Walker's lieutenant

Soon-to-be Gov. Olene Walker was talking about the future, but she reached into her past when she selected former state lawmaker Gayle F. McKeachnie to be her lieutenant governor.

His experience as a lawyer and public servant, she insisted during a Wednesday press conference, "overqualify him to be lieutenant governor." Walker will serve as governor and McKeachnie as lieutenant governor till early January 2005.

Walker and McKeachnie became friends while sitting next to one another — McKeachnie as majority whip and Walker as assistant majority whip — while serving in the House in the mid-1980s.

They have maintained a relationship over the years as McKeachnie has served in a variety of government appointments. He accepted Walker's invitation to the state's No. 2 job, he said, because it was an opportunity to contribute for a "short time."

And in doing so, he said all the right things: how he has no political aspirations, how much he admires Walker and how he recognizes that he has not been elected by the people.

"My observation is that Utah has been blessed with good leadership in the governor's office," McKeachnie said. "It is my privilege to help Olene Walker continue in that tradition."

McKeachnie and Walker will take the oaths of office next Wednesday after the resignation ceremony of Gov. Mike Leavitt, who will be sworn in Thursday as the new administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Walker used the press conference to announce she will not simply be steering the Leavitt agenda for the next 14 months, but will "roll out projects I think are exciting." And she promised her gubernatorial personality will be different from that of Leavitt.

"Quite frankly, I am very excited about it," Walker said of becoming Utah's first woman governor.

McKeachnie's selection drew praise from elected officials and politicos, even though McKeachnie has been a rather obscure figure on Capitol Hill. Since deciding not to run for re-election to the House in 1986, he has served as an appointee to various boards and commissions where he earned the reputation as thoughtful, quiet and unassuming.

"He is someone the people of Utah will be excited about," Walker said. "He is someone all citizens will just feel good about."

Indeed, he seems to be a person everybody likes.