Nearly 50 years ago, France Davis arrived in Utah, where he became the pastor of the state’s most prominent black congregation.

For 46 years, he led Calvary Baptist Church. But Davis is more than a preacher. He’s an educator, who has taught communication and ethnic studies at the University of Utah; a civic activist, who has served on numerous boards and commissions; and a civil rights icon, who marched for voting rights from Selma to Montgomery.

During his decades in the Beehive State, his words have carried a resounding moral clout and clarity that belie his small stature and soft-spoken nature.

As Davis retired at year’s end from the pulpit, he joined the podcast to talk about his time leading a Baptist church in the heart of Mormondom.

Listen here.

Depending on whom you ask, motorized recreation either threatens to overwhelm Utah’s public lands or has been choked off by bureaucrats and environmentalists bent on keeping vast reaches off-limits to those who can’t walk long distances.

The emerging dispute over a revised travel plan for Emery County’s San Rafael Desert, south of Green River, illustrates this great divide that the Bureau of Land Management must navigate in determining where off-road vehicles can roam.

The land agency recently released a draft plan detailing four wide-ranging alternatives for the 377,609-acre area east of the more famous San Rafael Swell and includes recently designated wilderness in Labyrinth Canyon. One proposes a dramatic expansion of routes open to at least some motorized use, from 309 to 890 miles, which the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance and its allies contend would turn a place of sublime natural beauty into a motorized playground and invite conflicts.

“BLM’s draft travel plan is shortsighted and wholly fails to account for the diverse array of public land resources and user groups,” said Laura Peterson, staff attorney with SUWA. "BLM’s plan would open popular hiking trails to motorized vehicle use. It would designate routes that will bisect wildlife habitat, fragment wildlands and damage important cultural sites.”

For Rainer Huck, however, the draft plan hardly goes far enough toward restoring what he asserts all Americans are entitled to: the freedom they once enjoyed to motor almost anywhere on Utah’s federal lands available for multiple use, which make up nearly half the state.

The public has until Jan. 13 to submit comments, which the BLM will use to select a final plan. Land managers inventoried 1,203 miles of existing routes and evaluated them for full motorized use, limited use and closure, according to BLM planner Ann Glubczynski.

“All these plans are a sham,” said Huck, a former Salt Lake City mayoral candidate and stalwart advocate for motorized access. “The BLM had no legal authority to close any of those routes” as long as they were in use in 1976, when Congress passed the Federal Land Policy and Management Act.

Along with another motorized user, Salt Lake City resident John Anderson, Huck is suing the BLM in U.S. District Court, seeking to upend the Emery County lands bill, which Congress passed in 2019 as part of an omnibus public lands package named in honor of the late Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich.

The pro se suit targets some of the land set aside as wilderness in the Dingell act, but it also goes far beyond Emery County, alleging that the BLM has illegally closed motorized access across Utah in collusion with environmental groups the plaintiffs deride as “Earth-religionists" and “radicals.” These groups’ alleged goal is to exclude vast majority of Americans, particularly the aged and disabled, from enjoying Utah’s remote scenic treasures.

What Huck calls “flagitious” restrictions on motorized access, SUWA and its allies contend merely follow federal laws designed to safeguard irreplaceable natural values and balance uses.

The BLM has authorized thousands of miles of motorized routes in Utah, including many into scenic and sensitive areas despite concerns for potential impacts on archaeological sites, rare plant communities, delicate soils, wildlife and other recreational users.

As the administration of President George W. Bush was coming to an end in 2008, the BLM adopted six resource management plans that prioritized energy development and motorized access on 6 million acres in southern and eastern Utah. SUWA successfully challenged the travel-planning components of these plans in court and won concessions from the BLM. The settlement agreement obligates the agency to reconsider its plans for 13 areas.

The San Rafael Desert is the first revised plan to be released, and the draft’s most ATV-friendly alternative, in SUWA’s eyes, could not be worse.

“Rather than capitalize on an opportunity to develop a reasonable, manageable and forward-thinking travel plan that ensures public access while preserving the backcountry and minimizing damage, BLM’s plan does exactly the opposite," Peterson said. “It proposes to designate any cow path, wash bottom and line on a map as open to off-road vehicles.”

According to SUWA’s analysis, more than 300 miles of these proposed routes are either reclaimed or do not exist on the ground. The group argues designating so many motorized routes is not only unnecessary but also will create a management nightmare for the BLM, which is strapped for the resources and personnel needed to ensure drivers adhere to designated routes.

"It certainly does not minimize impacts to soils, watersheds, riparian, cultural resources. Instead it designates routes where none existed on the ground," Peterson said. "How are people supposed to stay on a route that isn't even there?"

BLM officials disputed Peterson's characterization of the plan.

“That’s not accurate,” spokesman Jonathan Moor said. “We are examining what they put out to see if we can clarify any inaccuracies they have written on their website.”

SUWA’s proposal for a travel plan, which would authorize 333 miles of routes, is largely reflected in the BLM’s “conservation” plan, identified as Alternative B in the plan’s environmental review.

“We do not have a preferred alternative,” Glubczynski said. “We want to get comments from the public and consider them all. We will pass that on to the decision-maker.”

Huck rejects environmentalists’ assertions that motorized recreation damages the land.

“Impacts are just used as a pretext to limit access,” said Huck, an avid motorcycle rider who logs 10,000 miles a year on Utah’s back roads. “Any human activity is going to have an impact, including hiking.”

At 73 and suffering from asthma, Huck said he can’t walk far. He argues the BLM’s closures “discriminate” against the disabled, like him, who rely on motorized vehicles if they want to explore public land. Back in 1976, motorized users enjoyed legal access to nearly all the public land in Utah, but that access has since dwindled to less than 5%, Huck said.

“The closures apply to only one group of people, motorized travelers. They never apply to people who travel by foot, horseback and mountain bike. They are violating constitutional and statutory protections for handicapped people,” he said. “I’m so excited to get my day in court. I think I’m going to win, and it will change the management paradigm.”

In the meantime, however, the BLM believes the law requires it to plan where and how motorized folks such as Huck can and, more important, cannot drive on public lands.

