| Updated: 1:32 a.m.
Utah legislative leaders said the process of setting next year’s $21.7 billion budget was one of the easiest they’ve ever experienced. Having more than $1.5 billion in extra money to spend can help clear any roadblocks that pop up.
“This is probably the smoothest budgeting process I’ve seen in my nearly decade of doing budget negotiations with the Senate,” House Speaker Brad Wilson, R-Kaysville, told reporters Friday.
Last year, the unfolding coronavirus pandemic forced legislators to cut nearly $1 billion from the budget they had approved just a few months earlier. But, the economic damage from COVID-19 was not nearly as bad as they predicted.
‘What’s the rush?’ ask those upstream and downstream of Utah’s largest freshwater lake.
(Francisco Kjolseth | Tribune file photo) This July 26, 2019, file photo shows Lincoln Beach at the southern end of Utah Lake has been closed because of a toxic algal bloom. The Legislature snubbed a bill Wednesday that would have created a new authority to manage and clean up the lake, Utah s largest fresh water lake.
| Feb. 24, 2021, 7:25 p.m.
A bill that would turn over management of the beleaguered Utah Lake to a new taxing authority was swamped by opposition during its first committee hearing Tuesday.
Under the bill, the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands would turn over control over the state-owned lake bed to the Utah Lake Authority. The authority would then serve as a political subdivision, eventually enacting a tax on the project area to fund its ongoing operations and environmental restoration, estimated to cost as much as $7 billion.
State lawmakers looking to form Utah Lake Authority to restore polluted waters
Sponsor says the bill has nothing to do with an artificial island city proposed for the lake thatâs still in the works.
(Francisco Kjolseth | Tribune file photo) Utah Lake is plagued with invasive species, a nutrient overload and toxic algal blooms, as seen in this file photo from 2019.
  | Feb. 15, 2021, 1:00 p.m.
A Utah lawmaker is considering legislation to create a new Utah Lake Authority that would have broad authority over the management, cleanup and future use of the stateâs largest freshwater lake.
Rep. Brady Brammer, R-Pleasant Grove, is sponsoring the legislation, which has not yet been numbered or made public. But a recent draft obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune shows it would create a 13-member Utah Lake Authority Board, with members appointed by the governor, Legislature, Utah County, the local Chamber of Commerce and numerous cities that border the lake. The lake autho