Despite lawsuit, state land near Teton Village is developed for uses few approve

JACKSON — On state trust land near Teton Village, 800 units of storage and 11 glamping sites are being installed, even though Teton County commissioners have asked the courts to review the state’s decision to approve both operations.
West Bank residents are wondering why a legal appeal didn’t stop construction — and, specifically, why the Teton County Board of County Commissioners didn’t seek an injunction, aiming to halt installations while the county wrestles with the state over its controversial June decision to approve temporary use permits for both businesses.
Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, the parcel’s neighbor to the north, opposed both operations. 
But some Teton County residents wrote state officials to say they supported the storage units, proposed by businessmen Scott Hardeman and Peter Cornfoot, lamenting the county’s lack of affordable storage options.
But Andrew Chekian, who lives near Lake Creek, roughly half a mile south of the 640-acre parcel where both operations were approved, wants the county to be more aggressive in fighting the approval.
“It’s got to be a huge issue for them,” Chekian said. “If they don’t fight this one, or they lose this one, what are the ramifications for all the other properties that the school trust owns?”
Chief Deputy County Attorney Keith Gingery, representing the commissioners, said that he didn’t file for an injunction because Teton County was asking the courts to review the approvals — and because “the injunction was not what I was asked to do by my clients.”
Some county commissioners, however, said they wanted to put a hold on work while the issue is being argued in Jackson Judge Melissa Owen’s Ninth District Court. 
Luther Propst, the commission’s vice-chair, said the News&Guide would “have to ask Keith” about why an injunction wasn’t filed. 
Commissioner Mark Newcomb said he originally thought there was “no avenue for a stay” — and that he’d planned to ask about an injunction when residents first asked him why there wasn’t one. But with other high-profile items on the county’s agenda, like a controversial development on Fish Creek Road, it slipped through the cracks. 
Both commissioners, who are running for reelection, said they want to explore halting construction now.
“Day late, dollar short,” Newcomb said. “I think we should request an injunction or a stay.”
Gingery, however, said the case is now tied up in legal wrangling over whether the county has any authority to request a review of a state agency’s decision. The state says the county does not.
“To be successful on an injunction, the judge has to find that there is a strong likelihood that you will prevail at the end,” Gingery said. But right now, the deputy county attorney said, that could be difficult considering the county “can’t even get past this first step of whether or not we can even bring the suit.”
Teton County residents, Gingery said, would likely have a “stronger argument as to standing.” Propst, likewise, said, “the county doesn’t have a monopoly on the lawsuit,” arguing others could join the fray.
The Teton County commissioners asked Owens to review the state’s decision in June.
That was roughly three weeks after the State Board of Land Commissioners — a five-member statewide board that consists of the governor, secretary of state, auditor, treasurer and superintendent of public instruction — voted unanimously to approve the glamping and 3-2 to approve the storage facility.
Gov. Mark Gordon and Auditor Kristi Racines voted against the storage, arguing it was likely not as temporary as the permit it was approved under, a temporary use permit, would suggest.
The two five-year permits were approved with a slate of other, less controversial stockpiling and landscaping uses on the site, setting the state up to receive at least $600,000 annually from the parcel. That’s a 13-fold increase to the roughly $46,000 a year the state was making earlier from the land, and a change that moves the needle in favor of the state’s coffers. 
Led by Rep. Steve Harshman, R-Casper, the Wyoming Legislature has tasked the Office of State Lands and Investments, which manages state land, with maximizing revenue for Wyoming schools from state trust lands in Teton County. 
They’re interested in capitalizing on high land values in Jackson Hole as revenue from state lands elsewhere in the state have fallen, mirroring the decline of the state’s coal industry. 
In 202, revenue for schools from state trust lands hit a 15-year low.
The county took issue in its appeal with the decision to approve the storage and glamping under temporary use permits, which is part of why the state said it doesn’t have to follow local land development regulations. 
The county, however, contends that the state should have reviewed the proposals under special use permits, which require the state to follow county code. The county argues those permits, intended for “industrial, commercial and recreational purposes” are more appropriate for storage and glamping.
Both proposals, the county argues, aren’t “temporary.”
They, like Gordon and Racines, said it would be difficult to remove the operations in five years.
Now, however, the State Board of Land Commissioners, represented by the Wyoming Attorney General’s office, is attempting to dismiss the case. 
The state is pointing to the Wyoming Administrative Procedures Act, which says that “any person aggrieved or adversely affected in fact by a final decision of an agency in a contested case ... is entitled to judicial review.” 
The statute goes on to define a “person” as a “individual, partnership, corporation, association, municipality, governmental subdivision or private organization of any character other than an agency.” 
Counties are included in the act’s definition of what constitutes “an agency.”
The county, meanwhile, has argued that it does have standing to sue the state because of its “disregard” for local land development regulations adopted to “protect the general welfare, health and safety of the citizens of Teton County.”
It also argues the county is a “governmental subdivision” and thus a “person.” 
And it is arguing the case at hand is not a “contested case” — so the rules the state cited wouldn’t apply — but rather an appeal based on the actions of an agency: the State Board of Land Commissioners.
If the commissioners’ suit is successful, it could compel the five state elected officials to reconsider their decision and the storage and glamping proposals under a special use permit and, by extension, Teton County land development regulations. 
If the uses are then found to be inconsistent with local code, Gingery said the two outfits could no longer be allowed to use the property, according to the state board’s policy.
But if that were to happen it would require a sequence of “ifs” to break in the county’s favor. And right now, with the state arguing that the county doesn’t have standing to petition for review, Gingery said the best people to ask for an injunction are neighbors like Chekian — potentially more legally sound “persons.”
“They probably have better standing than the county,” Gingery said.

Chekian said that a number of West Bank residents are discussing suing, but that the feedback they’ve received so far from an attorney is that a “citizen lawsuit against the state was not going to fly.”
Neighbors are also hesitant to file a lawsuit, Chekian said, after a lengthy legal imbroglio involving the Bar J Chuckwagon property. In that dispute, a neighborhood alliance was sued for millions of dollars by a developer who alleged the neighbors improperly interfered with plans to build on the property.
A judge ultimately ruled against the developers, but Chekian said the case has had a chilling effect.
“You know how nasty it’s gotten in the valley,” he said.
Meanwhile, construction work is moving forward, surprising Commissioner Propst.
“I thought, with a lawsuit pending, they probably wouldn’t want to commit the funding to level the place,” Propst said of the glamping operation. “But they did.”
Cornfoot, who along with Hardeman is behind the storage units, did not return a request for comment. Ryan Thomas, co-founder and CEO of Basecamp Hospitality, the Utah-based company that’s installing 11 geodomes on the state trust parcel, said he was working in partnership with the state.
“Our partners are the state of Wyoming and we’re working very closely with them and under their direction for our build schedule and construction schedule,” Thomas told the News&Guide.
He said the geodomes should be installed in the next few months. After that the plan is to beautify the property. Berms are going up to block the site from the road this fall and trees should be planted come spring.
Thomas said the company hasn’t yet figured out what it will do to manage sewage, but is working with health officials to figure out the specifics. He hopes to have guests staying there this winter.
“It’s very possible,” Thomas said.
 
This story was published on Oct. 5, 2022.