It looked like a stunning reversal: the same church that helped defeat gay marriage in California standing with gay-rights activists on an anti-discrimination law in its own backyard.

. . .

The ordinances passed and history was made: It marked the first time the Salt Lake City-based church had supported gay-rights legislation.

More than a year ago – months before the votes started coming in for California’s Proposition 8 the LDS Church stated its official position that they were supportive of the basic rights of all people, including homosexuals, such as probate rights and housing rights. They stated that they were amenable in theory to the Common Ground Initiative but could not take a public position on bills that had not yet been drafted.

The position of the church never changed. Some people claim this is a PR move to blunt the backlash over their role in defeating Prop. 8, but the only thing that changed is that unlike the theoretical five bills of the common ground initiative, the Salt Lake City council actually drafted two bills. The church publicly supported the bills – in keeping with the position they had already taken.

Sadly some people still don’t get it and are suggesting that the church should take a further step by actually writing bill proposals for the state legislature to consider which would extend these same benefits statewide that were just passed within Salt Lake City. The fact is that the church will do just have they have done up to this point – they will not write legislation and they will take no position on theoretical bills that have not been written. When bills are written that are acceptable the church will support them. Bills they can’t quite support will get no comment. In the Utah Legislature they don’t even have to worry about addressing bills that are worthy of their opposition.

Latest Version: 2.0 (March 16, 2009)

Display templates are introduced here giving you total flexibility in deciding what to display. There is one set of template settings for recent votes and another for search results. Each template is made up of a header, a footer, and an item template. Template tags are used to display the variables specific to each recorded vote such as the vote cast or the vote description. There is also a setting for what to display when no votes are returned in the recent votes and another setting for when no votes are returned in a search.

Votes are entered on a dashboard widget:

A vote management page is available from the posts menu:

Recent votes are shown by adding <?php recent_votes(); ?> in your theme templates. You can show a search votes form by using the shortcode [ SEARCH-VOTES ] on a page or post. Options for Voting Record include:

• The option to specify a primary voter (if most or all of the votes being tracked are from one person).
• The option to specify header text/code for the recent vote list.
• How many recent votes to show – limited by number of votes or number of days.
• What to show before a list of recent votes and what to show before a list of search results.
• What to display at the end of a list of recent votes and what to display at the end of a list of search results.
• The format for displaying your recent votes or search results lists, including which pieces of information to show.
• What to display when no recent votes are returned or when a search comes up empty.

To install it simply unzip the file linked above and save it in your plugins directory under wp-content. In the plugin manager activate the plugin. Settings for the plugin may be altered under the Voting Record page of the Options menu (version 2.3) or Settings menu (version 2.5 or later).

The group I will be forming will be open to, even encouraging of, participation by people of all political perspectives. The only requirement for participation is a commitment to avoid the playground politics of name calling and guilt by association . The aim of the group will be to draw people out of the silent majority until the silent become the minority by fostering civil dialog between people of differing perspectives. We will not aim to come to a consensus except the consensus that wider participation is better than narrower participation. I would like the group to seek to engage other group members in public discussion of issues so that people who have been silent will have a chance to be exposed to various positions on important issues without the likelyhood of being personally insulted by those who disagree with them. I also would like the group, individually and collectively, to engage in discussing issues with candidates for office and elected officials with an emphasis on local candidates and officials and a balance of local, state, and national issues. (emphasis original)

I note it hear in case there is anyone who reads here but not there who would be interested in this effort. If you are, please email me or comment on the original post.

While the Utah Department of Transportation has explored user fees as a funding option – one that could cost some west-siders up to $200 a month – state Transportation Commission Chairman Stuart Adams said his panel hasn’t seriously considered it.

“I don’t think anyone wants to take a tool out of the toolbox and throw it away,” Adams said, “but it isn’t a tool that has been talked about.”

I could not believe that the Transportation Commission has not discussed tolling yet. The Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT) has and there are rumors that congestion pricing will be recommended for freeways nationally.

It’s about time that the Transportation Commission started talking about this tool – and they should apply it across the board. Ideally, I-15 and the MVC should each include congestion pricing along-side a free lane or two (meaning always free rather than only free when traffic is low).

I believe that reasonable discussants find it easy to read other reasonable discussants across the spectrum and less than reasonable discussants who match up with them ideologically. I also believe that unreasonable discussants provide fuel to other unreasonable discussants who are ideologically opposed to them. In other words it is probably fairly easy to follow those in adjacent quadrants, but unreasonable contributors tend to drive away reasonable contributors who are ideologically opposed to them. (Reasonable contributors probably bore unreasonable contributors who are ideologically opposed to them.)

It’s time for another grid:

I have tried to depict who would be alienated by a person who fell at various positions on the grid. For each dot, those on the other side of the line matching the color of the dot would be alienated (according to my theory).

By way of experiment, I am cross posting this at One Utah to see how the discussion differs since that site attracts a very different set of commentors.

• • Salt Lake
  • Utah Valley/Happy Valley
  • Weber/Ogden
  • Cache Valley/Logan
  • Davis
  • Dixie
  • Tooele

The classifications will be self-selection – if you want to be identified in a particular region you just email me or leave a comment with the region(s) you want to be listed in. Please only request to be listed in regions where you have an interest (that would generally be living or working in that region). Please do not choose Salt Lake if your only interest is that you follow the legislative session.

