Op-Ed: County Executive provides open letter on legislative priorities

Cache County Executive David Zook has been busy conferring with local lawmakers during the 2022 general session of the Utah Legislature. That session will end Mar. 4.

To Cache County Residents

From County Executive David Zook

It’s been a busy session so far with our state Legislature and many important issues are being discussed.

Several people have asked about bills I’ve been watching, working on or concerned about in this session, so I thought I would write an update on a few of them.

One of the bills I’m most interested in is one I asked Senator Chris Wilson to sponson. It’s Senate Bill 167, which addresses child sexual exploitation. This bill increases penalties for the manufacturing and distribution of child pornography.

I’ve been working with Malouf on figuring out how to make our community and our state safer for our children and we identified that we needed to toughen penalties related to child pornography. The current penalties are sickeningly weak.

We had a recent case that was handled by four law enforcement agencies, including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security and our county prosecutors. A lot of work went into tracking down a predator here in Cache County. He was convicted, but only got 60 days in jail.

That is horrible for the victims and it’s also a serious morale issue for law enforcement. For our law enforcement to go through all that work and have somebody get a slap on the wrist like that is not right.

But it’s worse is the child victims, who are being depicted in these pictures and videos. That is ultimately what our cause is and what we’re trying to fix. We need to stop this! That bill passed the Senate and will hopefully be passed by the House soon.

Another important public safety issue I’ve been working on is getting funding to put a fiber optic line through Logan Canyon so we can get cell towers installed there.

Right now, there is a very long stretch of road where there is no cell service. This is a critical safety issue when there are accidents or other emergencies. If it might take someone 30 minutes to drive to a place where they can get a cell signal, and then another 30 minutes to get help there, that’s too big of a risk.

I’ve been working with UDOT, the Forest Service, the governor’s office and other local, state and federal leaders to move this project forward. The governor put it in his budget request to the legislature to allocate $20 million to pay for the project. In addition to supporting cell towers, the fiber optic line would also allow for traffic cameras, changeable message signs and would provide a critical middle-mile internet link between Cache and Rich counties.

Speaking of transportation, I’ve also been working with Representatives Casey Snider and Mike Schultz to address a problem we’ve been having with the railroad. The railroad is preventing road projects from being completed on 1400 North in Logan and on State Road 30 near Mendon. Rep. Schultz’ House Bill 181 will hopefully bring us some relief and allow those projects to move forward by giving UDOT the ability to decide how maintenance of those crossings gets handled.

Another issue I’ve been supporting during the legislative session is one to expand Utah State University’s Veterinary program into a full-fledged program here in Cache Valley.

USU has a vet school right now, but students only complete the first two years here, then go to Washington for the second two years. USU is making a bid right now to the Legislature to fund the entire program here, which would be incredible for our community, our economy, our students, our agricultural operations and for pet owners and pets.

There is currently a shortage of vets in our community and state because there is actually no veterinary school in the Intermountain West region. Utah State University would be an ideal place for a program like this as they are a leader in other animal sciences, genetics and bio-tech and this school would support all of those programs.

Finally, the last bill I will tell you about in this email is House Bill 440 by Rep. Steve Eliason.  This bill would change the way the state distributes homelessness funds.

I’ve been advocating for more funds for our community because historically most funds have gone to the Wasatch Front.  However, we have a growing homelessness problem here and our service providers — including non-profits, churches and government agencies — are having a hard time keeping up with the needs.

Did you know that we counted more than 200 homeless people in Cache County in our recent count?

These are just a few of the hundreds of bills being discussed at the legislature this session.  If there are others you are concerned about, please let me know.

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