Today's key developments and analysis for Utah policymakers

A service of
Utah Policy.com

News Highlights

Gubernatorial campaign expenditures adding up quickly, The Salt Lake Tribune (Dan Harrie) and Deseret Morning News (Bob Bernick) both report. The Tribune (Thomas Burr) also reports that Salt Lake County Mayor Nancy Workman is amassing a big war chest. The Morning News also features in-depth profiles by Tad Walch of Chris Cannon and Matt Throckmorton.

Wednesday Buzz

GOP Gubernatorial Candidate Debate: Tonight, 6:30, KSL Channel 5, "Conversation with the Candidates," hosted by Bruce Lindsay, featuring Nolan Karras and Jon Huntsman, Jr. On Thursday, the candidates will debate on KSL's Doug Wright Show at 10 a.m.

Time to Get Nervous: The last few days before an election are always tense and scary for the candidates and everyone associated with their campaigns. Candidates with enough money will be doing tracking polls nightly, so they will know how things are going. Probably the person who is as nervous as the candidates is pollster Dan Jones, who will be producing a major survey for the Deseret Morning News and KSL Television, for publication over the weekend. That poll isn't meant to be predictive of the Tuesday election outcome, but because it is conducted so close to the election, many people view it that way. Primary elections are tough to survey because turnout is low and getting the right sample is difficult.

UTOPIA Moving Forward: The big project by several Utah cities to put fiber optic cable into every home and business seems to be moving forward, despite meeting stiff opposition by Qwest. Several cities gave final approval to the financing plan and the interlocal agreement Tuesday night, so the project is expected to proceed. Provo City is well ahead of UTOPIA with its own fiber-to-the-premises project. Construction will begin within weeks. Between Provo and UTOPIA, Utah will have perhaps the biggest fiber-to-the-premises project in the country, and it will be closely watched by numerous interested observers.

- LaVarr Webb

The Media and Ronald Reagan

The conservative Media Research Center says: "The national media’s often gracious coverage in the days after Reagan’s death obscured the unfortunate historical record of media coverage: a chronicle often filled with not just disagreement, but with disgust, hatred, ridicule, and insults." In a special report, the MRC lists about 90
news media quotes documenting derogatory assessments offered by journalists about President Reagan in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Campaign Tip:
The Value of Good Research

If the final days of a campaign are scary, at least good survey research can provide a little help and comfort. Here are a couple of war stories.

In the last few days of the Republican primary election in 1992, the Mike Leavitt campaign began receiving dozens of phone calls from people who had heard negative accusations and stories about our candidate. We initially just laughed this stuff off, but the calls kept coming. We soon learned that someone was conducting a phone campaign spreading these crazy stories. Then people called telling us that flyers were being handed out in at least three shopping malls making accusations against Leavitt. Several people brought copies into campaign headquarters and said they were being distributed widely.

By now we felt like we were under siege and we were getting a little panicky. We'd received 30 or 40 calls and visits and they just seemed to keep coming. We talked about whether to call a press conference, issue a news release, or what. But by that time in the campaign we were doing a daily tracking poll, a rolling 600 total sample with 200 new calls a night. We decided to hold off and see if our numbers took any kind of a hit that night. The next morning's tracking results didn't even show a blip. The next day was the same. The phone and flyer campaign was having no impact because while it seemed big to us, it really wasn't hitting many people and couldn't compete with our heavy mass media campaign.

It would have been easy to overreact and turn nothing into something, give it extra attention, if we didn't have good research. A little later, our tracking numbers began to trend a bit negative. We wondered what was going wrong. Did we have a bad TV or radio spot? Was our opponent gaining momentum? Senate candidate Bob Bennett was tracking using a different firm, and his numbers showed us holding steady. That made us feel better, but we still weren't sure if we were OK, or needed a quick strategy change. So we called a national polling firm and had them, overnight, do a very large 2,400 sample. We found we were holding steady. There was no need to change our plan or overreact.

Good research is essential, but it does have its limits. Research is only one of the factors that ought to go into campaign strategy and decision-making. Obviously, research must be conducted properly, interpreted properly and the results used properly or it can do more harm than good.

- LaVarr Webb

Agenda Utah is a service of Utah Policy.com

Publisher: LaVarr Webb
Editor: Bart Barker
News: Golden Webb
Subscriptions: Paul Hollingshead

Please send your comments and suggestions to AgendaUtah@UtahPolicy.com.

