Thursday, November 10, 2011

Stake Discontinued in Utah

A stake was discontinued in Salt Lake City, Utah.  Organized in 1943, the Salt Lake Park Stake was discontinued and four of its five wards (First, Legrand, Tenth, and Thirty First) were transferred to the Salt Lake Sugarhouse Stake.  The Salt Lake Valley 1st (Deaf) Ward was transferred to the Salt Lake Granite Stake. 

2011 has been an unprecedented year for stake consolidations in Utah.  Only five stakes were discontinued in Utah in the 2000s yet in 2011 six stakes have been discontinued in the state (Blanding Utah West, Salt Lake Mount Olympus North, Taylorsville Utah West, Bennion Heights Utah, West Valley Utah, and Salt Lake Park).  Stake consolidations have been long overdue in the Salt Lake City area as active members have steadily relocated to suburban communities or elsewhere over the past several decades resulting in dwindling numbers of congregations in operating stakes.  Stakes operating in areas of Salt Lake City bound by I-215 up to the downtown area appear most vulnerable to consolidations in the near future as many stakes have six or fewer wards.  The rate at which congregations have closed in the older areas of Salt Lake City has not appeared to have significantly changed over the past decade.

Currently there are 555 stakes in Utah; an increase of nine since the beginning of 2011.  Of the 15 new stakes created in Utah in 2011, 10 were YSA stakes.

4 comments:

Michael Worley said...

Did any of the 6 stakes discontinued have a YSA ward in them before the YSA stakes were opened?

Stephen Barton said...

yes, the mt olympus stake had 6 wards in it.... then the YSA ward got moved to the ysa stake to dwindle it to 5. As a result the MT OLY north got combined with the Mt oly stake.

James W. Anderson said...

The fact that stakes are possibly going to be combined also shows what I've been experiencing in missionary work in the same area, inside the I-215 beltway.

I give away more pass-along cards in that same area than anywhere else within it. In fact, the morning of General Conference in October, I was on my way via TRAX when I got off at 13th South to get two breakfast burritos at a Walmart about three blocks over. By the time I got back to get another train, I had given away 10 cards, going and coming.

I see similar action on 35th South as well almost all the way out, between TRAX and 56th West.

D Christian Harrison said...

There was also the Wells Stake, which was incorporated into the Liberty Stake (my stake). This happened in August or September (?); the ward boundaries were realigned in a stake conference held in December.