Rep. Steve Urquhart, R-St. George, is the original sponsor of HB148. That is the main voucher law that would give parents who send their children to private schools a taxpayer-funded tuition payment of between $500 and $3,000 a year, based on family income. That's the law that anti-voucher groups gathered enough voter signatures to put on the Nov. 6 ballot.

After HB148 passed by just one vote in the House, anti-voucher Democrats and moderate Republicans brought forth HB174 to provide more voucher funding to administer the voucher program. HB174 passed by two-thirds vote, and so under the Utah Constitution can't be subject to referendum.

Attorney General Mark Shurtleff says HB174 has enough voucher language in it to start a voucher program all by itself, whether or not HB148 is repealed. The state board says no, and refuses to implement HB174.

The Utah Supreme Court may be able to fix the mess, if the state board's decision is appealed in the courts. But will it be?

Meanwhile, Urquhart and House Speaker Greg Curtis, R-Sandy, say legislators should act soon. The pair propose that in a special session both HB148 and HB174 be repealed. In their stead, a new voucher law would be passed, but put on hold until June 2008.

Legislators would then place on the November ballot a nonbinding opinion question for voters: Should Utah have private school vouchers or not?

The catch is that currently the Nov. 6 referendum question on HB148 is legally binding. Citizens will vote that bill up or down, and HB148 will either be on the books or not. But, HB174 may still implement vouchers in Utah.

The public opinion vote desired by Urquhart and Curtis by law can't be binding. So Huntsman and the Legislature could go through all the work of repealing HB148 and HB174, passing a new voucher bill, and legislators could still ignore voters' voucher wishes.

Urquhart suggests that before any special session is called, all 104 legislators would sign promises to follow voters' wishes on vouchers — that the Legislature would implement or repeal vouchers depending on the Nov. 6 vote.

For political reasons, says Urquhart, the Nov. 6 vote would be for the sake of "democracy" only. In other words, legislators shouldn't be opposed or favored simply by doing what citizens at the ballot box want in the Nov. 6 vote.

The political voucher pain or praise — and both sides of the voucher debate have pumped hundreds of thousands of dollars into legislative campaigns on this issue — would be reflected by the original HB148 vote last February, says Urquhart.

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E-mail: bbjr@desnews.com