Category: Sponsors

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox wants nuclear energy to power the Beehive State. And halfway through this year’s legislative session, Utah lawmakers have signaled they feel the same way.

HB249, sponsored by Rep. Carl Albrecht, R-Richfield, would lay the groundwork for a nuclear-powered future in Utah. The bill sailed through the state House with unanimous approval and is working its way through the Senate.

“We need to be on the cutting edge as the state of Utah, as we are on a lot of things, and start down this nuclear path,” Albrecht said about his bill in January, “to make us an energy leader in the West and the United States.”

Gov. Cox announced “Operation Gigawatt” last fall, a plan to double Utah’s energy production within the next decade, to fight what he calls the state’s “looming energy crisis.” This year, he wants to put $20.4 million toward developing infrastructure for nuclear power as part of that plan.

Albrecht’s bill, if it passes, could help achieve Cox’s goal.

The 25-page bill would establish the Nuclear Energy Consortium to advise the Utah Office of Energy Development and the Legislature on nuclear energy development.

The legislation would also help create “electrical energy development zones,” areas designated by the state for new energy development projects.

Utah counties and municipalities would be able to apply to create a zone in their community as long as their applications include a development plan, projected local economic benefits and evidence of local support. Those counties and municipalities would have to give some of the tax revenue generated by an electrical energy development zone to the state.

The bill also forms the Utah Energy Council to review those applications and ease development of other energy projects in the state like power plants, transmission lines and energy storage facilities. The council will include representatives from the Legislature, Office of Energy Development and Gov. Cox’s office and can put money towards projects from the Energy Development Investment Fund, which the bill also creates.

In a statement, Cox said that the bill “represents a critical step forward in solving one of the great challenges of our time: energy security.”

Creating the energy consortium and state energy council, Cox said, will bring industry leaders and policymakers together to “advance nuclear power as a reliable, safe, and clean energy source.”

“Nuclear power, particularly advanced, small modular reactors (SMRs), offers a promising path to meet our growing energy demands while reducing emissions and making Utah a national energy exporter,” Cox said. “I’m grateful for the Legislature’s leadership on this issue and I support HB 249 as a key component of a future of energy abundance, built here.”

Katelyn Balakir, a policy associate with the nonprofit Healthy Environment Alliance (HEAL) of Utah, voiced concerns about the Utah Energy Council when HB249 was discussed in committee.

The council, she said, would have “the authority to spend taxpayer dollars,” but its “members are appointed and therefore not directly accountable to the public.”

The council should discuss potential energy solutions, like nuclear, “in the public forum before authorizing taxpayer dollars to be spent by an unelected council.”

Albrecht acknowledged that it will take time to get nuclear power going in Utah. The bill, he said on the House floor Feb. 5, is “a bridge to get us from where we are to somewhere down the road, 10 to 12 years, to nuclear facilities in the state of Utah.”

And while his bill is named “Nuclear Power Amendments,” he said the legislation could open doors to other energy development in the state, like natural gas, battery storage, wind, solar or geothermal.

But some Utah communities don’t want nuclear development in their backyards — at least, not yet.

Eagle Mountain, Utah’s third-fastest growing city, in January considered allowing small nuclear reactors, natural gas power plants and battery storage systems by altering their city code. But a host of local residents spoke against the proposed change.

Balakir, in her comments during committee, added that “past nuclear energy projects in Utah should serve as a cautionary tale for the importance of transparency, especially around cost and investment decisions.”

She referred to the cost of nuclear development — nuclear is among the most expensive power sources — and the failure of the Carbon Free Power Project. Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems gave up on that project in 2023, which was a plan to power 27 communities with small nuclear reactors by 2029.

Sen. Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, also said he believes nuclear power “will be part of our energy solution” when introducing his own bill, SB216.

That legislation would streamline the expansion of nuclear waste facilities in the state, like EnergySolutions’ Clive Disposal Facility located 75 miles west of Salt Lake City. Casey Hill, a lobbyist for EnergySolutions, said the radioactive waste storage facility is running out of room for the waste it can accept during a committee hearing for the bill.

