Getting a new city up and running requires a lot of paperwork and discussions on zoning and bylaws. And for Ogden Valley City, there’s another item on the to-do list: deciding whether to change its name. And if so, to what?
The name “Ogden Valley City” was a placeholder throughout the incorporation process, which ended with the city launching in January. Now, the Name Advisory Committee wants to hear from the community.
Longtime resident and committee member Victoria Hale Malmborg remembers growing up in the unincorporated part of Huntsville and feeling like her home didn’t have a name.
“‘Unincorporated Weber County’ isn't very beautiful or doesn't give you a very strong sense of identity,” she said.
Highway signs referred to her exit as the Ogden Valley Recreation Area, and that bothered her and her sister, fellow committee member Edith Hale Songer.
“Kind of makes you feel like you're just there for other people's entertainment,” Songer said.
Community members can weigh in and suggest up to three name options on a survey that’s open until April 27.
The question of what to call the new city has raised a lot of strong feelings, Malmborg said. Some people worry the name Ogden Valley will be replaced.
“I think a lot of it is that sense of who I am, where I've always been, and you're trying to take this away from us,” she said.
The new city comprises much of Ogden Valley, including neighborhoods like Eden and Liberty, but it does not cover the entire Ogden Valley, which also includes the town of Huntsville and a pair of ski resorts. Malmborg and Songer have explained that the term Ogden Valley would still refer to the general area, and the city’s name would define the newly incorporated parts.
“Even if we changed the name of the city to something else, we still live in Ogden Valley,” Songer said.
Beyond identity, Songer hopes a new name will clarify her hometown for outsiders. She recently told someone she lived in the newly incorporated Ogden Valley City.
“She said, ‘How long have you been part of Ogden?’” Songer recalled, though the new municipality of about 7,500 residents is separate from the northern Utah city.
Other times, she said, people hear Ogden Valley City and think it’s referring to the greater Ogden area, like how the Salt Lake Valley includes Salt Lake City.
Weber State University senior Mia Foster designed the survey as a follow-up to a political science class project. In her college work, surveys often need an incentive to get students to take them, she said. But in this case, she thinks residents have their own incentive: shaping the future of their home.
“That's so cool that you'll be able to rename your community,” she said.
Foster plans to present the results to the city council. Afterwards, if a rename is popular, a second survey will ask residents for their preferences among a list of popular ideas.
The final decision on a new name will sit with the city council.
The costs of changing the city’s name would be minimal, said city council member Kay Hoogland. The city doesn’t have its name on road signs or buildings yet — it’s currently operating out of Huntsville Town Hall — but it would need to file a name change with the Lt. Governor’s Office and reflect that on official documents.
In previous unofficial surveys, Songer found that familiar names were popular, like Eden or Liberty. Some people suggested Pineview like the reservoir or Three Forks after the three main branches of the Ogden River.
As for Songer, she’ll be happy with whatever the community and city council decide.
“There was a name originally that I just really wanted, and then as I learned people's feelings about things, I started to just really want to get the most people happy that we could,” she said.
Macy Lipkin is a Report for America corps member who reports for KUER in northern Utah.
