applicant agreed to seek placement on the City Council agenda (the panel noted the council meets twice monthly and identified the next Tuesday meeting as a likely date) and to prepare variance materials and any requested studies. Staff recommended a system-capacity study showing that city culinary infrastructure could handle any additional demand; if upgrades are needed to meet fire-flow or code requirements, the panel said the cost would likely fall to the developer.

The work session concluded with a procedural motion to close the session, which passed. The applicant and staff will pursue a variance application and options for securing the necessary water rights or temporary city allocations before returning to formal council consideration.