The Clive site currently accepts low-level radioactive waste, which doesn’t include spent nuclear fuel. McKell’s bill also proposes that radioactive waste facility owners pay a tax on the waste they receive. The revenue from that tax would fund new energy development across the state.

SB216 passed out of the Senate Natural Resources, Agriculture, and Environment Committee on Feb. 5, but it has not yet cleared the full Senate.

How does someone do justice to the legacy of a larger-than-life local sports figure?

That’s the task Aaron Asano Swenson, a first-time playwright, had at hand as he embarked on writing “Kilo-Wat,” a play about University of Utah men’s basketball legend Watura “Kilo-Wat” Misaka — the point guard who led the 1944 Utes team all the way to an NCAA championship win.

For Asano Swenson, it started with exploring a simple question: “Where does the legend end and the story begin?”

“How do we get through sort of what’s become the prevailing narrative,” Asano Swenson said, “to the stuff that lets us maybe see something about this person, or about the story, that we haven’t had a chance to see?”

The answers Asano Swenson found will come to light Friday, when “Kilo-Wat” premieres at Plan-B Theatre in Salt Lake City. The final production is a one-man show produced in partnership with UtahPresents.

Misaka’s rise to fame came during a dark period in the nation’s history, at the height of World War II when Japanese-Americans were being incarcerated at concentration camps throughout the United States. (One such camp, Topaz, was in Delta, Utah.)

Misaka — who, along with his family, was spared from being forced to an internment camp — would go on to break the color barrier in professional basketball when he became the first non-white player in the Basketball Association of America, which later merged with another league to become the National Basketball Association.

Swenson, who concedes he is not a sports fan, said when Jerry Rapier of Plan-B Theatre approached him about writing this play, he decided to approach the story from a point of general curiosity, not one of sports history.

“Since it was going to be a piece of theater, rather than a piece of sports journalism,” Asano Swenson said, “I wanted to keep that in mind and just remember that there are things that theater can do … particularly well.”

Connecting with Japanese-American roots

Asano Swenson is a fourth-generation Japanese-American, but his family never spoke about what they went through during World War II. Working on “Kilo-Wat” encouraged the playwright to look into his family’s history.

“Suddenly my own personal history overlapped with this,” he said.

Asano Swenson’s maternal grandparents met just before they were detained in separate camps in California and Arkansas.

“[They] continued their courtship through letters while they were incarcerated,” Asano Swenson said. Afterward, they were married in Brigham City and lived in northern Utah while Misaka was playing college basketball.

“[The play] definitely lit the fire under me to reach out to family members who are still alive and still with me to get an oral history going,” Asano Swenson said.

In his script, Asano Swenson hits on the contrast of Misaka’s rise to fame during a traumatic period for Japanese-Americans. The play is set through the lens of a fictional podcast called “This Asian American Life,” hosted by Japanese-American podcaster Kenji Kushida (played by Bryan Kido), who unravels the different threads of Misaka’s life.

Kushida shares details about Misaka’s family, the anti-Japanese sentiment they faced, his basketball career, and also Misaka’s military service, which Asano Swenson said didn’t come up in many interviews.

After winning the NCAA championship, the Utes came home for a three-day parade, welcomed by thousands of people at the train station. When Misaka got off the train, his mother had his U.S. Army draft notice in hand.

After the war, Misaka interviewed survivors of the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings. Asano Swenson found transcripts and handwritten reports of these interviews.

The reports helped answer one of Asano Swenson’s biggest questions — how Misaka, who at that time was 21 or 22, felt about gathering this information from people who looked like him and had just suffered from such a colossal tragedy.

Asano Swenson details how Misaka felt conflicted about the experience in a portion of the play that cobbles together thoughts the basketball star expressed over the years.