Whatever the outcome, not everyone will be happy. That divide persists.

Like most kids growing up in the 1970s and ‘80s, Shannon Hale was a big fan of Wonder Woman — specifically, the TV version played by Lynda Carter.

“The best Christmas ever was the Christmas I got the Wonder Woman Underoos,” Hale said recently. “There were so few girls in shows, especially superhero shows. There weren’t very many awesome women for girls to look up to.”

Her love for the character did not dissipate in adulthood. When Hale, the best-selling author of the “Princess Academy” series and the comic novel “Austenland,” and her husband, Dean, bought their first minivan, Dean procured a large Wonder Woman emblem sticker for the hood.

The sticker, Shannon Hale said, was “very symbolic of my personal role as driver of that car and wielder of four children.”

Now the Hales, the Utah-based co-writers of the “Princess in Black” children’s books and two young-adult novels featuring Marvel’s Squirrel Girl, have brought their own sensibilities to Wonder Woman — by writing a graphic novel for pre-teens about the young Diana.

“Diana: Princess of the Amazons,” written by the Hales and illustrated by Victoria Ying, will be released Jan. 7, through DC Zoom, a young-adult imprint of DC Comics. (The paperback is 144 pages and costs $9.99.)

The standalone book starts with Diana as an 11-year-old girl, the only child among the immortal Amazons on the island of Themyscira. It’s a great life, though Diana wishes she had a friend. So she makes one, the way her mother, Queen Hippolyta, made Diana — from a lump of clay. But the new friend, Mona, turns out to be not at all what Diana expected or wanted.

The Hales said the story was inspired, in part, by watching the 2017 “Wonder Woman” movie, starring Gal Gadot as the adult superhero and Emily Carey and Lilly Aspell as Diana at 12 and 8, respectively.

“I remember that look she gives when they say, ‘You can’t have that sword,’” Dean Hale said.

“She gets this look in her eye, like she’s fierce, she’s going to go for it,” Shannon Hale said. “She’s got a very strong sense of right and wrong, and of justice, of doing the right thing and protecting people who can’t protect themselves. She’s an incredibly noble character.”

Dean Hale added, “I love seeing how these heroes become who they are. We’ve seen that with Superman in ‘Smallville,’ and Batman in ‘Gotham.’ Of that trinity of heroes, we’ve never really seen that, at least not to my satisfaction, with Wonder Woman.”

Shannon Hale said she also “loved the idea of writing about a kid who’s the only kid in their entire world — what would that be like?” Though few kids are that alone in their worlds, most kids, she added, “can relate to feeling lonely, and being unsure of their place in their community, and not being sure if they have any friends.”

The book also explores, Shannon Hale said, “how hard it can be for adults sometimes to give kids the space to make mistakes. Kids are kids, and they’re going to make mistakes, because they need to learn and experience and grow.”

The story is aimed at pre-teens, who are at that odd age, Dean Hale said, “between little kid and adult, [when] it can feel to the kid like the parent has retracted their love somehow. In this story, [Diana’s] mom feels more distant and [Diana wonders] ‘why don’t you love me any more?’ Even though she does, but it doesn’t feel like that.”

Shannon Hale agreed. “I noticed with our own kids, that when they’re babies and they’re little, everybody says, ‘Oh, they’re so cute!’ When they start to grow up and they get older, we don’t coo over them as much any more. We start expecting them to grow up and act a certain way,” she said. “Our kids have felt that longing to be little, and be perfectly loved again. I think it’s on adults to remember that kids always need to be loved and adored for who they are at that moment.”

Writing for graphic novels is different than novel writing, the Hales said.

“It’s mostly like writing a screenplay, but you don’t have motion and you don’t have sound — and those are kind of important,” Shannon Hale said. “You have to do it panel by panel, and you have to figure out what freeze-frame moment can communicate what’s most important, and doing it in as few panels as possible, and as few words as possible, because it’s a visual medium.”

The Hales praised Ying, the artist on “Diana: Princess of the Amazons.”

“We’ve written for artists a number of times, and every time there’s an instance where they do something slightly different than what was in my head, but it’s better,” Dean Hale said. With Ying, that happened in one panel when Diana and Mona are sitting together as friends. “I had more of an emotional impact seeing it on the page than when I did when we were writing it,” he said.

The Hales’ book is part of what will be a busy 2020 for Wonder Woman. A sequel to the 2017 movie, “Wonder Woman 1984” — with Gadot’s Diana living in the ‘80s, reunited with Steve Trevor (Chris Pine), and battling The Cheetah (Kristin Wiig) and billionaire Maxwell Lord (Pedro Pascal) — lands in theaters on June 5. And a landmark issue of the comic book, Wonder Woman #750 — a 96-page special-edition anthology with stories from more than a dozen writers, including the Hales — will be released in comic book stores nationwide on Jan. 22.

The Hales hope “Diana: Princess of the Amazons” is a hit, and DC will call upon them to write more stories about Wonder Woman’s younger days. The couple is working on a story for another DC character: Amethyst, princess of Gemworld, a sword-and-sorcery heroine who has been around since 1983.

The couple will be keeping busy elsewhere, too. The seventh “Princess in Black” book was released in November, the eighth installment is completed and the ninth is in outline form. A third book of Shannon Hale’s graphic-novel childhood memoir, following up on her collaborations with artist LeUyen Pham — “Real Friends” (2017) and “Best Friends” (2019) — has not been announced, but in December, Hale complained on Twitter about the process: “Writing memoir is the WORST. [Whose] great idea was this anyway? Mine? It was mine? I’m the worst.”

“The third one’s about eighth grade,” Shannon Hale said. It won’t cover her high school years — which is when she met Dean, when they both attended Salt Lake City’s West High School. “And I don’t plan on doing more,” she said. “But I never know.”

“When you’re 60,” Dean Hale joked, ”do one about this experience, so it will be a meta-memoir.”

Jerusalem • The unprecedented killing of Iran’s top general in a U.S. airstrike in Iraq has sent shockwaves across the Middle East, with Iran and its allies vowing revenge amid fears of an all-out war.

