REXBURG, Idaho %26#151; Northbound motorists who exit I-15 at Idaho Falls and head east on U.S. 20 toward Yellowstone National Park have a new landmark to tag along their way.
The Rexburg LDS Temple is the newest in a string of 10 temples %26#151; spiritual pearls to members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints %26#151; that dot the landscape close to one of the Intermountain West’s most traveled highways.
With names that reflect their geography, they are strung north from Las Vegas to St. George, then clustered through Provo, American Fork (Mt. Timpanogos), South Jordan (Jordan River), Salt Lake City, Bountiful and Ogden, then on to Idaho Falls and Rexburg.
Like many of its counterparts, this one sits on a hill overlooking the valley below like a sturdy general by day and a lighthouse by night.
Capping the northern end of what some have dubbed the “Mormon corridor,” the temple %26#151; to be dedicated this morning by new LDS Church President Thomas S. Monson %26#151; overlooks not only a bustling community of 27,000 that immediately surrounds it, but beyond the city streets to thousands of acres of farmland in the Upper Snake River Valley.
Though it is difficult to predict exactly what the long-term economic impact of a temple will be, major changes are already under way, and city leaders here have an inkling of how this religious landmark could ultimately change the face of their community by looking to the south.
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Economic development almost invariably follows the announcement of a new temple in areas heavily populated by Latter-day Saints, with land values in the area rising as developers put up new housing %26#151; some of it expensive homes in exclusive neighborhoods %26#151; drawing the faithful and their financial resources.
While LDS leaders and members alike tout its spiritual benefits, government and business leaders know there are significant financial benefits that flow into the area once a temple is announced and construction begins.
Donna Benfield, executive director of the Rexburg Area Chamber of Commerce, said roughly 200,000 people attended the temple’s monthlong public open house. Though figures have yet to be compiled showing how many were out-of-town visitors as opposed to locals, the economic impact on restaurants, motels and gas stations in town has been huge, she said. Especially during the off-season for tourism.
Motel occupancy rates ranged from 80 to 100 percent in January %26#151; unheard of during winter’s deep freeze here. “We’ve seen waits of up to an hour at the restaurants in town. People here are not used to waiting like that.”
Even before the temple was announced in December 2003, city leaders saw the potential for growth sprout when LDS Church President Gordon B. Hinckley stunned the community in 2000 by outlining a plan to make church-owned Ricks College a four-year university now known as BYU-Idaho.
As a new member of the City Council back then, Benfield had known only six months of “normal” council meetings as things plugged along “like they had for the past 20 to 30 years.” After the June 2000 announcement, “We never went back.
“City Council meetings went from 90 minutes to six or seven hours a night. We had a line of public hearings stacked up each meeting,” for everything from proposals for new housing development to new motels and restaurants.
The temple announcement added fuel to the development fire, and while things have slowed a little, she said, “it’s still continuing.”
Early on in that boom, council members took a bus trip to Utah County, talking with business and government leaders in the Orem-Provo area about what they would have done differently with the benefit of hindsight, Benfield said.
“That really helped set up our thinking with regard to planning, developing, zoning and how we want to see our city laid out. … We don’t want to turn it into what developers can make it. We wanted to lay out the guidelines and the developers can work within those parameters. We’re not going to let it happen the other way.”
Census figures show the town had about 17,500 residents in the year 2000, but the most recent population figures come in at about 28,000, said Clair Boyle, director of economic development in Madison County.
Daryl Olsen, principal in a local title company, works with Benfield as president of the area Chamber of Commerce. The sub-prime mortgage crisis that has a stranglehold on some parts of the country hasn’t had a significant impact on the Rexburg area, he said.
“Our economy here is still quite robust. Foreclosures have not increased dramatically here. Things are still pretty good, and the various lenders and builders are quite optimistic.” Property prices saw a “pretty sharp spike” in 2000, and those values haven’t declined much, if at all, he said. Average home prices hover around $200,000.
In addition, city leaders are fielding an influx of inquiries from large commercial developers they haven’t seen before. Marriott just purchased property on the newly opened University Boulevard for a new hotel/motel-type property %26#151; the sixth to be built here within the past eight years.
A new high school is also planned in the same area.