“The U.S. Army thought that somehow it would make it easier, if it were people [of] Japanese descent conducting these interviews,” Asano Swenson said. “The alienation and disorientation of that entire situation just blew my mind, and that ended up being something that I wanted to look into.”

Folklore and facts

The play includes specific nods to Japanese culture — like the use of a hyōshigi, a musical instrument that is made of two pieces of hardwood connected together by a rope. Some of the script is in Japanese, too.

Asano Swenson said he used these cultural aspects as a way to explore the distinction between facts, folklore, myths and legends.

“Legends come from facts. They’re based in something that actually happened, and then gradually magnify, to illustrate moral lessons [or] embody culture,” Asano Swenson said. “The distinction between those gets really interesting when you’re looking at a story like this, where so many people participate in the living, retelling and hearing of the story. They all have different expectations for what it’s going to be.”

Floyd Mori, who once served as the national president for the Japanese American Citizens League, the oldest Asian American civil rights organization in the U.S., witnessed the legend firsthand.

“Like many kids, I had my heroes in sports, and of course, Wat was number one,” Mori said. “Being a period of time right after World War II [it] was very unusual to see [Misaka] and very inspiring to people like me.”

Eventually, Mori met and befriended Misaka, and was even with Misaka the day he died in November 2019.

“[He] was always a hero in the Japanese-American community,” Mori said.

“Kilo-Wat” is sold out and will show through Sunday. To join the waitlist, call UtahPresents at 801-581-7100.

Utah’s population has officially surpassed 3.5 million, but growth in the state has slowed overall.

A new report released Wednesday from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah estimated that the state added more than 50,000 new residents from July 2023 through July 2024. And while population growth continued, it was down to .1% from 2023, from 1.6% two years ago to 1.5% last year.

Migration to the state and natural increase — the number of annual births minus annual deaths — contributed almost equally to population growth in Utah, with net migration accounting for 52% of new residents and natural increase accounting for 48%, according to the report. Utah’s net migration — which subtracts the number of people moving out of the state from those who move in — was slightly more than 26,000 in 2024, down from more than 31,000 in 2023.

The rate of natural increase, meanwhile, did not change for the first time in over ten years.

Salt Lake County, however, bucked trends across the state, with 57% of its population growth driven by natural increase, a change from a 51% majority net migration increase in the county in 2023.

“Utah’s recent shift from natural increase to net migration as the primary source of growth represents a continuation of COVID-19 trends, though this year’s data shows a slowing of that initial post-pandemic pattern,” the report read. “These estimates reflect a continuation of slowing after the fast growth exhibited earlier in the decade.”

In the mid-2010s, Utah’s population grew significantly and was up more than 2% a year for several years in a row. That increase slowed from 2018 through 2020, but increased again in 2021. It has fallen in the years since.

Piute County, which has an estimated 1,649 residents, saw the highest amount of change in the state, with a 5.3% population increase. Next, with a 3.1% population increase, Tooele County added 5,000 new residents, up from a 2.2% increase in the country in 2023. Utah and Washington counties both saw 3.0% increases, while several others grew by more than 2.0%, including Rich (2.9%), Iron (2.8%), Juab (2.7%), and Wasatch (2.3%).

“Utah County has been the largest driver of statewide growth for the last five years and accounts for 43% of the population increase in 2024,” the Gardner report read. “Salt Lake (24%), Washington (12%), and Tooele (5%) counties also contributed large shares of state growth in 2024.”

Eight counties, meanwhile, lost population — including Daggett, Emery, Carbon, Sevier, Uintah, Garfield, Summit, and Kane. Six counties — Carbon, Garfield, Daggett, Wayne, Piute, and Rich — had more deaths than births from 2023 to 2024.

“Typically, slower-growing counties are fueled by natural increase, with less or negative net migration, and faster-growing counties are fueled more by net migration,” the report read. “In 2024, net migration drove growth in 11 counties, a drop from last year when 17 counties’ growth were fueled by net migration. Of the 11 counties with large shares of net migration, 8 of them had growth rates higher than the state.”