But while they have vast arsenals and are within striking distance of U.S. troops deployed in Syria, Iraq and the Gulf, Iran may be wary of launching a retaliatory attack that could ignite a major conflict.

The targeted attack on Friday could give them pause by signaling that the mercurial President Donald Trump is willing to wield U.S. military power in dramatic and unforeseen ways.

The slain general, Qassem Soleimani, was a towering figure who mobilized heavily-armed militias across the region against the United States and its allies, extending Iran's influence to the Mediterranean.

His death was a major blow to Iran and led nearly everyone from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on down to vow massive retaliation.

“There will be for sure a reaction from Iran's side and the axis of resistance, but the question is where, when and how," said Ibrahim Bayram, an analyst with Lebanon's daily An-Nahar. "I think the Iranians are precise and know how to direct the hit.”

Here is a look at possible scenarios going forward:

America out of Iraq

The most immediate repercussions are likely to be felt in Iraq, where the airstrike — which also killed a top Iraqi militia commander — was seen as an assault on the country's sovereignty.

Iraq’s parliament will meet for an emergency session Sunday. On Saturday, the country’s powerful Iran-backed militias will hold a funeral in Baghdad that thousands are expected to attend.

The targeted killing is likely to strengthen Iran-backed forces and political factions in the face of anti-government protesters who oppose Tehran's influence. Iran's allies can now present themselves as upholding national sovereignty against foreign aggression.

Iraq's government, which has maintained an uneasy alliance with both Washington and Tehran, will come under mounting pressure to expel the 5,200 American troops who are in the country to help prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State group.

Restricting or expelling American troops on Iraqi soil is a likely immediate impact option, according to Renad Mansour, a research fellow at the London-based international affairs think tank Chatham House.

“I think it would be hard for any Iraqi government official making a claim to keep American troops after this," Mansour said. If America goes, he added, other diplomatic missions might follow.

That would place Iraq even more firmly in Iran's camp, alongside Syria and Lebanon, and fulfill a goal Soleimani had pursued since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

But it might not be enough.

Regional Pressure Points

Over the last decade, Soleimani had mobilized tens of thousands of heavily armed fighters in Syria and Iraq, who have battled alongside President Bashar Assad in Syria's civil war and fought the Islamic State group in both countries.

The United States has relatively small deployments of troops in both countries who could be targeted in revenge attacks. The latest escalation began last week when a rocket attack blamed on an Iran-backed Iraqi militia killed a U.S. contractor.

The U.S. responded with a wave of airstrikes that killed 25 militiamen in Iraq and Syria, and the militiamen then staged two days of violent protests at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. No one was hurt in the protests, but demonstrators breached the embassy compound.

Iran could also exact revenge through allies further afield, in Lebanon, Yemen or the Gaza Strip.

The Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group dominates Lebanon and has an arsenal of tens of thousands of rockets that can hit every part of Israel. But it is unlikely to risk an all-out war that would devastate Lebanon, which is already in the grip of a severe economic crisis and its own anti-government protests.

Cyberattacks and other possible retaliation tactics

Security experts said cyberattacks were likely to be part of Iran’s retaliation. And while cautioning that the U.S. power grid is quite resilient, there are plenty of other opportunities for major disruption, they said.

Other potential targets include the financial sector, manufacturing, oil and gas plants and transit systems.

Iranian hackers carried out a series of disruptive attacks that knocked U.S. banks' websites offline prior to the Obama administration's 2015 nuclear deal.

“Our concern is essentially that things are going to go back to the way they were before the agreement,” said John Hultquist, director of intelligence analysis at the cybersecurity firm FireEye. “There are opportunities for them to cause us real disruption.”

Iran has also been doing a lot of probing of U.S. industrial systems in recent years — trying to gain access — but has limited its destructive attacks to targets in the Middle East such as the Saudi oil company, experts say.

Striking the gulf

Rather than unleashing its proxies, Iran might respond on its own by targeting U.S. allies in the Gulf and their oil infrastructure. The U.S. blamed Iran for a sophisticated attack on Saudi Arabia's oil facilities in September that temporarily halved its oil production.

The U.S. also blamed Iran for the sabotage of oil tankers last year in the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world's oil passes. Iran denied those allegations, but acknowledged shooting down a U.S. surveillance drone in June.

Iran could also retaliate by abandoning the 2015 nuclear deal, which has gradually come unraveled since Trump withdrew from the agreement in May 2018 and restored crippling sanctions.

Iran has already openly breached some of its commitments in response to the sanctions and could announce a major new drive to enrich uranium.

Sound and fury?

There's also the possibility, amid all the dire predictions, that Iran does nothing, at least for now.

Israel, for one, does not appear terribly concerned. Authorities closed a ski resort near the borders with Lebanon and Syria, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cut short a trip to Greece, but there have been no other security measures or any talk of calling up reserves.

“I think the Iranians are shocked now," said Yoel Guzansky, an expert on Iran at the Institute for National Strategic Studies, a Tel Aviv think tank. He said Trump had restored America's power to deter attacks by reinforcing the image of himself as a “crazy guy.”

Iran and its allies have lost several other senior commanders over the years. While they always vow revenge, they usually add that it will happen at a time and place of their choosing — and the crisis passes.

For example, Hezbollah vowed revenge after one of its top commanders, Imad Mughniyeh, was killed in a bombing in Damascus that the group blamed on Israel. That was in 2008, and while the group has traded fire with Israel since then, it has not carried out any major attacks.

Then again, there's no real precedent for the killing of a figure like Soleimani.

Joost Hiltermann, the Middle East program director at the Crisis Group, an international think tank, says “we could see a war.”

“You could argue that it would be wise to do nothing and to let the storm pass,” he said. “But frankly, when you see Khamenei, the supreme leader, crying at the mourning ceremony... You realize that they have put themselves in a corner. They will have to respond.”

Associated Press writers Josef Federman in Jerusalem and Fadi Tawil and A.J. Naddaff in Beirut contributed.

