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Speaker Moody opens 1992 session, emphasizes budget balance, education, child safety and toxic-waste protections
Summary
Speaker H. Craig Moody opened the 1992 Utah House session, urging fiscal prudence ('one of nine states' with a surplus), plans to shift from welfare to workfare with childcare, attention to student growth, child safety and gangs, health-care access, toxic-waste protections, and preparation for defense job losses.
Speaker H. Craig Moody used his opening floor time to outline the House's policy priorities for the 1992 general session, front-loading fiscal balance and a focus on families alongside specific policy areas the House intends to tackle.
Moody said the House's "first priority is to balance the budget," and noted Utah was "one of nine states that finds ourselves with either a surplus or flat in terms of revenues," a fiscal position he framed as a responsibility to avoid risky borrowing approaches. He urged members to "stay away from the credit card approach" and to allocate funds thoughtfully.
On welfare, Moody proposed emphasizing "workfare instead of welfare," coupled with an expansion of childcare, citing federal childcare funding that "went from $1,000,000 a year ago to 7,000,000 this year" as an opportunity to expand work-related supports. He flagged education pressures, saying the state would need to accommodate about "8,000 additional students" in public education and about "10,000 in higher education." Moody urged keeping education a top priority and referenced a strategic plan to address the growth.
Child safety and school safety measures were highlighted as continuing priorities; Moody recalled earlier work and appealed for members to join together "to stop that flood or the loss of those loved ones" and to address gang activity he said was "permeating throughout the state." He called for continuing health-care access reforms and cost-control measures and described toxic waste as a personal priority, saying the Legislature must ensure adequate fees and protections so citizens can "feel comfort in knowing that we're charging adequate funds today" to avoid long-term state liability.
Moody also warned that a significant portion of Utah's economy depends on defense and aerospace employment and told members to "act this session on preparing ourselves for retrofitting many of the jobs" that may be cut back due to impending defense reductions.
At the close of his remarks the Speaker appointed Mrs. Carol Peterson as chief clerk and moved the House onto organizational business. The House subsequently recessed for lunch and planned to reconvene at 2:30 p.m.; the governor's State of the State address was scheduled for 6:30 p.m.
