3 GOP guvs visit Utah to ski, raise funds

You have to hope that Republican governors like snowfall.

Three governors came to Park City Sunday and Monday for a Republican Governors Association fundraiser, or "fulfillment event," as Mike Schrimpf, RGA communications director, put it.

RGA sponsors pay a certain amount of money each year and for that they get tickets to various events, including the Park City skiing holiday and roundtable.

And the governors arrived just in time to be socked in with a spring snowfall for those two days.

Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., who didn't ski with his colleagues, attended a "roundtable panel" Sunday to discuss what role GOP governors can and should play in rebuilding the national Republican Party — which was soundly thrashed in the 2008 presidential and congressional elections.

Those participating include Govs. Haley Barbour, R-Miss.; Mark Sanford, R-South Carolina; and Jan Brewer, R-Ariz., who just succeeded former Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano, who left that seat to join President Obama's Cabinet.

Huntsman has been named, among others, as a new face for the national GOP — even mentioned as a possible presidential or vice-presidential candidate in 2012.

Huntsman downplays such talk, although he did attend a South Carolina GOP function last month, making a quick side trip while going to Washington, D.C., on other business. South Carolina is an early presidential primary state.

"While there are varying opinions" from GOP governors about what should be done nationally by Republicans, said Huntsman spokeswoman Lisa Roskelley, "there is a belief that the party has to broaden its base, include more people — as Gov. Huntsman believes."

Huntsman has been an advocate of that, sometimes taking stands to the displeasure of some conservative Utah legislators.

Several bills and resolutions were debated in the just-completed Utah Legislature aimed at curtailing the governor's ability to join groups, like the Western Climate Initiative, that the conservatives don't like or don't agree with.

And Huntsman clearly displeased some Utah conservatives when he said halfway through the session that he supported the "Common Ground Initiative" — a group of four or five bills introduced (but quickly killed) in the 2009 Legislature that would have given rights to non-traditional family groups, like same-sex couples or relatives or just friends living together in a mutually dependent household.

Besides a policy-development agency, the RGA is the main fundraising arm for Republican governors, aimed at helping incumbents get re-elected and GOP challengers take away statehouse seats from Democratic chief executives.

E-MAIL: bbjr@desnews.com