If you are going to be listed in a region with two names, please vote on which name you prefer to use. (We’ll use straight democracy – I’ll break any ties.)

As an example, I could be listed in the Davis (live) and Salt Lake (work) regions – in the past I could have been listed in Utah Valley (before I moved).

Update 8/28/08: The names of the geographic categories have been settled. Only Utah Valley has more than the basic name attached to it (valley) because “Utah” might appear to be general for the whole state (even though that would have been redundant).

First, nobody is pretending that tolling is a temporary measure, so Doug is right that once that door is opened it won’t be closed again. Doug also fails to recognize that we already have a toll lane on I-15 with the possibility of other lanes starting to be tolled in the future so the door has already been opened to tolling in Utah.

Second, as cars get better fuel efficiency the government (State and Federal) receives fewer tax dollars per vehicle mile traveled to maintain roads. Regardless of how innovative our ancestors were, we have to find more revenue to maintain that transportation infrastructure. Perhaps Doug would like us to raise the gas tax – as if that would not disproportionally hit the poorest people (the same complaint he makes against tolling). That option fails to address the possibility of a future with other fuel alternatives and the fact that we must find a way to generate revenue in a way that is fair according to use regardless of other factors such as what fuel one person’s vehicle uses or how efficient the vehicle is. Fair revenue would be based on usage (miles traveled being the best measure of usage in my mind).

Third, Doug is referencing revenue projections on toll roads that were built for the purpose of generating revenue. The Mountain View Corridor needs to be built regardless of what revenue it might generate. Any revenue it generates is better than not generating any revenue. Also, lower revenue is an indication of lower usage which results in lower maintenance costs. For a road that is already necessary the risk of low revenue is minimal and tolling a necessary road is a totally different situation than adding new road capacity in order to generate revenue.

Let’s review what’s really being discussed.

• • Simple tolling is being less talked about than congestion pricing – which is even more fair because the cost is adjusted based on the usage levels when the driving is happening and it means that people can plan most of their trips at low-toll or no-toll times.
  • Calls to include similar tolling options on I-15 and the Mountain View Corridor are increasing. There is no reason that tolling should favor one area over another.
  • Electronic tolling would prevent the sitting in line using up gas that Doug complains about. Anyone who was using a toll road regularly would be getting an electronic monitor. Only those who are passing through or who use the roads infrequently would ever have to be stopped at a toll booth.

There are arguments against tolling that deserve consideration, but Doug missed any of those. My conclusion is – if we get congestion pricing as I envision it and I had to listen to Doug Wright I can promise that I would pay the highest toll rates to get off the road as fast as possible in order to minimize my listening time.

First, I think that Utah Lake would be a great natural resource for the county and the state if it were restored. In its present condition it is little more than a big puddle interrupting our transportation and growth.

There are currently efforts to rid the lake of the carp that were introduced to the lake a century ago. I believe that is a crucial step to improving the beauty of the lake and I think the Department of Wildlife Resources should take every possible step to make that happen – some suggestions they could consider include offering a bounty to fishermen for every carp caught (and kept), making it illegal to release carp (like they have with burbot), or even trying to host a tournament for carp fishing as Texas has done. I’m not sure what the effects on other animals and plants of the ecosystem would be if they try poisoning the carp (as has been suggested).

When the carp have been contained we should be able to reintroduce cutthroat trout and nurse the June sucker populations back to sustainable levels. This would both improve the beauty of the lake, and increase the opportunities for tourism and recreational use of this natural resource.

None of this depends, or is hindered, by a lake bridge as far as I can see. Some have even argued that a lake bridge could be a toll road and that the tolls could be used to fund other lake improvements. The only conjunction I can see between the two issues is that the specific placement of a bridge might influence the recreational activities available on the lake.

The two-page Herriman statement said the council supports the corridor project, but believes tolls would create a financial burden for residents.

I would love to read the full statement from the city council, but I know that we need to quit thinking of tolling as an all-or-nothing proposition.

We already have a single carpool/toll lane on I-15 and I think the lane next to it should become a congestion pricing lane as well – that would leave at least two and in most places 3 free lanes on the road and would allow people to discover the value of congestion pricing.

That is also an idea that could be implemented and begin generating revenue while the Mountain View Corridor is still being built. I believe that if we created a congestion pricing lane on I-15 while the MVC was being built we would see little opposition to having one or two of the leftmost lanes on the MVC as congestion pricing lanes. This would allow residents on the east and the west to share the cost of the improved transportation infrastructure which will benefit both sides.

This comment:

Great, now I can take commuter rail all the way to Cougar football games on fall afternoons.

Reminded me that I will not likely go to many BYU games with family memebrs which has been a fun event once or twice a year for me while I lived in the area. Once the line is finished I could go from Bountiful as easily as I did from Lehi for those games.

Another:

They really should finish first what they have now considering the line from Ogden to Pleasant View City is still not complete.

Reminded me that there are still detractors who must still be countered with leavel-headed reason. Which section of rail is likely to have more riders per mile – Ogden to Pleasant View, or Salt Lake City to Provo?