Don't expect earth-moving on Capitol Hill

Eight days to go in the 2004 Legislature.

And most of the major budget decisions are yet to be made. The House is behind in its floor work. The Senate is impatient.

It's deja vu all over again, as the comic may say.

Utah's 104 part-time legislators don't spin their wheels the first four weeks of each session.

Important votes are taken on hundreds of bills; public hearings held mornings and afternoons; and issues debated on the chamber floors and in the hallways.

But the last two weeks of each session is crunch time, where many of the critical decisions are made.

One can't say now exactly what will happen. But here are some safe bets:

• No taxes will be increased.

A few fees will go up — they do each year. For example, it appears that off-road-vehicle registration fees will go up, the new money dedicated to improving ORV trails in state parks and on state land.

• Unless legislators can get by without the $14 million now being brought in through a new cable and satellite TV sales tax, imposed last July, that tax won't be repealed this session.

Cable TV companies will just have to live with the state Tax Commission's ruling that local governments can't impose their sales tax on satellite TV bills; unfair to cable subscribers, perhaps, but who says state taxing policy is fair?

• Two anti-abortion bills will become law.

GOP Gov. Olene Walker could veto one of them — a bill that denies state funds for abortions. That bill has far-reaching effects and will likely end up in court. Utah could well lose the challenge. And if Walker doesn't run for her own term as governor this year, she need not fear the wrath of conservative GOP delegates in the May state Republican convention.

But a veto may well be overridden by legislators who are up for re-election this year.

And as we've already seen in the abortion debate this year, emotional rhetoric carries the day, not cool-headed reasoning over whether the bills are needed or accomplish a desired result of reducing the need for legal abortions.

• Gay marriages, which already can't be performed in Utah, will be clearly stomped out.