South Salt Lake candidates all hope to entice businesses

South Salt Lake candidates for mayor and city council think the city's business ought to be businesses.

The candidates favor bringing businesses and their sales-tax revenue to this Salt Lake suburb as a way to fill city bank accounts with money that could then be used to replenish housing stock, improve parks, renovate city buildings, and give raises to key city employees. While each candidate advocates keeping businesses in South Salt Lake, only a few have specific ideas how to do it.

Mayoral candidate Bob Gray proposes a closer liaison with the business community, which often supports schools and civic events. Likewise, Boyd Marshall, who also is running for mayor, wants a close relationship between city hall and businesses as a way of courting those businesses to within city boundaries. Incumbent Wes Losser, who is seeking a second term, suggests that South Salt Lake could collect more sales-tax revenue by lobbying against a possible redistribution that the Utah Legislature is considering.

(Tony Clements, the fourth mayoral candidate, did not respond to a questionnaire distributed by the Deseret Morning News.)

Otherwise, the eight candidates vying for two city council seats are concerned about a smattering of issues: zoning and code enforcement, attrition in emergency services, intelligently promoting South Salt Lake, and caring for the city's senior population.

Voters will select two candidates for each available seat in the Oct. 4 primary election and choose a winner in the Nov. 8 general election. Candidates were given an opportunity to respond to Deseret Morning News questionnaires; the following brief biographies are from those questionnaires.

Mayoral candidates

• Clements did not respond.

• Gray, 65, has been on the City Council for eight years. As a retired police chief, he is concerned with the city's reputation for high crime. Gray suggests that South Salt Lake can shed that reputation "through a restoration of a community policing philosophy throughout the city government," and that city officials can work with citizens "to rebuild the partnership that it takes to curb crime and restore the quality of life that this community deserves."

• Losser, 52, is seeking another term as mayor to fight for South Salt Lake's sales-tax revenue. The Legislature is considering tweaking the sales-tax distribution formula in a way that Losser said "is potentially the most devastating concern facing our city." Losser wants to repair city infrastructure — curbs, sidewalks, gutters, parks and other facilities — and also wants to purchase new vehicles for the fire and police departments. He worked previously as a construction site manager and has worked as a tile setter and in a family business.