Ellis Ivory, chairman of the private foundation that operates the living history park on state land at the mouth of Emigration Canyon, has made a twofold proposal. He would lease 12 acres in the park's northwest quadrant to ARUP Blood Services for a 100,000-square-foot commercial building and parking lot. The lease would provide the park with revenue.

He also would construct a 9,000-square-foot reception center based on the original design for the Territorial Statehouse in Fillmore. The new building could host weddings, receptions and other gatherings that also would bring new income to the park.

On Friday, the foundation's board voted to study Ivory's plans.

Some neighbors of the park object to the foundation facilitating more commercial development in the area, which includes the adjoining University of Utah Research Park. They have a point. This park is supposed to be about living history, not office buildings. The two are at cross-purposes.

However, realizing that does not help the park pay its bills. The park received a $700,000 annual subsidy from the state, plus $563,000 in Zoo, Arts and Parks grants from Salt Lake County between 2001 and 2004. Yet it has not been able to meet its $2 million annual operating expenses; the Legislature awarded it a $2 million bailout this year.

The long-term answer might be for the LDS Church to operate the park. The story that the park attempts to bring to life is really modern Utah's founding by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is useless to pretend otherwise.

Because the park sits on state land, church/state entanglements might be a problem under such an arrangement, but perhaps a lease agreement or management contract or both could be worked out.

The church could bring its financial, management and volunteer assets to a project that celebrates its roots in this valley.