Sen. Mitt Romney — who heads a Senate foreign relations subcommittee on the Middle East — praised the U.S. strike Friday that killed a top Iranian general but also called on the Trump administration to articulate “a coherent strategy for protecting our security interests” there.

Meanwhile, Utah’s only Democrat in Congress, Rep. Ben McAdams, said he, too, wants to see a coherent strategy and vowed, "I will not put American soldiers in harm’s way without a clear plan and unless the risk is warranted.”

Romney, R-Utah, said, “Qassem Soleimani was a depraved terrorist who had the blood of hundreds of American servicemen and women on his hands, and who was doubtlessly planning operations to further harm our citizens and allies. We remember and honor the sacrifice of those servicemen and women, and we commend our brave troops and intel officers who carried out this successful mission."

Soleimani was commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and was the architect of its interventions across the Middle East. He was killed in a drone strike early Friday that was approved by President Donald Trump, the Pentagon said.

Romney also said that in a time of increasing tension in the region, the United States must take necessary steps to protect its interests and personnel there.

“With ever-increasing challenges confronting us in the Middle East, it is imperative that the U.S. and our allies articulate and pursue a coherent strategy for protecting our security interests in the region,” Romney said. “I will be pressing the administration for additional details in the days ahead.”

McAdams gave a mixture of praise and concern in his statement.

My statement on the drone strike killing of the Iranian general #utpol pic.twitter.com/IJ9Q60QNfA

— Rep. Ben McAdams (@RepBenMcAdams) January 3, 2020

“A terrorist who plotted against and killed Americans has received justice,” he said. “I share Utahns’ concerns today about what this action means for our men and women in the military who put their lives on the line to defend America and our freedom. Our reaction as a country must be to come together, not as Republicans and Democrats, but as Americans.”

He added that he will be analyzing the information and intelligence regarding the evolving situation and asking questions about the strategy. “We must ensure there is a coherent and long-term strategy to protect the United States and to protect freedom abroad,” he said. "I will not put American soldiers in harm’s way without a clear plan and unless the risk is warranted.”

Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, issued a short statement. “The death of Qassem Soleimani is a big victory for the safety of the American people. As always, I am anxious to learn about the legal justification for this action, and look forward to being briefed by the Pentagon and the White House.”

Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, tweeted out support for the strike, and also issued a warning for Iran to be careful in its next steps.

“I want to thank @POTUS for his decisive leadership as well as the brilliance of our intelligence & military forces,” Stewart tweeted. “Soleimani was a terrorist who was responsible for hundreds of American deaths & creating chaos & instability in the region. The world is a safer place without him.”

I want to thank @POTUS for his decisive leadership as well as the brilliance of our intelligence & military forces. Soleimani was a terrorist who was responsible for hundreds of American deaths & creating chaos & instability in the region. The world is a safer place without him.

— Rep. Chris Stewart (@RepChrisStewart) January 3, 2020

Stewart also issued this warning in a tweet: “Iran needs to be careful in their next step, for we will continue to be committed to defending American lives in the region.”

Rep. John Curtis, R-Utah, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, also praised the strike but sought more information from the administration.

“Qassem Soleimani was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Americans in Iraq and elsewhere; the State Department puts the official figure at 603. With reports of Soleimani actively plotting more attacks against the United States, the president acted decisively to protect countless lives including our service members, diplomats, and everyday citizens," he said in a statement. "I expect someone from the administration to brief myself and my colleagues on the House Foreign Affairs Committee as soon as possible.”

Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah and a member of the House Armed Services Committee, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A drone killed Soleimani as he was leaving Baghdad International Airport. It was launched after pro-Iranian demonstrators earlier this week marched on the U.S. Embassy, trapping personnel inside and destroying a reception area.

U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Matthew Tueller, who is from Utah, was out of the country on personal leave at the time of the embassy protests, according to the State Department.

Tueller is a career diplomat who previously served as ambassador to Yemen and to Kuwait. A graduate of Brigham Young University and Harvard, he speaks fluent Arabic.

During confirmation hearings last March, he talked about the pivotal role of Iraq in the region.

“Our relationship with Iraq remains a critical one for the national security interests of the United States," he testified. “However, let me stress from the outset that there will be no greater priority for me than the safety and security of all Americans residing in Iraq.”

Nationally, the strike sharply divided congressional leaders along party lines.

According to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., the strike was carried out “without the consultation of Congress.”

“American leaders’ highest priority is to protect American lives and interests,” Pelosi said in a statement. “But we cannot put the lives of American service members, diplomats and others further at risk by engaging in provocative and disproportionate actions. Tonight’s airstrike risks provoking further dangerous escalation of violence.”

Another Democrat, Sen. Tom Udall of New Mexico, accused Trump of bringing the nation “to the brink of an illegal war with Iran.”

The New York Times also reported that the decision to kill Soleimani was one that Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama had rejected, fearing it would lead to war.

Logan now has the lowest unemployment rate among the nation’s 389 metro areas, and Salt Lake City has the lowest unemployment for metro areas with at least 1 million people.

That’s according to data released Friday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. It comes two weeks after release of similar data for states showed that Utah matched its lowest unemployment rate ever in November at 2.4% statewide.

Also in the new data, a third Utah metro area — Ogden-Clearfield — ranked No. 3 among all metro areas nationally for the job growth rate it logged between November 2018 and November 2019: 4.2% (behind only Myrtle Beach, S.C. at 5.1% and Idaho Falls at 4.5%).

The new data said the Logan metro area had an unemployment rate in November of 1.5%, with just 1,126 people actively seeking work. That rate was less than half the national average of 3.3%. Logan’s unemployment rate a year ago was 2.4%.

While Logan was the lowest in the nation, the highest was in El Centro, Calif., with a rate of 20.6%.

For the 51 metro areas with at least 1 million residents, for the second consecutive month Salt Lake City was the lowest nationally with a rate of 1.9%. That was down from 2.7% a year ago, with 12,706 people actively seeking work. The highest rate nationally was in New Orleans, at 4.4%.

The unemployment rate for other areas in Utah in November were: Ogden-Clearfield, 1.8% (down from 2.8% a year earlier); Provo-Orem, 1.7% (down from 2.5% a year ago); and St. George, 2.1% (down from 3.1%).

