Need help picking a town to move to in St George... (St. George: co-op, how much)

[Mmaryanne]

We've made the decision to move to St. George! We have researched for years and visited and we're looking forward to moving. We are not LDS. My children are elementary and middle school age. I have read lots of the threads here. My question is this-we love the landscape in St. George but we are moving from a place that is very green. We really like the green and would like to find a town where we're still living in some mature greenery. Santa Clara looks like it will fit the bill for that; the school district is Snow Canyon. However, I have heard that Dessert Hills is the better school, newer, better facilities, better teachers who are more willing to go the extra mile. But it's definitely not as green, or is it? I have become very good at using google maps and have used it to "take a drive" through the areas. They are beautiful and I see trees and bushes, just not as much. Washington Fields seems to be the greenest area over there. Is there an area I'm missing on the Dessert Hills side that is more green? And does anyone have an opinion as to the Santa Clara residents and schools on that side? Are both area equal? And please, feel free to add anything else you think is important! Thanks!

[Code Stemi]

I wouldn't get too hung up on "living green". The whole region is a desert! A beautiful one, at that. If you must have some mature greenery…Hurricane, Old Santa Clara, and most all of STG proper. Out of those 3, the most family friendly and best schools will be in Santa Clara.
Santa Clara has brown scenery around it. The city itself has old mature trees and foliage. Try Green Springs in Washington City. Absolutely beautiful area…growing quickly. Tucked away into the hills.
I graduated from Snow Canyon high school. It was fine. I'm sure Desert Hills is better in a lot of ways.
If you don't mind a 15 minutes commute…try diamond valley. Higher elevation and much more green up there.
Old bloomington area south of STG and on the west side of the freeway is also "green".
The color scheme in STG is RED! Which is perfect in my opinion. Washington fields is green…due to all the grass and farmland.

[GoOutsideAndPlay]

I agree with Blues above, this area should be viewed as desert. Anything green must be irrigated. So keep that in mind as it seems we're always in a drought to some degree. Areas like Bloomington, STG proper and Santa Clara make up the oldest parts of the area, so have more mature trees and landscaping. Many homes in these areas have full yards of grass (mainly because they were there before the growth and the water conservation concerns). Newer areas of town are much more conservation conscious, with smaller plots of grass around the home and mostly hardscape. However, the older parts of the area also tend to have a more mature make-up of residents and a higher concentration of LDS. The newer areas have more diversity in general and are made up of younger families which might help your kids transition more quickly. Kind of at opposition to what you might be looking for. Alternative - If you build in a newer area, you could request more grass and trees be landscaped.

Things to keep in mind. Washington School District had a bond pass a little over a year ago to build a new hub and spoke high school (middle, intermediate and multiple elementary) to accommodate the growth in the Washington Fields/Little Valley area. I believe it will be located south of Staheli Farms (Washington Fields Road and E 3650 S) somewhere before the airport. When this happens, I assume redistricting. So when looking for a house, know that where they align now, may not apply in a few years. Also, Washington Fields has some green with pastures, but with the growth, the number of farms may decrease over time.

Coming from Illinois, we wanted more grass/trees too. Honestly, I don't miss the 'green' all that much. There's too much other beautiful stuff to look at. But, when we go home to visit, the green is one of the first things we notice. Maybe you can find a home that backs up to a city park - free green.

[Mmaryanne]

Thank you both very much, that was really helpful. Can't wait to move there this July!

[silverspoons]

I would carefully consider schools. I was shocked moving here from out of state how unequal schools are here. I also miss trees, the fall season, and traditional homes. It is hard moving here in the summer because schools are closed. I originally moved to the santa clara/arrowhead area of town. My kids were young and I was very unhappy with the secondary school options so I moved to desert hills boundaries before they finished elementary schools. Bloomington Hills is slightly older but has plenty of trees and mature landscaping and is in the desert hills boundary. It might be a good option.

If you choose Little Valley it currently goes to desert hills and parts might get pushed into the new school which opens in 2019. I think the new school will be good but my only concern is finding new teachers especially for math and science. Desert Hills opened 7-8 years ago and grew rapidly & can't find enough math & science teachers so how will a new school fair? Starting teacher pay is very low & with high housing costs it is hard to attract a math and science teachers. Half of my kids teachers are hourly without benefits(and they have degrees which makes me feel so bad). Desert Hills is currently rank one of the top 5 high schools in Utah. Coming from out of state (East coast) I find it to be a decent school but not anything special.

If you are not aware 6-7 grade is intermiadiate school, 8-9 middle 10-12 high school. The 6-7 grade school in the desert hills area Sunrise Ridge is by FAR the best school I have been in. I have some high standards but from the most incredible principal to some of the best (and over-qualified) dedicated teachers my kids who are very opposite had the best years here. I can't say enough good things about Sunrise Ridge. The Desert Hills middle school was very easy. I saw 200+ kids in my kid's grade have 3.75 or higher, usually close to 75 kids with 4.0's. One plus was the incredible behavior backed up by everyone. Walk into snow canyon or Pineview and it is crazy in the halls and classrooms(, very disrespectful in general. AT desert hills middle while I thinking grading is easy, walk through the halls and the teacher are at the doors watching kids and shake their hand as they go into class, it is just a different place, no swearing, no disrespect , just a nice place. I always felt safe with my kids there. Desert Hills High School lacks anything special, before 10th grade there is one choice of foreign language Spanish, very few clubs, most everything is geared towards sports. If you push and plan your kids can get a decent education, even better if you are willing to drive them to Dixie college for classes, and I feel safe with my kids at desert hills. Sure I'm not naïve there are drugs/drinking etc in the school but it is easy to avoid because the school has a high LDS population. I'm not LDS, my kids have had some issues, my son not as much or boys don't care or talk much about religion, it is mostly sports and video games. My daughter has not been invited to some birthdays or some people won't be her friend but she has a nice group of friends and after awhile it rolls off her back. The one bit of advice is do your own research about colleges. Whatever high school your kids go to. With the LDS mission age dropped to 18 for boys, most boys my son knew went right on a mission so as seniors they were not preparing for college. I would say with new Utah scholarships close to 90% of kids stay in Utah for college. The high schools have little information on college outside of Utah. If your kids need a class and you ask at least at desert hills they have been fine to help but you have to know. Utah requires less foreign language, sciences and social studies then out of state college require. I recently talked to a heartbroken senior who had no idea he needed 4 years of a foreign language and 3 lab sciences to get into his dream school and it was too late. He just took the Utah requirements.

Another benefit to Desert Hills is I believe every home is in Dixie Power. I'm not sure if you have looked at electric/gas costs but they vary ALOT within blocks of each other. Dixie Power which covers Bloomington, Bloomington Hills, Little Valley and Washington fields is a co-op non profit that is about 3.0kwh while some areas are as high as 20kwh. Just think about how much power the A/C uses during the 3 months of 100+ degree days in the summer especially with all these 2 story grand family rooms, and big homes(it always seems like St George has 2 types of homes 3bed/2bath(retirees) and 6 bed/3 bath(family)). When I lived in Santa Clara I saw neighbors with $400-500 electric bills in the summer while I have my A/c on all the time to 70 degrees with Dixie Power in my 3300 sq ft home and have never paid over $120 and my house is all electric, no gas so my total utility cost is $120 or less plus $51 (standard charge for water, sewer trash for the city).

The lack of green might be a shock for you. You can drive to Enterprise or Cedar City to see the green. St George doesn't have a lot to do besides shopping and chain resturants so the 45 minute drive to cedar to see the fall leaves or just the greenery is a nice weekend day trip.