March 7, 2020

"I fully expect this year that our legislature will robustly fund public education once again, my recommendations was a 4.5% weighted pupil unit increase which is the basic unit of funding education and a $292 million in new money." Governor Herbert

ANNOUNCER: PBS Utah presents The Governor's Monthly News Conference an exchange between Utah Reporters and Governor Gary Herbert.

GOVERNOR HERBER: Good morning.

REPORTERS: Good morning Governor.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Thank you for taking time to be here today, as you know we're coming down to the last two weeks of the legislative session, and a lot of bills still being determined and talked about and debated and who knows what's going to happen there, and we'll probably talk about those issues here in a minute.

But before I take your questions on whatever the issue you'd like to talk about, let me make some mention about the Coronavirus issue. I know it's on everybody's mind, what's happening. A little bit of uncertainty out there, and I just want you to know that the Utah Department of Health which will be having a press conference later today, at the Department of Health with hospitals and other healthcare experts will give you a briefing on where we're at in the state of Utah when it comes to being prepared, and ready for whatever the Coronavirus issue's going to become.

Certainly, it's a concern, we have no confirmed cases of the virus in Utah, so you ought to be aware of that. Our Department of Health has a surveillance system where we coordinate with our different local health departments throughout the state of Utah. We're in contact every day, every day and a half with in fact the national folks on what's happening on this potential pandemic that's taking place. We've activated all of our incident command systems so make sure that our communications are there and we're coordinating with our local health departments and healthcare specialists and all of our agencies are engaged in that, whatever their responsibilities are and however they fit into the overall scheme of things here to protect us on this issue.

The virus has not spread to our state, as of yet. We're actively monitoring the situation and we'll have updates will come as we in fact have those, the information available to us. Right now, we have 37 international locations that have reported an incident of this virus which is called Covid, C-O-V-I-D 19. It's related to other Coronaviruses we have, the common cold, traditional flu and what we know about the Covid-19 really is in large part because of what we've done with others.

We know that this is a very infectious, it spreads easily. We also know that 80% of the cases that we have out there are mild which means you might have fatigue and that's the only symptom you may have. 15% are moderate, headache you know, traditional kind of flu symptoms, and 5% are severe and that's where we end up having fatalities. It has a little higher fatality rate than traditional flu and that's the cause of concern, and because it's so easily spread.

So what we do know, and again some of this is just common sense, we want to make sure that people just take common sense precautions. If you feel sick, don't go out. Self-isolate. Don't be around people that have sickness. This is mostly spread by coughing and sneezing. Also, hand contact, if you remember during the SARS pandemic we invented the elbow bump rather than the handshake we would just bump elbows. Maybe that's something we need to bring back until we get a handle on this.

It's found in California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Washington, Wisconsin and we have 14 cases there. Only 2 of them have come from person to person contact, the rest have come from people who have traveled abroad and brought it back to the United States. Again, I think we should be confident with our health officials having a handle on this issue and help giving us directions for what we should do.

The main thing for the people of Utah to know is that, this is not something that we're surprised about. It's something we're following meticulously each and every day, we're giving some common-sense things for us to do as people to slow the spread. We are in fact hoping for the best. We hope that this is not as big of as an issue, here in Utah and in America as it has the potential to become, so we're hoping for the best. But we're preparing for the worst. So, we'll be ready and we'll give you updates as we have them, let the public know. Again, a press conference later today at 1:30 where you'll get more specifics and more details, so I'll thank you for that, and now what questions would you like to ask me?

RAEANN CHRISTENSEN, PBS UTAH: Our Salt Lake teachers planning a walk out which is something that hasn't happened for quite some time so they say it's disgraceful for Utah to be dead last in student funding. Something we've seen for a very long time. I know you've got plans in the budget right now for education funding, is this going to be enough for us to get out of that last spot finally?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I don't know that it will, again I've always said it's not all about the money. But it is some about the money. We're able to do things probably less expensively in the state of Utah for a variety of reasons, we have really great teachers, we have good families. Highest percentage of two parent families in America are in Utah. That has an impact on I think student achievement, parents are involved and that helps with student achievement. We have great PTA programs.

