Still, he doesn't understand the fuss. "The fact that it would strike people as being aggressive when a governor took over and changed political appointees, I think struck me as being a little bit unreasonable. Because what do you expect a newly elected governor to do?"

Some in the media have complained that Huntsman is not as accessible as his recent predecessors. In his first six months in office in 1993, Leavitt seemed to be always in the news, with some reporters complaining the new governor was calling press conferences or "photo-ops" right and left.

KUTV Channel 2 political reporter Rod Decker has covered seven different Utah governors. Decker says: "Huntsman has done pretty well with the media. He does seem to be less willing to meet, to just have a reporter come up and talk with him, than Govs. Walker, Leavitt or Bangerter.

"But (Huntsman) holds regular news conferences, and he answers our questions. He started a minority media news conference, and that's a good idea. On the whole, he's done OK with the media."

One group watching Huntsman with a wary eye is Utah's environmental community.

The governor "has shown some signs that he is sensitive to the need to protect our natural resources, our wild lands. And (as a former chairman of Envision Utah) he's also shown he understands planning intelligently for growth," says Lawson LeGate, senior southwest regional representative for the Sierra Club. Environmentalists also like Huntsman's "strong stand" against allowing B&C level radioactive wastes in Utah.

"But we have reason to be concerned, especially about how he joined" the federal lawsuit against creation of the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, he adds.

"I give him a mixed review, overall. We'd like to see the governor step out more strongly in favor of protecting Utah's environment."

Former GOP congressman Merrill Cook, who ran for governor in 1988 as an independent, says Huntsman has done OK but tripped in two areas.

"He stumbled a bit on his appointment to the Public Service Commission's consumer advocate (picking a former utility lobbyist.) Especially since the Public Service Commission is not an elected body in Utah, it's not good to have someone who worked for a major public utility heading that office."

Secondly, Huntsman hasn't pushed hard enough to remove the sales tax from food, one of his campaign promises, said Cook, who led a failed citizen initiative in 1990 that would have done just that. With near-record state revenues, "he still has time to try to do that," said Cook.