Utah’s 2022 Legislature slogged through 819 pieces of legislation (752 bills 67 various resolutions) in just six weeks (45 days). Efficient ? Wow, yes! (But did they read it all … hell no!) Effective …. Yet to be determined! But the breath and depth of the material is amazing. Can we get Congress on the ball – or would that become more of a nightmare ??
Still, having so many more laws and all the tweeks and twists to current updates, in such a volume ... is that a good thing or a bad thing? From such we have a “Ranked Choice Voting Pilot Program,’ on one hand, and have so many new laws it takes lawyers to remember them all – even they have a hard time keeping up.
About 250 bills passed in the last 48 hours of the session under the “suspension of the rules.” This is when all the ‘”good” stuff’ usually gets through – things like good old SB54 that changed Utah’s electoral landscape, the 2019 Taxation ‘modernization’ which resulted in the Taxpayer referendum and the pre-covid 2020 session repeal by the legislature, etc.
And this session hasn’t been without its own controversies. One of the latter-day controversy was when Mike Brown was ejected from the Senate Taxation and Revenue Committee by Chair Sen. McCay (R) from Herriman. The committee was holding a hearing on HB 60 which wanted to ban Vaccine Passports. Brown had a sticker in favor of HB 60 which McCay said was not allowed – which we have looked and have been unable to find in the published rules of the legislature on the website.
Of course, Chairman McCay would never have made up a rule about “posters, or stickers, or …” such things …. of course! Just like he wouldn’t be so rude to a Utah voter to have one-such literally carried out by UHP officers of a meeting he was chairing!!
Senator Dan McCay won’t get censured for his actions, he was only “doing his job” and” legislators are immune from adverse actions when they are “doing their job’– afterall. Maybe it will all blow over before November …. election time, you know … McCay IS running this year (Senate District 18). Voters don’t remember very long, anyway. Right, Dist. 18??
See the outcomes of the various pieces of legislation we were following, shown below. Overall, the session finished before midnight on the 45th day. NOW it is up to Gov. Cox to sign or veto the 500+ bills passed. So, more later.
SUPPORT - Utah Open Meeting Modifications regarding Electronic Meetings
was passed.
SUPPORT - Voter Accessibility Amendments dealing with handicapped voter accessibility issues
Did not pass
OPPOSE - Gov't Records Access Amendments provides that gov't records on personal electronic devices is 'safe' from gov't searches. What are gov't records doing on personal devices?;
Did not pass
SUPPORT - Voter roll maintenance amendments is a bill which makes common sense changes to removing deceased voters from the rolls, etc., and return info on envelope of ballots sent to a wrong address.
OPPOSE - State School Board Governance Amendments because it eliminates electing State School Board members and makes them all appointed positions. We the People need to do the choosing!!
stuck in Hse Rules Comm
SUPPORT - Victim Address Confidentiality Program which provides protected addresses on voter rolls for victims of crimes in a Victims Confidentiality Program
Circled on Hse Floor
SUPPORT - Open Public Mtg. Comment Req. for it requires a public body to allow reasonable opportunity for public to verbally comment during the meeting.
This bill Passed
OPPOSE - Rank Choice Voting Amendments (co-sponsored by Sen. Curt Bramble - who brought us SB 54) makes Rank Choice Voting permanent for any constested race in Utah. RCV steals the one-man one-vote concept, eliminates primaries (which is wrong!), is generally confusing, centralizes vote counting away from precincts, and is NOT the will of the people! -
This Bill did not pass - yeah!
SUPPORT - Initiative and Referendum Amendments because it reduces the signature threshold from 8% to 4% if the signatures are not paid for signature collections.
This bill did not pass.
SUPPORT - Voter Signature Verification Amendments which requires notification to the voter when a ballot is rejected, due to signature, to be sent by electronic and a phone call
This bill did not pass
OPPOSE - Constitutional issue here because it deals with land use development plan permits AND citizen petitions for initiatives using electronic signatures (violates Art.. 6 Section 22 of Utah Const.) .
