OCR Text |
Show , of one for each 12,000, instead of 10.000 as now. That would give I Salt Lake County two more sen- ators. Utah County and Weber I County one more each. Salt Lake ! County would get four more representatives, rep-resentatives, Weber, Davis and ; Utah would get two more each, ! and Sanpete would lose one. 1 Latest to appear were two bills in the House, one sponsored by 25 rural representatives and one by 26 Weber, Tooele, Salt Lake and Carbon representatives. The first would set up the Legislature By Harry Marlowe , More noticeable than anything ' about the Twenty-ninth Legis- ( lature's first three and a half ( weeks has been the lack of color ( and fireworks. Since the House of Represen-. tatives took four days to effect1: an organization from its 30-30 ! ' party split, there has been little of the type of action in . either house that would keep a gallery alert as to what was going on. It could be that the entire session ses-sion -will run at the same pace as the first one-third of the 60-day 60-day grind. But with issues piling up on the calendars the way they are, considerable well-heated debate might well develop. ! For instance, four different reapportionment re-apportionment bills have been introduced, two in each house, i and a complete highway program !. of the Utah Legislative council, . including a raise of two cents in i I gas tax, is in the Senate. Also, . the schools have asked for an in-r in-r crease of $500, from $3300 to 1 $3800, in the minimum classroom I unit and for a ten-per cent in- i crease in the ceiling on taxes revenues amount to $15,095,000,' including the surplus of more than $3,000,000 carried over from ; the current biennium. Out of this he hewed a budget of a bit i over $14,800,000. ! What the appropriations com- I mittee may determine as esti-1 mated revenues may be a quite different figure somewhat higher than the governor's and the appropriations, consequently, may be considerably higher than those recommended by the dhied executive. But knowing of the governor's veto power and his strong stand for a balanced budget, however, the committee undoubtedly will attempt to keep the expenditures very close to estimated revenues. Action on reapportionment if it should come has the makings mak-ings of a red-hot rural-urban scrap in both houses.. On the other hand, so wide a range is covered by the bills introduced, that nothing may come of the question again this year. The constitution requires reappoint-' reappoint-' ment on the federal census, each ten years, but the matter has been left alone since 1930. There are those who think the present apportionment could hardly be bettered and that the law might best be changed to meet the present numbers. That would mean that the four measures meas-ures on the line would die a nat- with one senator from each coun- i ty and representatives on the present basis, giving Salt Lake County eight new members, ' Davis two, Carbon one, Weber J and Utah three each, and removing re-moving one from Sanpete. The other bill calls for strict reapportionment on the present basis, providing three more senators sen-ators for Salt Lake County, Weber Web-er and Utah counties one more senator each, and would increase the representatives as in the aforementioned bill. At present outlook, it appears some sort of a compromise may be worked out on both the school fund hike request and the legislative legis-lative council recommendation to jftmp gas taxes and truck license fees. Given less chance of getting get-ting attention, however, are proposals pro-posals of the governor picked in similar bills introduced by some House Democrats to lower income in-come taxes by raising exemptions, and to take the sales tax off , food. Many legislators have expressed ex-pressed the opinion off the record rec-ord tax decreases in these times are most difficult to secure and that it would be quite satisfactory satisfac-tory if they just hold the line with no increases. About the only Senate action to show signs of bringing on some controversial debate was a brief flurry over a resolution of Sen. Mark Paxton (R-Fillmore) I and Senator Hopkin to memori-' memori-' alize leaders of both political they may levy over and above the minimum program. Also at issue is certain to be the biennially presented proposal to refund taxes on motor fuel put to non-highway use, a measure that effects gas used in farm machinery. ural death. 1 First to appear was a bill toj reapportion on a basis of two senators for each senatorial district dis-trict (cutting five senators out of Salt Lake County) , and representatives represen-tatives on a basis of one for each 10,000 population, as of now. This measure was sponsored by 11 rural senators all tout one, Sen. Marl D. Gibson (D-Price). Five urban senators were on a bill to reapportion the Senate on a basis of one for each 29,000 population, pop-ulation, instead of the present 27,0000 and the House on a basis parties in congress to forget their political differences and formulate formu-late a unified, clear-cut foreign policy. The Democrats came out of a caucus and voted solid to table the 'bill on motion of Senator Hopkins against a solid front of eight Republicans. The motion mo-tion to table was not debatable, but in explaining his vote, Senator Sena-tor Paxton charged that the Democratic members of the Sen-tate Sen-tate had been "whipped" by "party bosses" to a point where A good deal or tne controversial matter will be thrashed out by the appropriations committee. Headed by Sen. Alonzo F. Hop-kin Hop-kin (D-Woodruff) and Rep. W. G. (Bill) Larson (D-Magna), this committee faces a task of fitting department requests to estimated revenues. Certain to influence the thinking think-ing are the figures presented by Gov. J. Bracken Lee in his budget bud-get message. 'He said general fun requests totaled more than $21,000,000, and that estimated they "did not dare to stand up and be counted." It required a majority of the Senate to lift the bill from the table for consideration. considera-tion. One bill, other than legislative salaries and expenses, was passed by both houses during the second week, and that effects the outly-' outly-' ing areas of the state seeking i cooperative fire protection. It i would permit establishment of fire protection districts in unincorporated unin-corporated areas. |