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Monday, May 22, 2023


The important policy work of the summer has commenced with the Legislature convening last week for the first interim committee meetings and special session of the year. Also, the work of the Unified Economic Opportunity Commission (UEOC) has begun in earnest. I’ll share a little bit about what was discussed at interim and about the UEOC. Lastly, I'll include some federal info, including current grant opportunities.


May Legislative Interim Meetings

The Utah Legislature met for the first time last week since the 2023 General Session for interim committee meetings. They will continue to meet monthly until November (except July)  to receive reports, study issues, and craft legislation for the 2024 General Session.


WFRC focused on the Transportation Interim Committee, where the following key issues were discussed:


  • Our partners at UDOT and UTA provided an update of state-funded and non-state-funded transit projects, including the strategic doubletracking of FrontRunner, Point of the Mountain transit, Point of the Mountain FrontRunner station, and the Ogden-Weber Bus Rapid Transit (OGX).
  • Legislative staff presented an overview of transit oriented development tools and requirements associated with Housing and Transit Reinvestment Zones (HTRZ) and Station Area Planning (SAP). The Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity (GOEO) provided some insights into Housing and Transit Reinvestment Zones, highlighting the South Jordan HTRZ project as a best practice for using the tool. 
  • WFRC and our partners at MAG continued the discussion by providing additional detail into station area planning, highlighting the work that’s being done in our communities to plan around fixed guideway transit stations. 
  • WFRC also presented on parking around transit, detailing preliminary information out of the joint parking modernization study that WFRC, MAG, UDOT, and UTA have commissioned.


The Legislature will meet again in interim June 13th and 14th.



Special Session

Governor Spencer Cox called the Legislature into a special session last week for a number of time-sensitive matters. The Legislature was asked to consider extending the 30-day state of emergency the Governor declared for spring runoff and flooding impacts across the state, which they ultimately decided to do by extending the declaration until August 15th and reallocating roughly $40 million to assist communities with excess snow removal costs and flooding mitigation and repair. Additionally, the Legislature made changes to firefighter retirement benefits, firearm restrictions for nonimmigrant work or student visa holders, and confirmed new appointments for the directors of the Department of Corrections and Public Service Commission, as well as the Great Salt Lake Commissioner.



UEOC Growth and Transportation Working Group

The Unified Economic Opportunity Commission’s Growth and Transportation (G&T) working group kicked off their work earlier this month. The G&T working group is co-chaired by Senator Kirk Cullimore, Representative Cal Musselman, and UDOT Executive Director Carlos Braceras. WFRC Executive Director Andrew Gruber serves on the G&T group, as does WFRC Chair South Jordan Mayor Dawn Ramsey, along with representatives from cities, counties, and other public and private sector stakeholders. The G&T group is divided further into three individual subgroups, including:


  1. Transit and Transportation Innovation and Investment
  2. Growth and Infrastructure Innovation and Investment
  3. Growth Policy Alignment


The subgroups, in which WFRC and our other community and transportation partners are heavily involved, will dive deeply into each of these study areas to provide actionable recommendations to G&T, and ultimately the broader UEOC. This work will happen through the Summer with the intent that actionable policy items will be made available to the UEOC to be included in the Governor’s budget and presented to interim committees. You can find the UEOC schedule in this document from the UEOC’s April meeting. 


The next scheduled UEOC meeting is May 31st.



Help Guide Utah’s Growth

The Governor’s Office of Planning and Budget (GOPB), along with a number of key stakeholders including WFRC, is soliciting feedback from all Utahns on how Utah should grow. Preserving Utah’s unique quality of life requires carefully weighing the impacts of potential decisions about housing, open space, water, transportation, and more. WFRC joined the Governor and our partners at the kickoff event for the Guiding Our Growth Survey. If you have yet to do so, please take the survey and share it with your colleagues and constituents. 


Take the Survey

Grant Opportunities

Notices of funding opportunities for discretionary grant programs from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act continue to be released. Below is information about a new electric vehicle charging grant opportunity, and a new resilience-focused grant program. 


  • Charging and Fueling Infrastructure (CFI) community grants are intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fill gaps in access to electric vehicle (EV) charging by providing funding for EV charging infrastructure in your communities. Award sizes range from $500K to $15M and require a 20% local match. Eligible projects include acquisition and installation of EV charging infrastructure located on any public road or publicly accessible locations (parking facilities, public buildings, public schools, parks, etc.) Here you can find the Notice of Funding Opportunity and webinar for further information. The application deadline was extended from May 30th, and is now due no later than June 13th, 2023.


  • (NEW!) Promoting Resilient Operations for Transformative, and Cost-Saving Transportation Program (PROTECT) grants are intended to ensure resilience to natural hazards like climate change, extreme weather events, and other natural disasters. The grants awards both for planning activities, like the creation of a resiliency strategic plan, and resilience project improvements including roadway, bike/ped, and transit projects. Applications are now open, and due no later than August 18, 2023. 


Congress

All eyes in Washington D.C., and indeed around the nation and even the world, are focused on the negotiations now underway on the federal debt ceiling and budget. We’ll leave it to other sources to share news about that issue, except that we’ll note that the ultimate decisions made could impact the availability of federal infrastructure funding for Utah. A default on the federal debt could impact the flow of payments made for federally funded infrastructure projects. Adjustment to the budget could impact the availability of projected federal funding for infrastructure projects. 


Even as the debt ceiling negotiations continue, Congress has begun its FY24 appropriations season and has begun the subcommittee markup process for several of the 12 annual appropriations bills. The Transportation-Housing and Urban Development (“T-HUD”) bill has not received action yet.


Looking forward to more of these important policy discussions with you all over the next several months, but hope you’re enjoying a little time away in the sunshine as well!


Best,

Miranda Jones Cox

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