The Deseret News has announced that elected officials and political candidates will no longer be permitted to contribute news stories to Deseret Connect, on online forum the news outlet developed for freelance writers. As KCPW’s Whittney Evans reports, this affects West Valley City Mayor Mike Winder.
This weekend’s Utah Pride Festival will be the largest in state history. Festival organizers say for the first time, the festival has sold out of vendor booth space, and has the largest number of entries in its Sunday parade, making it the second largest in the state next to the Days of ‘47. Marketing and Media Manager Marina Gomberg believes this year’s growth shows Utah is taking more steps to embrace the LGBT community.
Some Utahns who have committed crimes are finding their past is coming back to haunt them – even though their records were officially expunged. While the courts may have deleted records of the crimes they’ve been convicted of, the same is not true for private firms hired to do background checks. Salt Lake Tribune crime reporter Nate Carlisle has been researching this for a story that will appear Sunday in the newspaper.
With summer finally arriving, ozone will contribute to Utah’s air quality problems. But there are also ongoing concerns about fine particle pollution, with the Environmental Protection Agency telling the state it had better clean it up. We were joined by Bryce Bird, Director of the Utah Division of Air Quality.
With chairman Wayne Holland stepping down, a middle school teacher is one of two candidates vying to be the next head of the Utah Democratic Party. Robert Comstock describes himself as a political activist for more than 35 years. His goals include returning the party to its core Democratic values and opening the doors to everyone who wants to become a candidate.
One of Salt Lake City’s largest providers of housing outreach for the homeless is on the verge of being homeless itself. The Salt Lake City Mission has just days to find a new location, after receiving word that it must move out of two of its buildings. KCPW’s Jessica Gail reports on what happened, and what comes next for the mission.
The potential Election 2012 battle between Utah Senator Orrin Hatch and Utah Representative Jason Chaffetz has just been taken to the next level, with anonymous insiders telling the Salt Lake Tribune that Chaffetz is in the race for sure against the senior senator, who was first elected 35 years ago. But Chaffetz is coyly sticking to his line that he’s only a “definite maybe.”
Salt Lake County is trying to keep waterways clear of potential flood-causing debris as temperatures rise and snowpack melts. Many areas of northern Utah have already experienced flooding, and as KCPW’s Whittney Evans reports, the county isn’t ruling it out along the flood plains of the Jordan River.
Construction begun on the new public safety building in downtown Salt Lake City on Wednesday morning. Fire Chief Kurt Cook says he’s relieved to see the project starting, because over the past two years, his department has had to respond to 60 emergency calls within the current public safety building itself.
Governor Gary Herbert’s Senior Adviser on Environmental Affairs says the Interior Department’s decision to drop an initiative to designate “wild lands” is a responsible one. Ted Wilson says the original action of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to pursue the designation froze local governments out of the process, but now Congress will be able to work with local and state governments on wilderness bills, including two already coming out of Piute and San Juan counties.
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