I mean there's just a lot of factors, and as I look at the results of our educational experience here we find that our students are achieving now at top 10 status in the nation. We're not top 10 in funding but we're getting great results and we ought to applaud that and appreciate that. Our NAEP scores in compared to other states we're in the top 10 in reading, language arts, math, number one in science. Our ACT test scores we're number one in the nation for those states that require everybody to take a test, so we're doing some really remarkably good things.

I don't want to conflate with what we're doing in education as a state with some of the turmoil that we see in Salt Lake City, that's a different issue whatever the problems in Salt Lake City district I mean they have a change of leadership we've had people resign they've been replaced, there's turmoil and division. We hope that they get that resolved.

Overall at the state level we're doing very well, we've added $2.3 billion of new funding in the last nine years to public education, that's not an insignificant amount of money, it may not be enough, but it's certainly a step in the right direction. I fully expect this year that our legislature will robustly fund public education once again, my recommendations was a 4.5% weighted pupil unit increase which is the basic unit of funding education and a $292 million in new money. New ongoing it's not one time. This is new ongoing money and I fully expect that that's going to take place. 

BOB BERNICK, UTAHPOLICY.COM: All right let me ask you about Senator Romney's comments that he doesn't believe that the Trump administration is ready for this virus, what is your belief in that? Do you believe that the Trump administration is ready? Or are we going to be basically on our own here if it comes.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I don't think we're going to be alone and certainly there's an increased awareness and heightened concern about what's going to take place, as we see this spread in the different communities at large, and headed in our direction. So being prepared and being ready is certainly a key thing. I think the president has a hard thing to do in trying to say let's make sure we're prepared and ready and not create panic. Not have people think that nobody knows what's going on. I think he's somewhat downplaying the severity the potential of the problem. 

But again as I sit here the congress speak about giving moneys, and providing fundings necessary to help us be prepared to help slow down the spread to make sure that we're safe. I see that taking place, and certainly I'm not reliant on Washington D.C. I'm relying on our people here in the state, and that's what every state should be doing. Relying on their state and their local health departments. We have them in every county those are the people on the front lines are going to make sure we do the right thing in the right way and that we the people are protected. So, I'm comfortable with where we're at certainly the state of Utah and I expect the Federal government will do their part too.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: Governor the house last night and now the legislature that reduces bigamy among consenting adults to an infraction. Do you plan to sign that bill, do you plan to veto it, where do you stand on it? 

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well like a lot of bills we monitor them, we follow them, we give input and we analyze whether they should be signed or vetoed, all bills fall into that category. But this one I think has overwhelming support, I know there's been, it's not been without some controversy they've had some certainly people speak to it, but the fact that we only have three dissenting votes on that particular bill. Would lead me to believe that it is something that needs support. Again, I think with the marriage laws being what they are today and the liberalization, the more broadening of it. Eliminating it from being a felony to a lesser offense is probably warranted.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Governor, can you talk about the reported compromise on Proposition 4 that would allow independent redistricting commission and what role did you have in negotiations on that?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well not a lot. I have talked with Senator Bramble whose kind of the lead on this and some of the people working with Senator Bramble and trying to bring compromise. Those who advocated for the boundary commission recognized that the initiative itself had some flaws in it, and some issues that needed to be addressed and I think there was a collaborative spirit of saying, okay we know that this needs to be modified.

Let's work together, we had a couple of issues or stumbling blocks but as I talked to Senator Bramble here a couple of days ago he said, his words were I had an epiphany. I think there's a way to resolve this difference, and he said I think we're going to be able to bring everybody together the next day, and then that's been about three days ago and as you heard announced yesterday late afternoon it looks like they've had a compromise that they've agreed to.

