Courtesy Miguel Angel Sicilia

I received a postcard in the mail the other day from a group representing Monarch City USA.

Simple in appearance, this postcard referred me to their website and offered resources for how my community, Eagle Mountain, could join the ranks of others across the country and the world looking after the increasingly rare Monarch butterfly.

Many of us remember these gentle creatures from when we were kids. With each passing year, it seems, there are fewer of them to be found. According to a report from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, more than 1 billion monarch butterflies have disappeared from the Earth over the last 30 years.

This radical change has encouraged scientists and wildlife biologists to do some hard thinking about how we utilize our available land and how we, as good community stewards, can foster an environment for creatures both large and small.

Monarchs need milkweed, a plant that, while on the upswing, has largely been diminished from the environment due to development and other precarious decision-making. Monarch City USA helps municipalities encourage the planting of milkweed in their parks and in their developments to encourage and spur the growth of the Monarch population.

Courtesy Eagle Mountain

Reading along with the information I was sent, it really got me thinking about how communities throughout Utah County can consider the way we interact with our environment in a more positive way.

Previously, Eagle Mountain City has developed a Deer Migration Corridor Overlay Zone that seeks to protect the migration patterns of local mule deer, pronghorn and elk through the Cedar Valley. Not only that, but Eagle Mountain also recently announced the hiring of a wildlife biologist to assist our city planning department in the construction and development approval process.

Eagle Mountain continues to work with local wildlife advocates and features tips for how best to conserve and prevent unnecessary death in our local bird populations. We have also worked hard to preserve open space in the community in our Master Planning documents.

Having accomplished all of this on the wildlife and conservation front, I’ve been fortunate to consider what Eagle Mountain’s next steps in this pursuit might be.

The community I represent has a long history of ranching and farming. As we’ve grown from a community of 250 residents in the 1990s to more than 50,000 residents in 2022, we’ve lost some of that home grown feel that many of our residents continue to value.

It is my goal to work with the developers that come to Eagle Mountain in a way that benefits our residents. That’s why I hope to begin introducing concepts over the next few years that will hopefully lead to some big changes.

Similar to the needs of the Monarch butterfly, it is important that decision-makers look to vegetation that support and sustain the lives of our residents.

Already, our new developments are required to plant trees that fit the environment and whose placement enhances the appearance and uniformity of our subdivisions. Someday, perhaps not within my lifetime, it would show wisdom to plant trees that produce food that can be bought, sold and traded for the benefit of our residents. These trees can fit our climate and produce harvests that can be celebrated throughout the year.

Not only that, but with land becoming increasingly rare and water a continuing concern in Utah County, creating a path forward for vertical farming to enhance our food delivery at the local level will be critical.

Residents are probably feeling some pain in their wallets with respect to food prices and food availability. Exercising the options available to us as a local government to plan for the security of our residents over the long run will become increasingly important if these trends persist.

In Eagle Mountain, we are proud to work with representatives from our local business community to possibly donate some type of vertical farming unit to students at Cedar Valley High School. Introducing these technologies to our young people and giving them a chance to benefit from it first-hand is expected to pay dividends in the not-too-distant future.

Urbanization has many wonderful attributes. But connecting our residents to their food supply is not one of them.

With the plans I’m hoping to begin work on in the coming years, Eagle Mountain could soon lead the way in setting an example for urban farming and ensuring that the forests and the brush in Eagle Mountain are serving the needs of both our wildlife and our residents.