Mark Knold, chief economist at the Utah Department of Workforce Services, said last month, “Rapid declines in such a low unemployment environment point to an economy running at full steam. Employment opportunities are plentiful.”

Separate data released Friday showed Utah’s metro areas all saw increases in the number of jobs created over the past 12 months — led by Ogden-Clearfield finishing No. 3 nationally at 4.2%.

The increases for other metro areas in Utah were: St. George, 3.6%; Provo-Orem, 3.4%; Salt Lake City, 2.2%; and Logan, 2.0%.

This Pat Bagley cartoon appears in The Salt Lake Tribune on Sunday, Dec. 5, 2020. You can check out the past 10 Bagley editorial cartoons below:

• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/30/bagley-cartoon-warriors/" target=_blank><u>Warriors for Democracy</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/27/bagley-cartoon-baring/"><u>Baring Witness</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/23/bagley-cartoon-santas/"><u>Santa’s Helper</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/21/bagley-cartoon-matter/"><u>A Matter of Scale</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/19/bagley-cartoon/"><u>Impeachment Pout</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/19/bagley-cartoon-trolling/"><u>Trolling for Christmas</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/17/bagley-cartoon-oh-my-heck/"><u>Oh My Heck!</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/17/bagley-cartoon-republican/"><u>Republican Rules of Impeachment</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/14/bagley-cartoon-you-might/"><u>You Might Have a Problem If...</u></a>
• <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/bagley/2019/12/12/bagley-cartoon-make/"><u>Make American Greta Gain</u></a>

Want more Bagley? Become a fan on Facebook.

When Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall takes office Monday, one of the “immediate issues” she’ll face is addressing homelessness and gaps in the new resource center system, which has been dogged by concerns over capacity constraints since its inception.

While she’s not currently amenable to conversations about increasing the occupancy caps at the two shelters located in Salt Lake City, Mendenhall told The Salt Lake Tribune on Friday that she was interested in exploring options for creating a temporary low-barrier emergency center available in the cold winter months.

“I want to be clear that I’m not looking to build a third shelter in Salt Lake City,” she said, but added that she does see a need “to have more creative conversations with the partners we have and potentially partners we haven’t considered yet in the community that have spaces that could be used with service providers for emergency shelter options.”

Church buildings could be one possibility, Mendenhall said, or senior and recreation centers.

“I can tell you that under my watch, I don’t want a single person to be denied shelter when it’s freezing outside,” she added during an hourlong meeting with The Tribune’s editorial board.

Reexamining the 200-bed occupancy caps at Salt Lake City’s resource centers and exploring low-barrier emergency shelter options were two of hundreds of recommendations outlined in a 131-page document prepared by Mendenhall’s transition committee and related to her first 100 days in office.

The transition memos contain a deluge of ideas from eight subcommittees led by subject-matter experts. They look at ways to improve economic development and environmental sustainability, expand transportation and housing options, boost equity and inclusion, tackle homelessness and cultivate a tech ecosystem in the city.

Her goal in convening the committees, Mendenhall said, was to “solicit a real spectrum of feedback” from a diverse group of voices on ways to think differently about city government. The mayor-elect also facilitated input from residents during a series of open office hours held at city branch libraries over the past few weeks.

Some of the ideas outlined in the documents are simple administrative actions that don’t require a budget impact, like moving control of the Economic Development Loan Fund to a different department. Others are more aggressive, like working to ban single-use plastics in city-owned facilities, or would have an expense, such as increasing investment in electric vehicle charging stations.

Mendenhall Transition Memos by The Salt Lake Tribune on Scribd

Mendenhall wouldn’t say exactly what recommendations she plans to complete from the documents, noting that it would be “premature” to form a plan “before I’ve come into office and been able to talk with the people on the front lines who would be executing the suggestions” and without her own budget to work off yet.

But when it comes to homelessness, the mayor-elect expressed support for several of the ideas from the homeless services transition committee, led by Spencer Eccles, the managing director of The Cynosure Group, and Brittney Nystrom, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah.

Among those was a commitment to reexamine municipal code and policies that criminalize homelessness or adversely impact people on the streets — such as the city’s anti-camping ordinance, which carries a maximum fine of $1,000 and up to six months in jail.

“One of the tenets of work I’m walking in here with is policy reviews across the board,” Mendenhall said, noting that she will also look at zoning ordinances and language on job applications to improve diversity in city positions.

The effect of eliminating policies that people experiencing homelessness tend to violate more than anyone else could ultimately keep them from getting caught in the criminal justice system and help unsheltered people move off the streets, Nystrom said in an interview Friday.

“The more times you are cited as a lawbreaker, the more difficult it is to kind of return to life as the rest of the community imagines it,” she said. “So if some of those laws are no longer enforced in the same aggressive way or if some of them are taken off of the books, you may have the outcome of someone having an easier time regaining their footing or becoming self-sufficient.”

Nystrom said the committee focused on providing recommendations that balanced the needs of a diverse set of community interests, from business owners and law enforcement officers to volunteers and homeless service providers.

The result, she said, is an “ambitious” but “not overly controversial” set of ideas that focuses on ending the "human suffering that is associated with homelessness.”

In addition to the ideas included in the transition documents, Mendenhall also has some thoughts of her own on how to improve homeless services.

Amid confusion about constantly changing numbers around bed availability, the mayor-elect said she wants to create an app or online page that would allow service providers to offer real-time, systemwide updates on available space.

“You might call five minutes before me and we might end up with different numbers because things are in flux,” she said. “This isn’t rocket science. We should be able to come up with a more accurate and up-to-the moment reflection of what the bed count is. I should be able to sit here as the mayor and tell you whether or not we have room in our shelters right now.”

Mendenhall also wants to see improved transportation options for people experiencing homelessness.

The new resource centers are offering a pilot program that’s busing people between the three resource center facilities, including one in South Salt Lake, and the Weigand day shelter in Salt Lake City’s Rio Grande neighborhood. But Mendenhall said she wants to see a stop added at Library Square, where a number of homeless campers reside.

