Lt Governor hitting every town in the state as part of campaign

metroweekly.com

He’s a former Utah House Representative, the current Lieutenant Governor of the state and, so far, the only official Republican in the gubernatorial race to replace outgoing Governor Gary Herbert. Spencer J. Cox is touring the state on an every-city tour, making his way to Northern Utah this week.  On KVNU’s For the People program on Monday, Cox explained why he and his wife came up with this way to campaign.

“We wanted to do something different; we come from small towns in rural Utah. I was born and raised, and still live in, raising my family in Fairview, a town of 1200 people in Sanpete County. We realized that no one ever comes to visit us to campaign in these small towns. We wanted to do something different, so we had this crazy idea to visit all 248 (towns), and I’m just leaving Honeyville and number 67.  So, we’re well on our way,” Cox said.

Recently, in his capacity as Lieutenant Governor, he announced a telecommuting initiative. Cox said a couple years ago the governor launched his Rural Jobs initiative, where he wanted to help create 25,000 rural jobs in the 25 counties outside the Wasatch Front over the next several years.  Governor Herbert gave Cox the mandate of trying to figure out how to do this.

“As I traveled the state and talked to county commissioners and local education leaders and mayors, city council people, there’s a lot that’s going on, some really good things. But I was really frustrated because I come from the telecommunications business, and this idea of teleworking or telecommuting 10 years ago was all the rage.

“Then it kind of fell apart, and there are some reasons for that. The technology certainly wasn’t ready, it was expensive, people didn’t have high bandwidth in their home, it cost too much. And you couldn’t Facetime with the push of a button.”

The lieutenant governor said now the technology is there but businesses have been reluctant to do it. So, they decided to do a pilot program with state workers. He said the results were amazing, not only did they cut down on vehicle emissions but the employers were happier with a 22-percent increase in productivity compared to their co-workers who were doing the exact same job.

On his road tour, Cox is planning stops late Tuesday in Mendon and North Logan. Wednesday is an all-Cache day with appearances that include Smithfield, Amalga, Newton, Hyde Park and other towns on the north side.

Thursday morning he will be in Logan then Rich County. On Friday, he will be in River Heights, Providence, Millville, Nibley, Hyrum, Paradise and Wellsville. You can see his complete schedule at www.votecox.com.

AUDIO:Gubernatorial candidate Spencer Cox talks with Jason Williams on For the People 07-29-2019

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