Utah's 104-member Legislature adjourned late Wednesday but not before turning over a few rocks to find a bit more money for special programs, adopting an $8.26 billion budget for next fiscal year, passing more than 300 new laws and, in the end, feeling a little better about themselves.
The 2004 Legislature was light on diplomacy and laden with politics: gay marriage, abortion, tuition tax credits, all of which combined for some sharp words and musings over whether they had earned their $120-a-day pay.
But by Wednesday, during frequent breaks in voting, debating and caucusing, legislators put their differences aside and even had a few smiles on their faces and jokes on their tongues.
At one point House Majority Leader Greg Curtis, who lost his temper during a recent committee meeting, tearing up a chart on the wall, had his arm around Democratic Rep. Ty McCartney, one of the House's more liberal members, as they laughed together.
"There is peace in the valley," he said.
It wasn't always like that the past 45 days, which saw a few tears and "retribution" toward moderate Republicans, who voted with Democrats over tuition tax credits.
GOP Gov. Olene Walker — overseeing what may be her only session as Utah's chief executive — gave legislators high marks. "They did very well with the budget considering the resources they had. There wasn't money for new, innovative programs."
Walker said she only has seven bills on her desk for consideration and will take her allotted 20 days to consider any that deserve her veto. "I won't veto just to use a veto; there must be a good reason. Right now, it's impossible to tell how many" she may strike down.
Utah County got nearly all that its all-Republican delegation wanted, said Rep. Jim Ferrin, R-Orem.
"Utah Valley State College got $75,000 for its nursing program," he said. And the 13-member House delegation, while agreeing to delay the 800 North road project in Orem, succeeded in stopping $65 million from being taken out of the Centennial Highway Fund. That means reconstruction of I-15 in the county will begin sooner than otherwise it could have, he added.
"We pushed charter schools funding, which is important in this area," he said.
Finally, while Rep. Margaret Dayton's attempt to get Utah out of the costly No Child Left Behind federal education program failed, "we got the attention of the White House and moved the debate forward" over the controversial program by President Bush.
Political messages
No sooner had legislators filed out of the Capitol than almost all were looking ahead to their own political campaigns. Within two weeks, those holding all 75 House seats and 15 of 29 Senate seats must file for re-election or retire.
Indeed, old saws say the 2004 Legislature may have been the most political in 20 years, with two members running for governor, both House Speaker Marty Stephens and Senate President Al Mansell stepping down from their top-job posts, and resolutions arguing over getting the United States out of the United Nations and praising President Bush's war efforts.
They were "messages" being heard far and wide. Democrats charged that the conservative agenda was tarnishing Utah's reputation and harming economic development efforts.
Even the White House got the message this year. Top federal education aides came to Utah three times in an effort to kill Rep. Margaret Dayton's effort to get Utah out of Bush's No Child Left Behind federal education program. Dayton's bill was greatly watered down, then recommended for further study.
As one bill after another tagged by the Republican right wing failed or was sent to further study, rumors flew that moderate Republicans who voted with Democrats may be targeted for defeat this year. Those campaign fights will play out over the next six months.
Walker, too, must decide within two weeks whether she'll seek the Republican gubernatorial nomination or will retire after serving just 14 months in the top office.
Distrust of government in Capitol hallways reigned the past 45 days. And it wasn't just right-wing Republicans. Democrats also joined in condemning MATRIX, a little-understood program started by former Gov. Mike Leavitt that shares millions of files about Utahns with a multistate government database. Other measures were aimed at curtailing government or stopping faceless firms from spying on citizens' computer browsing.
The short shadow of a 13-year-old Parker Jensen flickered across the session, too. Jensen, whose parents made national headlines when they fought the state's attempt to force their son into cancer treatments, even showed up on the Hill to listen to debate and testify on some of the two-dozen or so bills introduced on parental rights.
While some of the measures started out fairly Draconian, child-welfare advocates claimed, in the end most of the issues went to further study. State social workers will still be able to enter homes and take custody of children who appear in danger of real physical and mental harm.
But there is concern swirling on Capitol Hill that even the minor changes could send the state back to court to defend how it protects children — a battle that has cost taxpayers millions of dollars.
"Things were done for human rights in terms of health and well-being" of Utahns, Mansell insisted. "And for parents rights."
Money and taxes
Taxpayers weren't hurt much this year. But they weren't helped, much, either.
If you subscribe to cable TV, your monthly bill may go down a dime or so; if your TV his hooked up to satellite channels, you get a slightly higher tax on your bill. The changes bring the state $4.4 million more while creating a uniform 6.25 percent tax on both competing industries.
Lawmakers also passed a tax increase on nursing homes. Most of that money will be matched several times over with federal Medicaid monies and will then come back to nursing homes through enhanced Medicaid reimbursement for poor patients.
But that tax increase hadn't even been signed by the governor before lawmakers — at Walker's behest — began raiding the nursing home tax revenue for other health-care needs.
And lawmakers imposed a 10 percent tax on strip clubs, with the money going toward sex-offender treatment.
Many hunting and fishing licenses go up, as do off-road-vehicle registrations. The fees for 911 emergency services go up a few pennies.
Professional licenses — from building contractors to barbers — also will see slight increases. Other professions will see big increases.
The biggest fee increase — a $32 per traffic ticket surcharge that would have gone to pay for bailiffs and court security — was killed, then brought back for consideration late Wednesday and passed.
And lawmakers rejected a nickel a pack increase in the cigarette tax.
Several bills that could have drastically changed tax law died.
An $88 million bill that would have helped fund public schools by Reps. Pat Jones, D-Cottonwood Heights, and Rep. Steve Mascaro, R-West Jordan, died in committee.
And a measure by Ferrin that would have given a tuition tax credit to parents who send their children to private schools also died without a formal floor vote.
Personal responsibility
Democrats claimed that some Republicans were talking out of both sides of their mouths.
Lawmakers passed both a Utah constitutional amendment and a statute banning gay marriages in the state, telling people whom they can and cannot marry.
Yet they also adopted a measure saying someone can't sue a restaurant if they eat too much and gain weight there.
"I applaud your stance for individual choice" of eating too much, said Rep. Roz McGee, D-Salt Lake. "I would hope that would carry over into all pieces of legislation," she said, referring to two anti-abortion bills that passed.
Indeed, Utahns may not have heard the end of partial-birth abortion and a prohibition on spending state funds on abortions.
While Republicans proclaim the bills are legal, Democrats and others say the measures will just land the state in court. In the current budget year, lawmakers appropriated nearly $800,000 in extra spending for Attorney General Mark Shurtleff to pay for outside lawyers hired to defend the state in various cases arising from legislation in years past. It will be years before the legal tab comes due for legislation passed this year. House Minority Leader Brent Goodfellow, D-West Valley, said that while minority Democrats worked well with the majority Republicans at times, public education didn't get the money it needs or deserves.
"This was a Band-Aid approach to budget problems, leaving families, job-seekers, health care, children and the disabled" underfunded and hurting, he said.
E-mail: bbjr@desnews.com; spang@desnews.com