| Updated: March 3, 2021, 1:02 a.m.
As Utah’s population grows more diverse, an effort is under way at the Capitol to purge state law of a controversial English-only provision that passed at the ballot box a couple decades ago.
Initiative A, which drew a lawsuit after voters approved it in 2000, declares English as the official language of Utah government and restricts the way state and local leaders can communicate with the public. But those provisions no longer fit Utah’s values or its practical needs, said Sen. Kirk Cullimore, who’s sponsoring the repeal bill.
“We’re not the same state, we’re not the same country that we were when this initiative passed over 20 years ago,” Cullimore, R-Sandy, said during a Wednesday afternoon bill hearing. “We have grown, and I think our law should reflect this.”
As women continue to be disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 economic downturn, advocates say there there are few bills in the Utah legislature that could help them recover.
Deseret News
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Scott G Winterton, Deseret News
SALT LAKE CITY Citing a rising rate in the number of uninsured children 87,000 in Utah two lawmakers are hoping the state will open its wallet to fund efforts to get health care coverage for all kids.
“We are a state that deeply cares for kids,” SB158 sponsor Senate Minority Whip Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City, said Tuesday during a virtual news conference with lawmakers and the nonprofit group Voices for Utah Children.
And yet “we have one of the highest rates of uninsurance when it comes to children,” she said.