This bill passed
(sent a letter to Gov Cox on the Constitutionality of this bill)
OPPOSE - Resolution highlighting Success of RCV because it was NOT a success in Sandy, Springville, Payson, Vineyard, and was confusing to voters, were unable to hold a re-iable recount in Sandy,and was not done well anywhere!
This resolution was not passed. - yeah!
OPPOSE - Local Election Amendments because is sets up a way to cancel local elections of unopposed races for municipal or local boards. This dis-allows write-ins and does not allow the public to know or vote for the candidate or against the candidate, either. (Co-Sponsored by Rep Norm Thurston of UT Co Dist. 64)
This bill Passed
OPPOSED - Election Modifications which allows bias information and limits information on the ballot (Bill does have some good points but needs amending - aka 'fine tuning')
This bill Passed
OPPOSE - has some good parts bukt woud need several revisons to fully support. Changes Sample Ballot requirements to be printed and distributed at least seven days prior to an election.
This bill Passed
SUPPORT _ Voting History Amendments which allows citizens more information of private voter information without disclosing the voters identity.
This bill Passed
OPPOSE - Ballot Amendments because it again allows bias information as well as limiting information on the ballot.
This bill Passed
SUPPORT School Board Expansion which allows for local school boards to expand representation and allows for more school boards.
This bill Passed
OPPOSE - Digital Drivers Licenses for several reasons: 1) digital IDs are vulnerable to security breaches [at this time the security of databases cannot be assured] 2) a gov't app on every phone is problematic 3) any 3rd party data collection is questionable 4) liability of misuse issues is unclear 5) who or what is building the algorithm??
Dead - Hse PUC
OPPOSE - Revisor's Tech Correx to Code besides being too broad and (we feel) doesn't fit the Constitutional test (Art VI Sec. 22) is too much and too vague, needs to be broken up onto multiple bills for clarity.
This bill Passed
Needs to correct the wording of the Senate Joint Resolution on the 125th Anniversary of the NPTA on line 21 to read "education of the children and youth in the State of Utah" and NOT "education of the state's children and youth." The Children and Youth do NOT belong to the State but to their parents!!
This resolution Passed
Almost every State Legislative session, someone or another has a bill 'modifying' Utah's Gov't Records Access Management Act (GRAMA). It started in 1992 as a national model and over the last 30-years has been tweeked and twisted into a 21st Century Platypus (a joke of nature)! The lastest wants to raise the cost of requests to get PUBLIC INFORMATION! Not only 'Hell NO!' but 'NOT EVEN on your birthday!' HB 96 is another attempt to make GRAMA more difficult and less relevant - while making transparency of government more impossible. And wouldn't you know it, it passed !!
While some bills want to make Ranked Choice Voting permanent and praise RCV as a success (these didn't make it through, by the way), HB 313 wants to add surveillance at ballot drop boxes and require both more security and ID requirements for new voters who are first-time Utah voters. Securing Utah's votes is also the aim of a citizen's petition drive, which died, but that cost Utah as much as this bill would (it was introduced Feb. 4). The Fiscal note was worked out at $500,000. The bill was amended and altered and passed. It will likely become law and it is yet to see whether it will help Election security and integrity or just be another fly in the ointment.
A proposal to dredge Utah Lake and 'create' 20,000 acres of 'new land' in the lake to be developed and sold as waterfront property is causing quite a stir (no pun intended). Check out dontpaveutahlake.org for more into on the Conservation side of the issue and look into the Utah Lake Authority on the political side, as well as Lake Restoration info and 2022's HB240 from the Legislature. Is Utah Lake worth a $6.8 Billion project?? Do we want 'islands' and causeways in Utah Lake? Will the proposed changes help or hurt the lake, the recreation opportunities of the lake and what is the impact of such dramatic changes to the area??
Like Utah Lake, the Great Salt Lake is under study (and funding by the State) for preservation methods and programs. Gov Cox wants to spend $200 million to meter Secondary Water and $600k to update the Lake Management Plan. While 2022's HB410 wants $40 million to help protect the Great Salt by providing more water to it, literally buying water rights to go toward the GSL, among other things. Several groups have praised and decried the move as well as the cost (some saying it didn't go far enough, others calling it a good first move). We will continue to watch and keep you appraised.
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