l Zoning change requested: The Boyer Co., in April 2004, asks Sandy to rezone the gravel pit to make way for big-box and other retailers.

l Council says yes: The Sandy City Council approves a new zone Nov. 29.

l Signature drive under way: Save Our Communities launches a referendum push on Dec. 11 to turn back the decision.

l No deal: The signature drive appears to die by Jan. 26, 2005, when it falls about 1,500 signatures short.

l High court petitioned: Residents, on Feb. 8, ask the Utah Supreme Court to order Sandy to put the issue on the ballot, arguing that the city required too many signatures.

l Court says yes: On July 1, justices order a voter referendum.

l Wait a minute: On Monday, Boyer and the landowner ask the high court to reverse itself. A decision whether to accept the petition is pending. Sandy activists: Put those referendum placards away.

That's what the developer and landowner of the Sandy gravel pit want opponents to do. A petition filed with the the Utah Supreme Court earlier this week says the justices got it wrong when they ordered a citywide vote on whether to rezone the controversial project to put big-box stores and housing on the gravel-pit site.

The petitioners: Boyer Co. - which plans to build a Super Wal-Mart, Lowe's Home Improvement Warehouse, a smattering of smaller shops and restaurants and more than 300 housing units on the 100 acres - and landowner Gibbons Realty Company.

The pair asked the court Monday to reconsider its unanimous ruling on the issue. Namely, they argued that the court contradicted itself and sent an issue to voters that is outside the purview of Utah's referendum statute.

"The Opinion [misunderstood] the reality of a city council's role and dramatically expanded Utah's referendum statutes," the petition states.

Some Sandy residents took Monday's filing as an attempt to silence citizens on the gravel pit's future.

"I just can't believe they are saying this doesn't warrant a referendum," said Gary Forbush, a member of Save Our Communities. "This is the biggest land-use decision Sandy has made in decades."

A Boyer Co. official said Tuesday the petition wasn't about muting the opposition.

"[Attorneys] were just concerned, not only for this project but others down the road, with the precedent set by this decision," said Wade Williams, Boyer's director of retail development.

For the past year, the future of the Sandy gravel pit at 9400 South and 1000 East has been the hottest topic in the southeast Salt Lake Valley community. The court gave new life to the issue on July 1 when it ruled that citizens had collected enough registered-voter signatures (6,425) to force an election.

While the main subject of the court case focused on whether the residents needed 7,940 or 3,790 signatures, the court made a series of other decisions on its way to ruling that the lower number was enough.

It's those other decisions that worry the private companies.

They return to an argument that voters cannot reverse a zoning decision on an individual tract of land.

That argument hinges on whether such a decision is an administrative act or a legislative one. The two companies claim it is an administrative act, and the City Council's vote cannot be reversed by voters.

The court specifically ruled otherwise on July 1, spending nine of 17 pages explaining its evaluation of that issue.

"All acts taken by a city council in a city organized pursuant to the council-mayor form of government [a full-time mayor who doesn't vote as part of the city council] are necessarily legislative and subject to referenda," the court ruled.

The companies go after that decision, citing four others that the court has previously ruled in the opposite direction. The most recent was a 2002 case involving the Monticello City Council's decision to repurchase a municipal-power company. In that case, the justices sent the case back to a lower court to determine if a buyback option was part of a city vote to sell the facility in 1979.

If the option were included, there would be no referendum because the city council was simply activating the option.

The two companies interpret that as the court ruling that "not all enactments of a city council are subject to referendum."

"The [July 1] opinion is not consistent with prior case law, as it claims to be," the petition argues. "Its abrupt reversal of all of the above precedent warrants reconsideration."

jsantini@sltrib.com