So, I think that's going to be healthy, that scenario that I think people have passion about. I think most everybody wants to have fairness in the issue of how you redistrict, and some of those the cynicism that's out there is that well you, you're gerrymandering to your way of thinking I want to gerrymander to my way of thinking, and so it's still gerrymandering. And so again we have an overwhelmingly more conservative population, more republican and we need to make sure that the minorities are not frozen out of this. That there's fairness in the redistricting and I think what they've come up with now with this compromise is one that will pass constitutional muster. Help us have the ability to see what a more fair redistricting process would be.

BOB BERNICK, UTAHPOLICY.COM: You had $160 million in old tax cuts that you had to repeal as part of tax reform. You have $80 million sitting in an account unallocated from a year ago, do you want a tax cut coming out of this session, and if so how much?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I think everybody would like to have a tax cut, the question is can we do it and is it prudent to do it in light of recent events? I can tell you the Coronavirus potential pandemic has certainly put a dampening effect on our future economic growth and expansion. It's caused people to go whoa let's wait and see. It's an unexpected event that reminds me a little bit of September 11 all the sudden bang. We've got a big problem that impacted our economy in a significant way. The Coronavirus pandemic has that same potential.

So that's something that heightens the worry that we're going to have a slowdown in the economy anyway. So, I think that creates uncertainty. Uncertainty means that we pause, we think, and we wait that on top of the issue of structural imbalance that we have clearly as we see the sales tax the general fund growing, but the income tax, the education fund growing at six times faster as what we see now and maybe even more than that, and so there's still an imbalance there. The lack of flexibility to use the moneys as we the legislature would prioritize in reflecting the needs of the people.

So, I think there's a lot of uncertainty even though there's a desire to in fact give a tax cut. I think at the top of the list is the desire to in fact give back the dependent deduction which was taken away with the Federal tax reform under Trump and that's been talked about since the beginning that we need to give that money back to the people of Utah so that's on the table I hear the debates back and forth, we're part of those discussions. It's uncertain now whether that will happen in a tax cut or wait till we have overall tax reform which maybe is going to be in a future legislative session, 2021 our new governor, maybe new perspective, new ideas. That we'd have to take into account. So, I think there's a desire to have a tax cut I don't know whether that's going to happen in this session.

ZACH KAYSER, CITY WEEKLY: Governor I wonder if you could elaborate on your description of Coronavirus as a pandemic given the reluctance of higher-level authorities to call it that. 

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well again a rose by any other name will smell just as sweet, a pandemic heightens concern, but it is the potential as we see it spreading to different countries around the world, and you can look at a map and see where it's at. It spawned out of China but it spread into neighboring communities. It's continued to spread and the issue about this that causes most concern is it's very infectious. It's easy to catch that’s the bad news. The good news is that most of us that catch it will be in a mild form. Probably less than a traditional flu, it could be just fatigue but you still have the virus and so again we want to be prepared. We want to not undersell it.

We don't want to over hype it either, and so I just say we're just taking the road that we're going to be prepared regardless of what happens. We're going to hope for the best. We're going to hope that this is going to be just a blip on the radar but we're going to prepare for the worst-case scenario.

MICHAEL ORTON, CAPITAL PRESS CORPS: Governor, regarding another health matter. I've just come from Senator Vickers presentation on his latest effort to fine tune the medical cannabis situation with his SB121. But what stood out was one of the comments he made to the committee was that card holders would only be protected when they were in possession of state product, and in the very next bullet point he said that the state was short of product. So, I'm wondering if you believe that your deadline of March first to get this whole program up and running is going to work?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well like most things in life you know, you need to have a deadline to make sure that we do everything we can to make the deadline. If we had July first we probably would still, wouldn't be as far along as we are today. So, I think having a March first or second deadline I think we anticipate there's going to be a rollout there will be probably a press conference and information given on March the second that we have these products available and here's how you can get them and give kind of a rundown of the parameters.

Ramping up is a hard thing to do. This is a new issue for us and it's not without complexity, but the medical cannabis will be available first of March here and available for those who follow the processes of getting doctor recommendation and have access to the home-grown product here in the state of Utah.

I think we have eight growers and I'm sure they all look at the opportunity to take advantage of the market. It's going to be a product that's going to be in demand and I expect it'll make some profit. 

