Lawmakers back balanced budget amendment, with reservations

"We create winners and losers inside the exchange and outside the exchange. We create winners and losers among the young and the old," Clark said.

Dunnigan said it was "cumbersome" to modify the health exchange program and that any changes that work outside it could be adopted later. He also said any rate changes authorized by the bill would be modest.

Another bill Herbert had threatened to veto established a prison relocation authority to study moving the state prison from Point of the Mountain. HB2002 ended up adding another appointee from the governor to the authority after some last-minute negotiations.

Other bills were less controversial, including SB2002, seen as making a number of minor fixes to alcoholic beverage control legislation that passed last session.

HB2001, a bill that died the last night of the 2011 Legislature allowing justice court judges to be evaluated differently for upcoming retention elections, sailed through the House and Senate.

The same with SB2001, which extends the deadline for special service districts to issue bonds secured by federal mineral lease payments by 10 years, to Dec. 31, 2020.

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