Negotiations, fine-tuning near crucial stage on Legacy

With pivotal negotiations set to continue tonight on a final Legacy Parkway agreement, lawmakers appear ready to get the deal done.

If the agreement in principal reached last month with plaintiffs in a lawsuit that halted construction of the highway isn't finalized, a special session of the Legislature tentatively scheduled Nov. 9 — the last realistic opportunity for lawmakers to vote on a settlement before their 2006 general session in January — could be in jeopardy, along with construction moving ahead this spring.

"It is imperative that we have a meeting of the minds of the agreement tomorrow in order to give it time to go through the legislative process," Rep. Stuart Adams, R-Layton, said Thursday. "We're hopeful an agreement will come out of talks today."

During his monthly news conference Thursday, Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said an announcement about the negotiations could be made soon.

"I suspect that in the next day or two that we're going to have something to report, either good or bad," he said. "I'm an optimist, and I think that everybody has come to the negotiating table in good faith — the plaintiffs, the concerned citizens, the Legislature, our office — and I think we're making good progress."

Huntsman told reporters after the press conference that the deal needs to be done within the next few days in order for him to call lawmakers into special session on interim day, Nov. 9.

Even if that deadline is missed, the governor said he is "absolutely" still optimistic an agreement on Legacy would be approved during the 2006 Legislature.

"The last thing we want is just to maintain the status quo, which is to put it on hold and fight it in the courts for the next three or four years," he said.

Right now, Huntsman said there are only "a couple of things we're fine-tuning and negotiating," calling what the parties have "a settlement in principle." Any substantial changes to that, he said, would mean "in good faith we'd have to do a new agreement in principle."

"Basically it's just a matter of making sure we both agree with the definitions," said Sen. Sheldon Killpack, R-Syracuse. "The agreement in principle, it put the basics in there, but now we have to go through and define very specifically what we mean by everything that is within that. It's an arduous task at this point."

Even if a final agreement comes out of today's talks, approval of the highway in the House is not a sure thing. Speaker Greg Curtis, R-Sandy, said while he has about 30 Republican votes, he needs votes from Democrats for the Legacy settlement to pass.