SALT LAKE CITY-Thursday, Utah lawmakers meet online after calling themselves into a special session of the Utah Legislature to deal with the effects of COVID-19.
Senate President Stuart Adams, a Layton Republican and House Speaker, Kaysville Republican Brad Wilson, are expected to be in the legislative chambers in the otherwise closed State Capitol Building.
New giant screens will be the form of communication for Adams and Wilson with their contemporaries for perhaps the next 10 days.
This means that Zoom will be heavily implemented during this special session which is to be broadcast via the Utah Education and Telehealth Network.
This is to insure a reliable Internet connection can be used and that everyone is dressed appropriately for the occasion.
Technology constraints limit work on the more than 20 items in the agenda to be tackled in one chamber at a time, per statements from Adams.
During this time, Adams confirmed that bills will not receive committee hearings. These are optional in a special session, he said.
Now, emails can be sent to lawmakers concerning each special session while using a new comment button on the Web site.
These emails can only be sent to lawmakers via a public records request, or if lawmakers should choose to post them to the legislative Web site at https://le.utah.gov/publicweb/menu.jsp?leg=pw. This tedious process can take up to 24 hours.
Utahns may tune into this session on UETN, or Channel 9.2 on broadcast television or Channel 388 on Comcast if interested.
This represents the first time the state Legislature has used a voter-approved 2018 change to the Utah Constitution. This allows lawmakers to convene a special session because of a “persistent financial crisis, war, natural disaster, or emergency” concerning affairs of the Beehive State.
Under prior law, only the governor was empowered to do such a thing.
