This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2011, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Gov. Gary Herbert is expected to call Utah legislators into another special session this month, but lawmakers do not anticipate that a push to repeal Utah's immigrant guest-worker program will be on the agenda.

"I assume someone will make the effort [to add it] but it's up to the governor and I don't think he has any appetite for that," said Senate President Michael Waddoups, who confirmed the special session plan. "I think [the immigration bill] is a pretty technical thing. I think it took a lot of debate and negotiation. I don't think that's a special-session item."

Instead, the agenda for the July 20 session is expected to include more mundane items: tinkering with health insurance rates, liquor commission guidelines, judicial evaluations, and adopting another resolution supporting a federal balanced budget amendment. Lawmakers may also tweak the makeup of a board created to study the relocation of the Draper prison.

The one-day session will cost little to nothing because it will piggyback on already-scheduled monthly interim-meetings.

The Utah Republican Party passed a resolution last month calling for the repeal of HB116, which would create a Utah guest-worker law. Keri Witte, who spearheaded the Republican resolution, said lawmakers can repeal HB116 in July and she thinks they should.

"The sooner they can consider repealing it the better," she said. "It's such a flawed bill and it comes down to being unconstitutional. It's an amnesty bill and something Utahns really want to see gone, the sooner the better."

Rep. Stephen Sandstrom, R-Orem, a leading critic of HB116, said he doesn't anticipate pushing for the repeal during the special session, but he would like to see the Legislature consider a bill during a special session this fall that would add strict sanctions to an expanded E-Verify program.

Sen. Steve Urquhart, R-St. George, who also wants HB116 repealed, said he doesn't like taking on complicated matters during special sessions and "the bill doesn't go into effect — if ever — until 2013, so I don't see a huge rush to repeal."

Changes to Utah's open-records law, many of which were hammered out over several months by a task force, won't be ready in time for the special session, said Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, the sponsor of the bill. He also wants the bill to have several public hearings.

One anticipated item on the agenda for the special session is a health insurance bill that Herbert vetoed, which would allow insurance companies to shift costs from young workers and single parents with one child to older workers and larger families.

Herbert originally vetoed the bill, but he and sponsoring Rep. Jim Dunnigan, R-Taylorsville, worked out a replacement they could agree upon, although health insurers have expressed concerns about the changes.

Legislators also are expected to fine-tune conflict-of-interest policies enacted for members of the state's liquor commission and top administrators and enforcement officers at the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control. Currently, individuals can't serve in those capacities if they are in any way involved in obtaining a liquor license.

Sen. John Valentine, R-Orem, who sponsored the conflict-of-interest policy, said that the way it is now written, compliance officers could not be members of a church that serves wine for sacrament, or a commissioner could not serve if he or she works for a university that has a license to do liquor research.

"We would like to get that cleaned up now so we don't have any potential problems," Valentine said.

Legislators also are expected to change the judicial performance evaluation process for justice court judges. A bill passed last session required them to all be reviewed, but there have been problems measuring judges from small jurisdictions against those from large jurisdictions.

So the change would allow the evaluation committee to only do those from the big justice courts that have full-time judges who handle about 80 percent of the total caseload. Part-timers would be reviewed if they have complaints against them or other problems.

Rep. Greg Hughes, R-Draper, is seeking to make a minor change to the makeup of an advisory panel that is considering whether to move the Draper prison. The commission now requires legislators to be part of the panel, but the intention was to have legislators designate members.

Finally, Waddoups said that he expects legislators to pass a resolution supporting a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. He said the move would come at the request of U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, a proponent of the amendment.

Legislators passed a resolution supporting the amendment earlier this year, as well. —

Special session

The planned one-day legislative session is expected to include:

Health insurance changes

Justice court judge evaluations

Tweaking Draper prison location study panel

Clarifying liquor commission conflict-of-interest rules