“I would dare say in the next two to three months we’ll have big-box retailers making announcements about coming here,” Olsen said.
His business has seen the university going to four-year status and the new temple “driving everything” within the area’s current economy %26#151; a dramatic departure from the town’s historic reliance on agriculture.
Madison Memorial Hospital is now undergoing a $40 million expansion that is slated for completion this fall in the heart of downtown, near where a multimillion-dollar mixed-use development is now under way, to be built near the city’s historic Main Street not far from the university, Olsen said.
Two brothers who grew up here and left Rexburg years ago are returning to oversee the development project, which is estimated to cost between $20 million and $30 million and will make over an entire city block between First and Second South.
Seen by some as a miniature version of what the LDS Church is doing in downtown Salt Lake City with the City Creek Center, the project is scheduled to include a mix of hotel, boutique-type retail, office space and upscale apartment living.
“It will break ground as soon as ground can be broken,” Olsen said. “They’ve been public, and they’ve gone to planning and zoning. They are local guys that have said ‘yes, we’re doing it.’ It will be the biggest thing to hit this community for a long time.”
As overseer for industry in the wider county, Boyle said development is expanding into the surrounding area as well.
Last summer, a new “self-contained community” called Fox Ridge was announced after approval by the county planning and zoning commission, to be built on an 1,800-acre site along the western ridge of the Rexburg Bench about a mile southeast of where the temple now stands.
Plans call for more than 2,000 homes, along with schools, churches, a golf course, small business district, parks, green space and miles of bike paths.
“Everywhere you go %26#151; east, west, north and south %26#151; there are new subdivisions,” Boyle said. Charged with drawing jobs to the area to become the engine for continuing growth, leaders are looking for “light industry” with its accompanying high-paying jobs.
He sees promise in companies like A-Met, a home-grown company specializing in automation welding started by two locals in the basement of one man’s home that now has sister companies in China, Canada and Europe. It’s one of 15 businesses that have filled the Rexburg Business Park in the past few years, many of them of the home-grown variety.
To help foster that entrepreneurship, the city recently opened an off-campus Entrepreneurship Center that helps train selected BYU-Idaho students in hands-on experience with performing due diligence and formulating business plans for local start-up companies.
“It’s working out beautifully” as students gain first-hand experience, help local businesses and are then equipped with the tools to start their own companies, he said.
Outlying Sugar City has just developed a 23-lot business park with Boyle’s help, and leaders are looking to develop enough local business to attract BYU-Idaho graduates, many of whom like the area enough to stay if the job prospects are bright, he said.
Tourism has also become more of a factor within Rexburg’s economy, said Mayor Shawn Larsen.
More than 200,000 people attended the temple’s public open house during its monthlong run in January. “The area went from being an empty field to beautiful landmark for our community.”
He said there have been no complaints from residents about the temple itself, but he has heard about traffic congestion on the corner of that block at the intersection of 7th South and 2nd East, with many requests for a traffic light there.
In 2007, the city had 11 subdivisions platted with 371 lots %26#151; half of them in the area of the temple %26#151; and others are still in the initial phases of development.
Larsen said there is no doubt the four-year university and the temple have both generated economic development here, but the city’s biggest challenge now is the fact that approximately half of the taxable value of the community is tax-exempt, being owned by the LDS Church.
“It’s a challenge to provide infrastructure for growing and developing community. But we also recognize the benefit that comes from this temple and BYU-Idaho. The community would be much different if we didn’t have church investments here.”
To help overcome the lack of revenue, in recent years the city has put impact fees in place for new development that goes to fund emergency services, parks and streets, “so that addresses the problem somewhat.”
Such challenges are preferable to many others, he said, noting that as a Rexburg native, he left the area for several years in the East before deciding to return with his wife so they could raise their family in what residents call “America’s Family Community.”
“We have a lot to offer here %26#151; a growing and thriving but a very safe community,” with an educated work force and a comparatively low tax rate. There are great recreational opportunities in southeastern Idaho, but we’ve managed to retain that small-town feel.”
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The yard of Rick and Terry Stone, 1803 E. Howard St., has been named the June 2008 Yard of the Month by the Beautification Committee of the Pontiac Area Chamber of Commerce.