'Mr. Twenty' bucks polls, petitioners

For a man who won his re-election to the state Legislature by a mere 20 votes last fall, House Speaker Greg Curtis sure is sticking his neck out a lot these days.

When a political candidate wins by 20 votes, he's on thin ice with voters right from the start. When he's a Utah Republican who wins by 20 votes, it's a moral defeat. He doesn't exactly have a clear mandate from the people.

But you wouldn't know it to watch Curtis in action these past few weeks. There he was last week, speaking out in support of private school vouchers and blasting the governor's call for a special legislative session on the issue — public sentiment, referendums and governors be damned.

By the way, it was Curtis who helped spearhead legislation for public funding of a soccer stadium last March after the notion was clearly rejected by public opinion polls, two audits and the Salt Lake County mayor.

Just like that, in the space of three months, Mister Twenty Votes went squarely against public opinion on two controversial, emotional issues.

Now Curtis is once again moving heaven and earth on the voucher issue in an apparent attempt to make someone happy; the question is, who is moving him? If no one is, his ardent stance against referendums and anything that would stand in the way of vouchers makes no sense.

Both the stadium and voucher issues were so unpopular that they produced petitions for voter referendums. The voucher petition collected enough signatures to have a referendum placed on the ballot this fall. And that brings us to the present and to Curtis, the man who is credited with ramming the voucher legislation through the House in the first place. Two bills, to be precise.

Vouchers — the issue so big and complex it required two laws and input from a governor, the Utah Supreme Court and the attorney general. We haven't had this much fun since Dave Checketts came to town.

First, one voucher law (HB148) passed, by one vote in the House, though the Senate passed it more readily. When other anti-voucher legislators wanted to make some amendments to the law, Curtis and other GOP leaders feared it would be defeated, so he produced a second voucher law, HB174. It placated the public-ed people by throwing more money their way but meanwhile included enough voucher language to stand as a voucher law all by itself, according to the AG.

And here's the irony: The second voucher law passed by a two-thirds majority, which meant a referendum couldn't be used to repeal the law. So much for the anti-voucher legislators. You had to hand it to Curtis.