Current Democratic minority leadership in the Utah Senate could be swept aside this week and the Legislature's longest-serving member, Sen. Mike Dmitrich, elected minority leader.
"I'm running for minority leader. It's just time," Dmitrich, D-Price, told the Deseret News on Tuesday afternoon.
Others running, according to Dmitrich, are Sens. Ron Allen, D-Stansbury Park, for minority whip; and Pete Suazo, D-Salt Lake, assistant whip. Sen. Gene Davis, D-Salt Lake, seeks to become the other elected member of leadership, a post that doesn't have a formal name.
Assuming those four run as a slate, they need only one other vote among the nine Democratic senators to win their leadership offices. Dmitrich said he has counted "and we have the votes."
Democrats have put off their Senate leadership election pending a recount in northern Utah's Senate District 19 where former Rep. Grant Protzman trails Rep. Dave Gladwell, R-North Ogden, by just 15 votes out of more than 24,000 cast.
Protzman could hold the key in the leadership races this year should he ultimately win and boost the number of Democrats from nine to 10 in the 2001 Legislature.
Candidates for legislative leadership elections don't have to publicly file for the posts they want. So it is difficult to find out before the secret votes take place in a party caucus exactly who is running for what.
But should the announced Democratic candidates win they would knock from office current leadership members Minority Whip Paula Julander, D-Salt Lake, and Assistant Whip Millie Peterson, D-West Valley. They are the first women elected to Senate leadership in the state's history, officials said.
Peterson said Wednesday morning: "I would like to run for my current leadership post, but I'm realistic. We can count votes."
Should Protzman ultimately win, Peterson believes he would cast a ballot for the current leadership team and in a 5-5 tie "compromises would have to be made."
Two years ago, in a contentious Democratic caucus meeting, current Minority Leader Scott Howell, D-Granite, ran on a slate that included Julander and Peterson. Dmitrich hoped to be Howell's No. 2 man in minority leadership. But Howell, who is retiring this year, let it be known that Julander would be whip or he wouldn't serve as leader. Dmitrich backed down and got out of the race.
"I didn't have the votes" to win a leadership post two years ago. "I have them this year, I believe," Dmitrich said.
Democrats lost two Senate seats in last week's election. And those losses probably opened the door to Dmitrich and others to take over Senate minority leadership.
Dmitrich, 64, is the state's longest-serving active lawmaker. He first won election to the Utah House in 1968 and has served in the House and Senate ever since. For eight years — 1980-88 — he was minority leader of the Utah House.
But in 1988 he was swept from leadership by a group of young House Democrats led, in part, by Protzman, who won a House minority leadership post that year.
For years Dmitrich has been a stalwart supporter of Utah's coal-mining industry. A former small-town banker, Dmitrich was government affairs officer for Plateau Mining Co., a firm that recently was bought out by the Germany-based international mining company RAG American Coal Holding Inc. After a July 31 explosion in its Carbon County Willow Creek Mine earlier this year that killed two miners, RAG's Utah operations were shut down and Dmitrich's small consulting contract (with RAG) will end.
"I've become a government and natural resource consultant, looking for clients," Dmitrich said. He said he won't become a registered lobbyist in Utah. "I'm the guy who hires the lobbyists" for his clients, Dmitrich said.
"With only nine votes," in the 29-member Senate, "Democrats won't be calling the shots" in the 2001 Legislature, Dmitrich said. "My leadership style, in the House and elsewhere, is to build coalitions through cooperation. I think I'll be more proactive" than previous Senate Democratic leaders, he added. "There will be issues where we differ from the Republicans, and we'll be heard" on those matters, Dmitrich said.
E-mail: bbjr@desnews.com