REPORTER: Okay.

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Governor, on Saturday the Republican State Central Committee is scheduled to meet and consider a censure motion against Senator Romney for his impeachment vote. You're a member of that committee what kind of advice would you give to others and how would you vote?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: You know I think we need to be very careful about censuring someone opinion, and certainly somebody who I think has demonstrated at least the willingness to think deeply and analyze all sides of an issue and then vote their conscience. Isn't that what we expect every elected official to do? That's why it's called a representative form of government we send you there to represent us and do the deep dive, the deep analysis, and be thoughtful about it, and vote your conscience.

It's not how necessarily I would have voted, based on my information but that's my job either. That's the good senator, and we had senators that had division as far as they had voted. But I think it's a little harsh, and I take Senator Romney to his word that he's said that this was hard, hardest decision to make. But I know that he struggled over it, and spent a lot of time and then voted his conscience. Why do you censure someone for voting their conscience after they've done the analysis necessary? I think that's just a slippery road to go down.

So, I would recommend people to say you know what, we don't agree with your vote for these reasons and put the facts out there why, and then move on.

I think Senator Mitch McConnell said it best. A lot of people don't realize that after the vote, Senator Romney went to Florida, why? To help Senator Mitch McConnell with a fund raiser for his own political needs. So, he hasn't been ostracized by the senate, they think he's one of their colleagues, and as Senator Mitch McConnell said there is no dog house in the senate, Mitt Romney's not in the dog house, and two the most important vote, is the next vote. So, I think it will all work out in the senate. I know that the President's a little upset. I know that first hand but I think Senator Romney will continue to perform and represent the people of Utah voting his deep held convictions and voting his conscience which is what he should do.

BOB BERNICK, UTAHPOLICY.COM: How are you going to vote? Are you going to go to the meeting? Or send someone there to represent you, and how are you going to vote?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I have a conflict with my schedule but I'm going to try to be there and that's yet to be determined. I know that they have some elections going on so it's something I would want to vote, but I wouldn't vote to censure if that's the question, Mitt Romney I think that's not correct. 

LEE DAVIDSON, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Tuesday is Super Tuesday, has President Trump earned your vote in the primary? Or are you looking at someone else. 

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I, Senator, sorry President Trump has done some really good things. Sometimes we don't like his style and that cuts across the spectrum of political thought. Sometimes he seems a little bit petty and some of his comments a little bit juvenile sometimes, but it's hard to overlook the successes that he's had and I can tell you was just there and met with about six cabinet members. With me and governors from the west. Republican and Democrat alike, this administration at least from a perspective of state sovereignty has been very friendly and even Democrats have said boy, this administration is very sensitive to states and allowing us to in fact have more say on what takes place. And the comment they made to us here just a few weeks ago was when issues come up they would say the vice president and the president “Is this not an issue better handled at the state level?” That's a refreshing point of view and quite frankly that's the way the founding fathers expected it to be. 

So yes, he's earned my support, and again I think the results and the outcomes that we're receiving under his administration have been good. I wish he would quit tweeting at 2 o'clock in the morning and some of the pettiness that happens. That's just him and I don't think he's going to change much.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: Governor, one bill that appears to be not going very far in the legislature and I wanted your thoughts on it, the Equal Rights Amendment. Should the state and the legislature consider that resolution?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: You know it's something that's puzzling to me a little bit, one the deadline's passed so I don't know if there's really, under the law. Unless we extend the deadline or change it, and I'm not sure that's the right thing to do. But most of the issues and concerns of the original Equal Rights Amendment have been addressed in some other form or fashion other laws and statutes have been passed subsequently.

So, I don't know if the Equal Rights Amendment does much anything more than what's already been done and so some of the fears I think have been, not realized and really have been taken care of. There may not be a need for an Equal Rights Amendment today. So I'm you know it's something I haven't spent a lot of time on, I think most of us agree, that we ought to have equal opportunity for everybody regardless of their gender and I think that was the basis for the Equal Rights Amendment and we merely have that kind of ensconced in our own Utah constitution.