Once the state with the highest birth rate in the United States, a 2022 Gardner report found Utah fourth in fertility rates across the country, and Republican Gov. Spencer Cox has repeatedly raised concerns about the state’s declining birth rate. “It’s not our thing anymore,” he said at the Utah Valley Growth and Prosperity Summit last November. “No one has figured out why the world has stopped having babies yet, but we are trending off a demographic cliff.”

Still, a Gardner report from last fall estimated that Utah’s population will grow by an additional 500,000 people from 2024 through 2033, with an average annual growth rate of 1.5%. “The short-term projections indicate continued statewide population growth driven by a nearly 50/50 split between natural increase and net migration out to 2033,” Gardner’s director of demographic research Mallory Bateman said in a statement at the time. “Continued economic growth largely drives this migration of new residents to Utah.”

This population growth may also mean that Utah could earn a fifth Congressional seat in the 2030 redistricting, several groups that follow reapportionment told The Salt Lake Tribune in November. The Gardner Institute has said they expect much of that growth to be concentrated in the Wasatch Front.

This story is developing and may be updated.

TL;DR: Live stream LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz in the NBA with FuboTV, Sling TV, or YouTube TV.

The LA Clippers head to Delta Center to face the Utah Jazz in a Western Conference matchup. The Clippers are 29-23, which puts the team sixth place. The Jazz are 13-40, which puts the team in 14th place.

The Clippers have lost three of their last five games, and are coming off a win over the Jazz. The Jazz have also lost three of their last five games, but are coming off a win over the Los Angeles Lakers.

When is LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz?

LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz in the NBA starts at 9 p.m. ET on Feb. 13. This game takes place at Delta Center in Salt Lake City.

This is the last game for both of these teams before the NBA All-Star Break.

How to watch LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz

You need to choose a streaming service to watch the NBA without cable or satellite TV. We’ve found some of the best streaming services to consider for the Clippers vs. Jazz basketball game.

Best for single game: FuboTV

Credit: Fubo TV

FuboTV offers you more than 250 channels of live TV and the option to watch on 10 screens at once. You can try FuboTV with a seven-day free trial period. 

FuboTV’s sports channel offerings include ABC, ACC Network, Big Ten Network, CBS, CBS Sports Network, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNews, FOX, FS1, FS2, Golf Network, Marquee Sports Network, Monumental Sports, NBC, NFL Network, and SEC Network. 

Most live sports: YouTube TV

Credit: YouTube TV

YouTube TV’s base plan is $49.99 per month for two months for new subscribers ($72.99 per month regularly). The base plan includes over 100 live TV channels, including ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, ESPN, Fox Sports 1, and NBA TV.

Most affordable: Sling TV

Credit: Sling TV

Sling TV suggests the streamer’s Orange Plan for the game, which costs $20 for the first month and $40 monthly after that.

Sling TV’s sports channels feature ABC, ACC Network, Big Ten Network, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3, ESPNews, ESPNU, FOX, FS1, FS2, NBA TV, NBC, NFL Network, and SEC Network.

How to watch Clippers vs. Jazz from anywhere in the world

If you’re traveling outside of the U.S. during this game, you might need to use a VPN to unblock this live stream. VPNs can hide your real IP address (digital location) and connect you to a secure server, meaning you can unblock live streams of the NBA from anywhere in the world.

Live stream LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz for free by following these simple steps:

1. Subscribe to a streaming-friendly VPN (like ExpressVPN)

2. Download the app to your device of choice (the best VPNs have apps for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, and more)

3. Open up the app and connect to a server in the U.S.

4. Sign in to your favorite streaming app

Credit: ExpressVPN

The best VPNs for streaming are not free, but leading VPNs do tend to offer free-trial periods or money-back guarantees. By leveraging these offers, you can gain access to live streams of the NBA without actually spending anything. This obviously isn’t a long-term solution, but it does give you enough time to live stream LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz before recovering your investment.

What is the best VPN for the NBA?