“We need to connect them more easily, especially at a time when the Health Department is doing its cleanups,” she said.

The Salt Lake County Health Department’s camping cleanups appear to have ramped up in recent weeks and have come under greater public scrutiny in part as a result of attention from Civil Riot, an activist group that’s best known for its involvement in protesting the inland port.

That group and others began occupying Washington Square outside City Hall starting Thursday night to put pressure on the city to take action on homelessness and members said they would stay there until their demands were met.

Early Sunday morning, police in riot gear arrested more than a dozen people there for violating curfew.

The group is seeking a new shelter downtown; an end to arrests, tickets or harassment for campers; changes to city ordinance to allow the new centers to have more beds; and free transit fare for all who stay in the shelters.

The group also wants to see an equivalent number of beds made available as were in The Road Home’s now-closed emergency shelter. The downtown shelter had nearly the same number of beds as the new resource centers have but had space for about 1,100 people total using mats and cots — nearly 400 more than the resource centers are able to hold.

Friday afternoon, activist Marvin Oliveros said the coalition wasn’t satisfied with the response from state, county and city officials so far to the demands.

The group is also upset about Mendenhall’s plan to provide free fare on public transit to people with tickets to events, like Jazz sporting games and arts events, feeling that its plan to expand transportation for people who are homeless was subverted to benefit people who don’t need a subsidy, he said.

That proposal "came close to two months after we made that same request not for folks that had shelter, not for folks that had resources, but for folks that had their resources stripped from them,” Oliveros said.

Mendenhall said Friday that she and outgoing Mayor Jackie Biskupski had extended an invitation to the protesters to have a sit-down meeting to hear their concerns with no response. She also said her idea for tickets to serve as transit fare and efforts to help unsheltered community members get around the city are not mutually exclusive.

“Expanding transit opportunities for all Salt Lakers," she said, “is a priority I share with our communities.”

Tribune reporter Paighten Harkins contributed to this report.

Eugene, Ore. • Oregon leads the nation in scoring offense, but it’s suddenly defense that matters to the Ducks.

While Sabrina Ionescu scored 17 points to go with eight rebounds and seven assists in leading No. 2 Oregon in an 88-51 rout of Utah on Sunday, the Ducks (12-1, 2-0) pointed to other numbers as the difference in the game.

The Ducks forced 20 turnovers by the Utes (7-7, 0-3), who shot 37% from the field overall and only 30% in the first half when the outcome was decided.

“I just thought we were really dialed in,” Oregon coach Kelly Graves said. “Where we’ve made the biggest strides in the last few weeks is at the defensive end.

“We’ve made it difficult for teams to get comfortable.”

Utah had five of its turnovers in the opening 10 minutes, and in points off turnovers, the Ducks finished with a 29-6 scoring edge.

“That’s impressive when you get almost 30 points off turnovers,” Graves said. “We’re on point. Our kids are doing a really good job of communicating our changing defenses.

“I want the other team to be confused, and not us, and we’re doing a really good job of that.”

That was especially apparent in the opening quarter, when the Ducks raced off to a 29-10 lead.

“We just had a horrendous first quarter and we’ve got to evaluate what we’re not doing,” Utah coach Lynne Roberts said, saying it was a repeat of her team struggling early against No. 3 Oregon State two days earlier in a 29-point defeat. “This is the toughest road trip in the country,” Roberts added. “Name another conference where you have to play two top-five teams in 36 hours. It’s really hard.”

By margin, it was the worst Pac-12 defeat for Utah, in its ninth year in the conference. It was also Utah’s worst loss by margin since a 42-point defeat against Western Kentucky in 1993. It also tied for the 10th-largest margin of victory for Oregon in a conference game, two days after the Ducks beat Colorado by 58 points.

Ruthy Hebard recorded the 46th double-double of her career with 13 points and 12 rebounds and Minyon Moore added a season-high 17 points as the Ducks shot 53% from the field, though only 29% on 3-pointers.

Lola Pendande had 12 points to lead the Utes.

Oregon was again dominant from the opening tip. Two days after taking a 15-point lead after the first quarter against previously unbeaten Colorado, the Ducks led the Utes by 19 points after the first 10 minutes by shooting 55 percent from the field with a 13-5 advantage in rebounds. Utah simply couldn’t keep pace, shooting 3 of 12 from the field to go with five turnovers.

“We know they’re a good team and well-coached. They just haven’t got it going yet,” Ionescu said of the Utes. “We knew they were going to come out and give us their best shot so we had to dictate on offense and defense.”

BIG PICTURE

Utah: The Utes have lost all three of their Pac-12 games and four of five games overall to fall to 7-7.

Oregon: In winning its first eight home games, Oregon’s closest margin of victory was by 36 points.

INSIDE DOMINANCE

Oregon had a 50-18 edge in points in the paint, and the Ducks also had a 17-2 advantage in second-chance points with 16 offensive rebounds.

TURNED AROUND

While Utah’s bench has outscored the opposing team’s substitutes in 11 of the previous 13 games, Oregon’s reserves had a 24-13 edge in that category.

UP NEXT

Utah is home to play No. 10 UCLA on Friday, its third consecutive top 10 opponent. The Utes have not defeated UCLA in the four previous seasons with Roberts as the head coach.

Oregon is on the road to play at Arizona State on Friday. It will only be the third true road game for the Ducks, who won earlier away games at Syracuse and Long Beach State.

The 77th Golden Globes were meant to be a coronation for Netflix. Instead, a pair of big-screen epics took top honors Sunday, as Sam Mendes’ technically dazzling World War I tale “1917” won best picture, drama, and Quentin Tarantino’s radiant Los Angeles fable “Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood” won best film, comedy or musical.

The wins for “1917” were a surprise, besting such favorites as Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” (the leading nominee with six nods) and Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman.” Both are acclaimed Netflix releases but they collectively took home just one award, for Laura Dern’s supporting performance as a divorce attorney in “Marriage Story.” “The Irishman” was entirely shut out.