SONJA HUTSON, KUER: Governor the Senator Dan McCay has a bill that bans elective abortions if Roe V. Wade is overturned in the Supreme Court. Would you support a bill like that if it came to your desk?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Well as you probably know I'm pro-life and I'm pro-life with the exceptions of rape, incest, and life of the mother kind of a traditional approach. I think we need to make sure that we, that abortions should be rare and not just elective abortions that is a form of birth control, that causes me concern. Certainly late-term abortions. So, Roe V. Wade if it's overturned opens up a new chapter and that's what I think Senator McCay is trying to anticipate if in fact that happens, we're going to say all elective abortions are in fact outlawed I think it's a little premature.

I think we could wait until Roe V. Wade is overturned. If it in fact ever is. It may be kind of a feel-good message bill with really not anything happening to it as far as real results. So, I'm a little concerned about it. I don't know it's something I just heard about here recently and I've kind of been thinking in my own mind what I would want to do. If I sign it nothing happens, if I don't sign it, nothing happens.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: Governor any thoughts on Daylight Savings Time. This bill always comes up but this year it finally passed the legislature, so it heads to your desk and are you a spring ahead or a fall behind kind of person?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: You know I like one of the arguments that I heard was made on the floor and that's they said. Let's pass this bill so it doesn't come up again! Because it does come up every year and I think people are getting weary of that.

I'm a golfer and so sometimes in the summer particularly when you have long days. You can get in nine holes of golf in the evening while it's still daylight. I have my grandkids that are playing little league baseball and other activities in the summer and so I really do enjoy the extra hours of daylight in the evening. I've a tradition on the longest day of the year, what's that June 21st, to go golfing with my sons, and we don't finish until 9:30 at night and it's still light so we've embraced that aspect of Daylight Savings I think people just don't like to change back and forth. And so, we have to wait for congressional approval and four other states in the west to decide to do it so again it may be a bill that we'll sign but probably nothing's going to happen and maybe for a long time.

BEN WINSLOW, FOX-13: But you are going to sign it then?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I think it will yeah, I think I'm ready to not have it come back up again.

RAEANN CHRISTENSEN, PBS UTAH: Okay just really quickly, ending with the Coronavirus because it is such a top of mind, our economy. It's effected the economy across the nation. Back to Utah are you worried about that with our economy?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: I'm worried from the standpoint of recognizing that it has the potential to be a very devastating to not only public health but to our economy and what it will do to us. We already are having to now review our trade missions. We usually have a couple a year we go and now we're having to say well we need to monitor this. We may not be able to do them because of this potential pandemic so it is a serious issue.

But I don't want to overreact either and act like the sky is falling. I think we'll be able to weather the storm I think we're going to be prepared as I mentioned we're going to hope for the best. But we're going to prepare for the worst and so again it's a serious issue, that ought to deserve serious consideration and concern and I think we're handling it with the right amount of fervor here in the state of Utah.

RAEANN CHRISTENSEN, PBS UTAH: Some of that money's been put aside in a rainy-day fund is that going towards the Coronavirus?

GOVERNOR HERBERT: You know we'll have, we have a significant healthy rainy-day fund we're very fiscally prudent in Utah. If anything, we're fiscally prudent we don't spend more than we take in we don't have irrational debt. We do have a rainy-day fund that's more robust now than when I came into office and that'll help us get through any significant downturns, and I think that's just prudence.

So, we have access to a significant amount of money that we can dip into if we feel the need. I think moneys will be set aside, I think there will be additional moneys put into a rainy-day fund of sorts. That's certainly being talked about in the legislature now, but we'll do what we need to do to protect our public health.

RAEANN CHRISTENSEN, PBS UTAH: Okay, thank you so much for being here.

GOVERNOR HERBERT: Thank you.

ANNOUNCER: This has been the Governor's Monthly News Conference, an archive of transcripts, video, and audio is available online. Please visit PBSUtah.org/Governor.

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