Dear Business Community,

The 2020 Legislative Session is finally underway. The first week has been relatively quiet, but did contain a few significant events. On day two, as promised, the Legislature repealed HB 185, the tax reform package it passed in December’s special session. This action set the tone for the week and will impact this year’s budget in ways that are still unclear. For now legislators are reporting that there will be no new revenue available to appropriate from the general fund. If this holds true, it will significantly impact many of our legislative efforts and priorities. We will keep you informed as this progresses.

On Tuesday, the Infrastructure and General Government Appropriations Subcommittee heard our initial funding request to facilitate a feasibility and market study regarding the potential of using the Rio Grande Depot as a year round public market. This project is a priority of the Downtown Alliance and has the support of the Chamber — it also has the potential to significantly impact the landscape of downtown Salt Lake City.

As your public policy team, we are excited for the opportunity to work with and represent you. We are closely monitoring all legislation that has the potential to impact business and will do our best to keep you updated. We meet weekly with our Public Policy Committee to discuss new legislation and determine our positions based upon our legislative priorities. These meetings will help us ensure we are getting the input of our members as we go along. We are also here to answer any questions you may have as well as to help you connect with your legislators and other policy leaders. If you have any questions throughout the session, please let us know.

We look forward to the opportunity to represent you on Utah’s Capitol Hill. In the meantime, we will provide you with these Business Watch weekly legislative updates every Friday, as well as additional updates as needed. We will also keep our public policy page current so you can check back anytime and monitor any issues that may be of interest to you and your business.

Here’s looking forward to a productive session!

Best,
Salt Lake Chamber Policy Team

Bills Worth Watching