“1917” also won best director for Mendes. The film was made in sinuous long takes, giving the impression that the movie unfolds in one lengthy shot.

Though set around the 1969 Manson murders “Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood” was classified a comedy and thus had an easier path to victory than the more competitive drama category. Brad Pitt won for best supporting actor, his first acting Globe since winning in 1996 for “12 Monkeys,” padding his front-runner status for the Oscars.

“I wanted to bring my mom, but I couldn’t because any woman I stand next to they say I am dating so it’d just be awkward,” Pitt said.

Throughout the night, those who took the stage used the moment to speak about current events including the wildfires raging in Australia, rising tensions with Iran, women’s rights, the importance of LGBT trailblazers, even the importance of being on time.

Patricia Arquette, a winner for her performance in Hulu’s “The Act,” referenced the United States’ targeted killing on Friday of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani last week, saying history wouldn’t remember the day for the Globes but will see “a country on the brink of war.” She urged all to vote in November’s presidential election.

Gervais, hosting the NBC-telecast ceremony for the fifth time, argued early in the evening that Netflix had taken over Hollywood the streaming service’s commanding 34 nominations, in film and TV, coming into the Globes. “This show should just be me coming out going: ‘Well done, Netflix. You win everything tonight,’” said Gervais.

As it turns out, he was wrong. Netflix won only two awards: Dern’s win plus one for Olivia Colman’s performance in “The Crown.” It was a definite hiccup for the streaming service, which is aiming for its first best-picture win at the Academy Awards next month.

Instead, the awards were widely spread out among traditional Hollywood studios, indie labels like A24, cable heavyweights like HBO and relative newcomers like Hulu.

As always at the Globes, there were surprises. Taron Egerton, a regular presence on the awards circuit this year, won best actor in a comedy or musical for his Elton John in “Rocketman” — an honor many pegged for Eddie Murphy (“Dolemite Is My Name”).

But no upset was bigger than the one by “1917.” The timing was fortuitous for Mendes’ film. It expands nationwide Friday. Mendes appeared especially surprised winning best director.

“There is not one director in this room — not one director in the world — that is not in the shadow of Martin Scorsese,” the British filmmaker said.

Awkwafina, the star of the hit indie family drama “The Farewell,” became the first woman of Asian descent to win best actress in a comedy or musical. “If anything, if I fall upon hard times, I can sell this,” said Awkwafina, holding the award.

No other category has been more competitive this year than best actor. Joaquin Phoenix won for his loose-limbed performance in the divisive but hugely popular “Joker” in a category that included Adam Driver (”Marriage Story") and Antonio Banderas (“Pain and Glory”). Phoenix gave a rambling speech that began with crediting the Hollywood Foreign Press Association with the vegan meal served at the ceremony.

Dern’s best supporting actress award for her performance as a divorce attorney in “Marriage Story,” was her fifth Globe. (Dern even served as Miss Golden Globe at age 15.) Her win denied Jennifer Lopez, the “Hustlers” star, her first major acting award.

The first award of the night went to a streaming service series. Ramy Youssef won best actor in a TV series comedy or musical for his Hulu show “Ramy.” Best actor in a limited series went to Russell Crowe for the Showtime series “The Loudest Voice.” He wasn’t in attendance because of raging wildfires in his native Australia.

“Make no mistake, the tragedy unfolding in Australia is climate-changed based,” Crowe said in a statement read by presenters Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge followed up her Emmy haul by winning best comedy series and best actress in a comedy series. She thanked former President Barack Obama for putting “Fleabag” on his best-of-2019 list. With a grin, she added: “As some of you may know, he’s always been on mine.”

Waller-Bridge’s co-star Andrew Scott (of “hot priest” fame) missed out on the category’s supporting actor award, which Stellan Skarsgård took for HBO’s “Chernobyl.”

HBO was also triumphant in best TV drama, where the second season of “Succession” bested Netflix’s “The Crown” and Apple TV Plus’ first Globe nominee, “The Morning Show.” Brian Cox, the Rupert Murdoch-like patriarch of “Succession,” also won best actor in a drama series. “The Crown” took some hardware home, too, with Olivia Colman winning best actress in a drama series, a year after winning for her performance in “The Favourite.”

Best foreign language film went to Bong Joon Ho’s “Parasite,” the Cannes Palme d’Or winning sensation from South Korea. Despite being an organization of foreign journalists, the HFPA doesn’t include foreign films in its top categories, thus ruling out “Parasite,” a likely best picture nominee at next month’s Oscars.

“Once you overcome the inch-tall-barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films,” said Bong through a translator.

Tom Hanks, also a nominee for his supporting turn as Fred Rogers in “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood,” received the Cecil B. DeMille lifetime achievement award. The Carol Burnett Award, a similar honorary award given for television accomplishment, was given to Ellen DeGeneres. She was movingly introduced by Kate McKinnon who said DeGeneres’ example guided her in her own coming out.

“The only thing that made it less scary was seeing Ellen on TV,” said McKinnon.

Hanks’ speech had its own emotional moment. Just as he was beginning comments that would touch on the importance of actors being on time, Hanks caught sight of his wife and four children at a table near the stage and choked up.

“A man is blessed with the family’s sitting down front like that,” he said.

Elton John and Bernie Taupin won the evening’s most heavyweight battle, besting Beyonce and Taylor Swift. Their “I’m Gonna Love Me Again” won best song. “It’s the first time I’ve ever won an award with him,” said Elton of his song-writing partner. “Ever.”

The Golden Globes, Hollywood’s most freewheeling televised award show, could be unusually influential this year. The roughly 90 voting members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association have traditionally had little in common with the nearly 9,000 industry professionals that make up the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The HFPA is known for calculatingly packing its show with as much star power as possible, occasionally rewarding even the likes of “The Tourist” and “Burlesque.”

Sunday’s show may have added to that history with an unexpected award for “Missing Link” for best animated feature film over films like “Toy Story 4” and “Lion King.” No one was more surprised than its director, Chris Butler. “I’m flabbergasted,” he said.

But the condensed time frame of this year’s award season (the Oscars are Feb. 9) brings the Globes and the Academy Awards closer. Balloting for Oscar nominations began Thursday. Voters were sure to be watching.

