Grand County (Moab) and Summit County (Park City) have the number one and two counties in Utah with the lowest percentage of Mormons at 26.5% and 30.8% respectively.
When I lived there, we elected the first openly gay legislator in the Utah Congress and have the only truly walkable and accessible business district close to affordable and nice housing in Salt Lake.
My grandparents lived there and being from California, it was the first place that I knew with snow and beautiful mountains rising to the sky so close by. It seemed magical.
It is the one of the two top places for car burglaries now in Salt Lake City. Mine was stolen the first night I came to live in Utah as a U student in 1971.
steve benson Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > . . . Moab and Park City.
I always liked Price and Helper. Some people may look upon them as shoddy backwater bergs, but I had good times there, working for Region Four of the Forest Service, doing survey work in the area.
Good people -- decent home-cooked food -- and two 3.2 beers are about the same as one 6.4 can -- (with a bunch of extra water thrown in).
I live in Moab, but I like Price, Helper, and Green River a lot. Some really cool country around there. Helper and G. RIver were once wild and wooly railroad towns, very little Mo influence. Price has a cool museum and some nice people, lots of non-Mos there, too. I spent a year in Green R. exploring the country around there and it's fantastic country, every bit as good as Moab, though you have to drive a bit to get to it. The little town of Torrey is nice, too.
And the fact that every time they open a new session, the entire state legislature visits the Mormon Pope and humbly genuflects before him says a lot about the "secular" arm of Mormonism...er, the state government.
I believe the politicians are smart in their friendly ways towards mo leaders in order to get some of their agenda accomplished. But in terms of a great place to live, Salt Lake is awesome.
I grew up there as a no-mo and so many of my TBM friends moved to the suburbs leaving more no-mos to fill their vacancies. In my last two neighborhoods, I counted more people from different faiths than Mormons. In that last election, Salt Lake County voted more Democratic than the rest of the state's conservative Mormon population. I was amazed but then, not really, since I lived among that majority of thinkers.
There's still stupidity. Always will be. But overall, the place has become cooler to live in.
And remember how Brother Romney walked to an overwhelmingly easy Republican primary victory in Utah in 2008. In Utah, Mormons still rule and government is their tool.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/25/2012 11:30AM by steve benson.
And that was the downside of living in Utah (I'm in Colorado, now). But again, my neighbors were awesome and life was better in Salt Lake the longer I remained. If it weren't for a job move, I'd still be in Salt Lake (Sugar House to be exact). And happy for the most part while trying to influence politics in any way possible.
I haven't been able to match the convenience to exceptional ski resorts as I did when I lived in the Salt Lake Valley. When I moved to Colorado, my friends said, "But, toto, ALTA! What will you do?" Well, I've had a depressing winter in Colorado, that's what I did. Locals and friends here even told me how fortunate I was to ski there since the mountains are great here but the prices and snow are better in Utah.
Yes, I hate the politics in Utah and always will. As long as those bozos are in charge, it's an uphill battle. But that's not all Salt Lake had to offer and I was able to have a splendid life in the midst of the political craziness.
With the nutsoness of the political scene in Utah, I've been thinking about why I had such a great time in Salt Lake. I realized that those of us who skied, hiked, camped, road or mountain biked, participated on RfM and drank a lot of wine had the best time.
I also think that, along with the Mormon influence in government, there are certain societal norms that were set up by Mormons and still paid lip-service to by non-LDS. As new people move in, that changes, but a lot of people are jack-Mos or ex-LDS and still have a certain amount of "mormonism" and mormon habits. The one that occurs to me is that the non-LDS kids in predominantly LDS high schools are often made to feel like they aren't equal by LDS kids. Outside of Utah, they wouldn't have that self-doubt for that reason. How much has the Mormon church imposed a shadow on even the non-LDS population there? How many habits, how much of an outlook is part of the UT culture, even among non-Mormons there who grew up in the area? I know personally, I learned some less-fortunate...OK, bad habits as a Mormon and if I'm having to unlearn them, other people must have the same situation to some degree with Mormons and the Mormon influence. You don't just turn into a reasonable, never-heard-of-Mormons person overnight. Just like people in the Northeast have a certain reputation for being hard-working because of their Puritan heritage, even though few are today Puritans, how much of a cultural force is Mormonism?
...is that I'm an urban guy at heart. If I could afford it, I'd live in Manhattan, or any other big city with an active core. I was in heaven when I lived in San Francisco. I'm not a suburban guy, even though that's where I live now. And I'm not a go-out-in-the-wilderness kind of guy, either. So, with SLC being the best Utah has to offer in urban living, meh.