Huntsman said, based on his success at campaign fund raising, he doesn't believe that will be the case.

When he started his campaign for governor, he and some advisers worried that people, corporations and other groups would be less likely to contribute to a candidate who has considerable personal assets, Huntsman said.

"But it didn't turn out like that," he said, noting that while he guaranteed loans and lines of credit at Zions Bank, personally he and his wife gave the campaign only around $50,000. (Other Huntsman family members and the firm itself pumped in around $300,000 more in cash and in-kind contributions.)

Fund raising was not a problem, said the governor-elect, in a campaign where he collared $3.5 million (including his own and his family's contributions). And he doesn't believe it will be difficult to have successful fund raising as governor, either.

Raising funds

Former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt — expected soon to be secretary of Health and Human Services in a second Bush administration — brought Utah gubernatorial fund raising to a whole new level. Not only did Leavitt raise enough money for two $2 million re-election campaigns, but he raised millions of other dollars that went into campaigns of other GOP governors and Leavitt's own special projects.

Leavitt annually held a $10,000-per-table Governors Gala each spring and a $10,000-per-attendee "Cowboy Weekend" each summer at his family's Loa, Wayne County, ranch. Those two main events, occasionally augmented with other fund raisers, routinely raised half a million dollars a year for Leavitt's PACs.

"We don't have a ranch," joked Huntsman. "But we do have a Park City house," which may be used for some elite fund raising.

This spring there will be some kind of governor's ball, although he may not call it that and it may not be as formal as the Leavitt events, said Huntsman.

Max Farbman, who handled Leavitt's fund raising, will do the same for Huntsman, the governor-elect said. In addition, longtime GOP political aide Greg Hopkins will, at least part time, manage Huntsman's PAC while working on other special projects for the new governor.

"All that will be handled outside of my office," said Huntsman, who previously told the newspaper that he wouldn't take any pay raise in the governor's salary in 2005, should the Legislature see fit to vote him one.

"I plan to handle my personal finances — the trust — like I did when I was a trade ambassador" in the Bush administration, a job he quit two years ago to return to Utah to start his gubernatorial campaign.

His federal department had an office of ethics and conflict of interest, and great care was taken to separate ambassadors and others from any possible financial missteps, he said. While Utah law has no such tough restrictions for a governor, Huntsman said he'll walk a straight line.

"My children already have trusts," set up when he was an ambassador, and those trusts remain intact, he said. Any potential conflicts when he was an ambassador were fully vetted, he added. "And I will operate the same way" as governor.

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Contributing: Lisa Riley Roche; E-mail: bbjr@desnews.com