ExpressVPN is the best choice for bypassing geo-restrictions to stream live sport, for a number of reasons:

• Servers in 105 countries

• Easy-to-use app available on all major devices including iPhone, Android, Windows, Mac, and more

• Strict no-logging policy so your data is secure

• Fast connection speeds free from throttling

• Up to eight simultaneous connections

• 30-day money-back guarantee

A one-year subscription to ExpressVPN is on sale for $99.95 and includes an extra three months for free — 49% off for a limited time. This plan includes a year of free unlimited cloud backup and a generous 30-day money-back guarantee.

Live stream LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz in the NBA with ExpressVPN.

LOS ANGELES (KTLA) – As more rain and high winds make their way into Southern California, forecasters are continuing to increase their precipitation predictions. The storm system, described as “significant” by the National Weather Service, will bring rain, high-elevation snow and gusty winds to the region, but according to NWS, there is “not much to […]

Help for low-income Utahns seeking to become homeowners near Utah Inland Port Authority project areas could be coming under a bill advanced by state lawmakers Wednesday.

State law already permits the use of up to 10% of the general differential revenue collected through inland port developments to be used to pay for affordable housing in or near one of the dozen project areas throughout Utah, including 16,000 acres in the northwest quadrant of Salt Lake County.

But SB250, sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Kirk Cullimore, R-Draper, gets more specific, calling for the revenue to be used to “assist low-income individuals and families who would qualify for income targeted housing to achieve homeownership, or retain homeownership, within a 15-mile radius of the project area.”

Cullimore told the Deseret News the new language “expands this to more home ownership,” as opposed to helping Utahns get into apartments or other rental properties. He said it’s part of the Utah Legislature’s efforts this session to add more “little tools, here and there” to address the state’s housing needs.

“We need all types of products in the housing market. But we’ve actually seen a pretty big proliferation of rental housing,” the majority leader said. “Our rents are still high, but they’ve actually stabilized. But home ownership has not stabilized. So I think the focus will be on more, what incentives can we do for attainable type home ownership housing.”

His bill passed unanimously out of the Senate Revenue and Taxation Committee and now heads to the full Senate.

The committee’s chairman, Sen. Dan McCay, R-Riverton, asked Cullimore about limiting the housing that could be funded to within a 15-mile radius of an inland port project area.

“For the inland port, it’s all permissive,” Cullimore answered, adding that “because oftentimes an inland port area that might be subject to tax increment financing may or may not be appropriate for housing, it just gave them a little bit more parameters to do housing should they choose to do it.”

He said the option to use the revenues for housing could be transferred to a local housing authority or other nonprofit.

McCay also wanted to know if the inland port authority could zone property to develop low-income housing. When he was told that’s not the case, McCay said, “that’s good to know. I just wasn’t sure how we were expanding the scope of the inland port.”

Utah Inland Port Authority Executive Director Ben Hart told the Deseret News that housing “is in the conversation in every project area.”

Hart said the inland port authority did not seek the change in the law. Nor has it taken a position on the bill, although Hart noted he doesn’t “see any red flags. If it was compulsory and we were being forced to do something, we would probably take a little stronger stand one way or the other.”

Some entities that share in the inland port project revenues are already contributing funds to local housing authorities, he said.

As for housing fits into the inland port authority’s mission, Hart said that’s left “up to the collaborative processes for cities to work through. Obviously, we’re primarily industrially oriented, so trying to fit and co-locate housing nearby can be a little bit difficult. But several of our project areas are working to include housing.”

The inland port authority “may not necessarily provide financial support for those efforts but it’s certainly something that we are pro, and for. Because housing and workforce go together. Workforce is the lifeblood of the economy and so having well-planned communities really makes sense,” he said, expressing interest in supporting “economic areas of strength wherever we can. And that definitely includes housing.”

Still, how money is used in the project areas is often “predetermined. So it’s hard for us to go back and say we’re going to pry 10% loose from other projects,” Hart said. “We’re already very focused on industrial properties. We already are focused on logistics projects.”