UDAF: Legislature advancing ag cleanup bill; pollinator pilot to be made permanent

Amber Brown, director of legislative and government affairs for the Utah Department of Agriculture (UDAF), told department staff this week that the 2025 legislative session is in its third week and “after this week, we have 4 more weeks to go.” She said UDAF staff are meeting daily at the Capitol to advocate for agricultural priorities and presented the department’s budget to the Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environmental Quality Appropriations Committee.

Brown said two bills important to UDAF have cleared House committee review and will be considered on the House floor. The first, HB 253, is the department’s annual agriculture “cleanup” bill. Brown described it as a set of clarifying, mostly administrative changes that “will help our programs be managed more effectively.” She highlighted several provisions the bill would change or authorize: expansion of eligibility for the veterinarian education loan repayment program; terminology changes in the Fertilizer Act to replace the word “fertilizer” with “plant food” (to allow inclusion of biostimulants and similar products); clarifying edits to the Elk Act; repeal of the unused ACEs program that is being replaced by the Ag VIP program; and authority for a larger state match in the water optimization program.

On the veterinarian education loan repayment program, Brown said the program allows veterinarians who work for UDAF or in large-animal practice to have up to $100,000 of student loans repaid. She said about 17 veterinarians have applied for assistance under the program so far and that the cleanup bill would broaden eligibility so veterinarians working in a combination of qualifying areas can participate.

Brown said the cleanup bill would change references to “fertilizer” in state code to “plant food” so the law better encompasses substances such as biostimulants used to grow plants. She also said language tied to a now-unused ACEs program would be repealed because the program has effectively been replaced by the Ag VIP program.

On water issues, Brown said the bill allows a 75% state match for projects that fund measurement, telemetry and reporting under the state’s water optimization program. She described those projects as “very, very, very important.”

The second bill Brown discussed, HB 251, would make permanent a pollinator pilot program first passed in 2021. Brown described the pilot as a three-year program focused on pollinator habitat education and distribution of pollinator-friendly plants and seeds. She said the pilot helped about 700 people and distributed roughly 31,000 pollinator-friendly plants over two years, and that the program has been “wildly successful” on social media. HB 251, she said, would remove the program’s temporary status and make it permanent.

Brown said UDAF’s annual budget presentation to the Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environmental Quality Appropriations Committee was “well received,” with “lots of great questions and engagement” from supportive legislators. She said the department’s division directors described program accomplishments from the past year and outlined pressing budget requests.

All items Brown described had passed through House committee and were expected to be considered by the full House; Brown did not report final floor votes or enactment. No formal votes or other legislative actions were recorded during Brown’s update.