Wednesday
June 16, 2004

Today's Headlines

Denver Post
- A win for Gale Norton

Associated Press
- Ecoterrorism may be lumber fire motive

Tooele Transcript-Bulletin
- Huntsman rebuked by county leaders
- Rule addresses new abortion law issues

Davis County Clipper
- Layton sets hearing on UTOPIA plan

St. George Spectrum
- Republican gubernatorial hopefuls face off in St. George
- Candidates address economic issues
- Senators to host drug card meeting
- Huntsman pans state water development cap
- Editorial: Education shows how candidates differ - slightly

Daily Herald
- Tilton likely to fill vacancy in Legislature
- Eagle Mountain's new budget includes substantial raises for mayor, council

Standard-Examiner
- Education plan sees progress
- Huntsman tops charts for campaign finance
- Ogden council finalizes budget
- New rec center will go to vote
- Morgan candidate exits race
- Former GOP candidates join forces
- Davis school board OKs budget that includes $1.3 million tax hike

Deseret Morning News
- Ed board drafting plan to raise bar
- His setbacks don't deter Throckmorton
- Cannon combines dreaming, analysis
- GOP primary costing millions
- Karras, Huntsman talk child welfare
- Greene, Herbert debate politely
- Granite, Davis OK reading taxes
- GOP rivals like 'aggressive'
- Panel divided on waste issues
- Orem to pursue its UTOPIA plans
- Lee Davidson: Flap over bar dues is just Demo stalling tactic

Salt Lake Tribune
- School-reform plan on hold a while longer
- Proposal would raise fee for remedial classes
- Candidates on torrid spending pace
- Gubernatorial funding race
- Cannon critic complains to feds
- Tax cut on way in S.L. County
- Workman's war chest dwarfs her Salt Lake County challengers'
- Granite schools adopt tentative $419 M budget
- S.L. County won't open Oxbow Jail
- City Council sticks by decision on Salt Palace expansion
- Editorial: Managing wild lands

Political Calendar

Please submit calendar items to AgendaUtah@UtahPolicy.com

- June 16: Ogden Rotary Gubernatorial Debate, noon at the Ogden Eccles Conference Center.
- June 16: Greg Skordas for Attorney General Fundraiser, 5-7pm, Urban Bistro, 216 East 500 South, SLC. Suggested Donation $50/person.
- June 16: Ogden Brown Bag Lunch with Enid Greene, 12-1 pm, MarketStar Auditorium, 2475 Washington Blvd, Ogden.
- June 17: Gubernatorial Debate, KSL 1160 Radio with Doug Wright, 10 a.m., broadcast live on KSL 1160 radio.
- June 18: Meet Nolan Karras, 6-7pm, Lehi City Council Chambers, Lehi Administration Bldg., 153 North 100 East, Lehi.
- June 18: Kitchen Table Talk with Nolan Karras, 8-9:30 pm, home of Jeanette Hales Beckham, 1260 E. Oak Crest Circle, Provo.
- June 19: Central Committee Meeting, Salt Lake County Republican Party, Hillcrest High School Auditorium. Agenda Highlight: selection of nominee for County Auditor and of interim County Auditor. Registration 8 am, meeting 9 am.
- June 19: Utah County Meet the Candidates, 12-4 pm, Pioneer Park, 500 W Center St, Provo.
- June 19: Fundraiser for Peter Corroon, Democratic county mayor candidate, Saturday, 5-8:30 p.m.; Buckaroo Bob’s Wild West Bar-B-Q, 3641 S. Christine St. Hosts: Bob & Nicole Adams; $30 contribution per person; RSVP 328-2208.
- June 21: Gubernatorial Debate: KUED Channel 7, Live at 9:00 pm.
- June 22: Utah Primary Election, 7:00 am to 8:00 pm.
- June 22: Green Party of Utah Roots Local Monthly Meeting, 12:00 pm, Sprague Library, 1100 East, just past 2100 South, Salt Lake City. Contact: 486-2558.
- June 24: Legislative Golf Tournament, Thanksgiving Point. 533-9777.
- June 26: Republican Central Committee Meeting.
- June 27: Green Party of Utah Roots Local Monthly Meeting, 12:00 pm, Sprague Library, 1100 East, just past 2100 South, Salt Lake City. Contact: 486-2558.
- July 7: Utah Stonewall Democrats, 5:30 pm, GLBT Community Center Multi-purpose Room, 359 North 300 West, SLC.
- July 19-23: National Conference of State Legislatures, Salt Lake City.

See the entire calendar.