Economic development was Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s chief campaign issue, but the state has yet to sign a key contract for recruiting new companies to Utah — even though only one firm submitted a bid.

Valued at more than $500,000, the contract was to have been in place more than a month ago when the state's economic development department officially became part of the GOP governor's office on July 1.

The sole bidder, the nonprofit Economic Development Corporation of Utah, even had an understanding that in exchange for providing services to the state for free since January, it eventually would be given the state contract.

But questions about the proposed deal have slowed the process.

Members of the Utah Board of Business and Economic Development are now expected to be asked at their next meeting Aug. 19 to ratify the contract. Because the newly reorganized board only has advisory powers, it'll be up to the governor's office to sign it.

And that's what even critics of the deal expect to happen.

"This was wired from the very beginning," said board member Joel Bradford, a Democrat appointed by former Gov. Mike Leavitt. Bradford called the review "more window dressing that anything at this point. Yes, we will look at the contract. But it's going to happen anyway."

Bradford and others have questioned why the state needed to hire an outside firm to handle recruiting, a job that had been done by some of the 33 appointed economic development department employees fired by Huntsman shortly after he took office in January.

Concern has also been expressed that only one company bid for the job — EDCU, which was headed by the governor's chief economic advisor, Chris Roybal, until he was hired by Huntsman.

And there are worries that EDCU, which already has contracts with a number of cities mostly along the Wasatch Front, might not pay as much attention to other areas of the state when recruiting.

It's also a sore point for some that the board — which saw its role shift from making policy to merely advisory under a reorganization by the new administration — was not involved in the decision to privatize a major portion of the state's economic development effort.

"None of us had any say in that. It took us all by surprise," Bradford said. "This was a horrible way to shift this . . . .They came in and just decimated the department, and the only plan they had was to off-load the national recruitment to EDCU."

Board chairman David Simmons, a radio station executive who has served on the board for 12 years, was more circumspect. "Obviously, in an advisory role, all the board can do is advise the governor," he said.