Senate advances substitute banning law‑enforcement quotas while preserving supervisory use of data

The Senate advanced a substitute to a bill that would prohibit law‑enforcement agencies from imposing quotas requiring officers to reach set numbers of arrests or citations.

Sponsor Senator Stevenson told the chamber the intent is to prevent officers from being placed under pressure to meet numeric targets that can distort enforcement priorities. "This bill is written basically says that in Utah, we don't have quotas," Stevenson said, describing committee evidence including recordings of supervisors imposing numeric expectations in local jurisdictions.

Multiple senators asked how the prohibition would affect supervisors' ability to measure performance. Stevenson and supporters said the bill is designed to preserve supervisors' access to data for evaluations while prohibiting quota practices. "The data are our friends...the data should be available to a supervisor in the evaluation of an officer's performance. But at the same time, then it should not be a quota," a sponsor said on the floor.

Questions from the floor raised specifics such as whether parking‑ticket practices or stop counts would be covered; the sponsor said the committee is working on clarifying language and additional tweaks with law‑enforcement stakeholders. Floor debate noted both support from some officers and concerns about constraining evaluation tools.

A recorded roll call shows the first substitute of SB154 received 24 yeas and 1 nay and will be read for a third time.

Next steps: the substitute was advanced for third reading; sponsors said they expect additional technical amendments and continued engagement with law‑enforcement groups.