While the Catholic Church has battled the Obama administration on mandatory contraception coverage for health insurance plans, Utah’s dominant religion, which does not oppose birth control, has been quiet on the issue. But that doesn’t mean prominent LDS Church members like Mitt Romney and Orrin Hatch have stayed silent.
It looks as though many Utah high school students won’t be able to get college credit through concurrent enrollment courses for free in the near future. As KCPW’s Jeff Robinson reports, a bill that allows Utah colleges and universities to charge them for that privilege is close to becoming law.
State Superintendent Larry Shumway received a prompt reply to a letter he sent U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan this week. Shumway wrote the letter to assert that Utah has complete control over its public school learning standards, amid concerns from Utah lawmakers, who are considering a resolution that urges the State board of Education to reconsider adopting the Common Core standards.
A divisive bill that would only allow Utah public schools to teach strictly abstinence-only sexual education is heading to the governor’s desk. House Bill 363 would also allow school districts to drop sex education altogether. Republican Senator Margaret Dayton sponsored the bill in the Senate. In a rare move, she refused to yield to questions from other lawmakers Tuesday on the Senate floor.
Without fail, there’s always one issue that dominates much of the discussion during the Utah Legislature’s annual session: public education. This year, issues like reforming teacher contracts, dramatically changing how education dollars are spent and the Common Core standards adopted by the State Board of Education have been debated in the House and Senate. KCPW’s Jeff Robinson sat down with State Superintendent Larry Shumway at his office in Salt Lake City.
Legislation that bans huka smoking and the use of electronic cigarettes in public spaces under the Utah Indoor Clean Air Act is on the verge of becoming law. But there’s one part of House Bill 245 that causes deep concern for some advocates, because it would exempt some existing businesses that specialize in those products, like huka bars and e-cigarette shops.
The Utah House of Representatives approved a measure Monday that would require women in Utah to wait three days before getting an abortion. House Bill 461, sponsored by Republican Representative Steve Eliason, extends the waiting period from 24 to 72 hours. He says in Utah, abortions are rare, and since the initial waiting period went into effect, there has been a fairly dramatic decrease in the number of abortions.
The fate of several liquor stores now rests in the hands of the Utah legislature. Democratic Senator Ben McAdams says six stores and six package agencies are at risk of being closed, because the funding to keep them open was not in the preliminary budget drafted by Republican leaders late last week.
In less than two weeks, the Utah Republican and Democratic parties will hold neighborhood caucus meetings across the state. There, delegates will be chosen for this year’s county and state conventions. And those delegates have a lot of power, choosing the parties nominees to go on the ballot in the November election.
This week, state lawmakers in the House of Representatives passed a series of bills aimed at taking over public lands from the federal government, which currently controls roughly two-thirds of the entire state. But a top federal official who oversees those public lands doesn’t think their efforts will amount to a hill of beans.
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