The dearth of nominations for female filmmakers stoked more backlash than anything else at this year’s Globes. Only men were nominated for best director (just five women have ever been nominated in the category), and none of the 10 films up for best picture was directed by a woman, either. Time’s Up, the activist group that debuted at the black-clad 2018 Globes, was highly critical of the HFPA for the omission, calling it “unacceptable.”

Former second lady and aspiring first lady Jill Biden visited with donors in Salt Lake City on Sunday night, promoting her husband as the candidate who can recapture the White House and help other Democrats.

Biden singled out Rep. Ben McAdams, the only Democrat representing Utah in Congress and who won election in 2018 by fewer than 700 votes, as someone who can be helped if the party’s presidential nominee is former Vice President Joe Biden.

“If we hope to get Congressman McAdams reelected,” Jill Biden said, “and I know that that's critical for all of us, we need to make sure that the nominee at the top of the ticket [is someone] that every Democrat can run with; not run away from.”

Jill Biden promoted her husband as a uniter who can defeat President Donald Trump in a general election. She gave the 40 or so people in attendance three reasons to explain their support of Joe Biden to others.

• He has a broad coalition that includes independent voters.

• He can win the swing states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Florida.

• His vision is “bold and progressive” but also “achievable.”

“There are a lot of good Democrats who are running for office,” she said, “but Joe has the best chance of beating Donald Trump.”

The former second lady visited donors in Denver earlier in the day. Sunday evening, she arrived at University of Utah’s law school and a banquet hall on the sixth floor. The hosts were Meg and Jim Holbrook. Meg is a former chairwoman of the Utah Democratic Party. Jim is a law professor at the U. The invitation listed attendance prices at $250 to $2,800.

Other notable attendees included Salt Lake County Councilman Jim Bradley, state Sen. Derek Kitchen, state Rep. Patrice Arent, state Sen. Karen Mayne and former state Sen. Scott Howell. Guests could snack from a buffet of hors d’oeuvres and drink from a bar.

“We live in a very volatile time in our history,” Meg Holbrook said in introducing Jill Biden. “It’s a very volatile time in the world and a very volatile administration. So very, very thankful that Joe Biden is running for president.”

Jill Biden said she knows it’s not easy being a Democrat in a conservative state such as Utah.

“But in a lot of ways,” she said, “I think that it's people like you who really understand what's at stake in this election really better than anyone else.”

When she talked about the time she and her husband have already spent on the campaign trail, she mentioned their son Beau Biden, who died of cancer in 2015.

“After our son Beau died, I felt betrayed by my faith, abandoned,” said Jill Biden. “And my minister would write me emails occasionally saying, you know, ‘Jill, where are you? Come back to the service.' But I just couldn’t go. I couldn’t even pray.”

Then while sitting in a pew at a Sunday service with her husband this summer on the campaign trail, a woman kneeled beside her and asked if she could be her prayer partner.

“Her kindness opened up something inside of me that morning,” Jill Biden said. “It’s as if God was saying to me, ‘OK, Jill. It’s been long enough. It’s time to come home.’”

Jill Biden addressed the room for about 15 minutes. Near the end, she offered the audience a vision of a United States under a President Joe Biden.

“You pick up the morning paper and the headline isn’t about some late night tweet storm,” she said, in a reference to Trump. “Instead, it’s about our children, our American children who are going to benefit from universal pre-K or you’re going to be reading about how families finally have a path out of homelessness because they can get emergency relief, and we’re creating more affordable housing.

“And then, if you’re like us, we always turn on the morning television to get the news to kind of prepare yourself for the day. And the anchors aren’t talking about how we’re on the brink of some ill-advised war. Instead, they’re talking about how we’re going to build on the Affordable Care Act with a public option and bringing down prescription drug prices.”

Utah’s Democratic primary is March 3.

New Orleans • After tight end Kyle Rudolph emerged from a purple swarm of celebrating Vikings near the corner of the end zone, he took an opportunity to mock those who doubted quarterback Kirk Cousins’ ability to come through in the clutch.

“I’m just glad Kirk can’t win big games, apparently,” Rudolph said. “We proved that one wrong today.”

Cousins hit Rudolph with a 4-yard fade on third-and-goal in overtime, and the Minnesota Vikings pulled out a 26-20 victory over the favored Saints in the wild-card round of the NFC playoffs on Sunday.

Cousins lost his only previous playoff start in 2015 with Washington, came up short of a playoff berth on the final regular-season game a year ago and struggled in a handful of other high-profile regular-season night games.

Yet Cousins eschewed an opportunity to gloat after his pass to Rudolph — and a 43-yarder to Adam Thielen at the Saints 2-yard line three plays earlier — helped the Vikings (11-6) advance to play top seed San Francisco in the divisional round of the playoffs on Saturday. It was Minnesota’s first road playoff win since Jan. 9, 2005, when the Vikings beat the rival Packers at Lambeau Field in the wild-card round.

“I’m just happy we won,” Cousins said. “It was a great, great game, two good football teams.”

Saints fans begged to differ after seeing New Orleans’ season end in overtime in the Superdome for a second straight year.

The latest disappointing end for the Saints (13-4) came nearly a year after New Orleans lost in the NFC championship game to the Los Angeles Rams in a game marred by missed Rams penalties late in regulation. This time, replays on video boards showed a possible push-off by Rudolph against defensive back P.J. Williams moments before he jumped to snag the winning catch.

NFL president of officiating Al Riveron said the league reviewed numerous replay angles, and while they saw contact by both players, “none of that contact rises to the level of a foul.”

Saints coach Sean Payton said the Vikings “deserved to win.”

Dalvin Cook gained 130 yards from scrimmage and scored two touchdowns after missing the last two regular-season games with a shoulder injury. Cousins finished with 242 yards and one TD passing.

“Being a fourth-round pick and kind of working your way up in the league — now you win a playoff game. Guess what? You look around and you realize there’s more mountains to climb,” Cousins said. “You just keep chasing the next mountain and there will always be people who are going to criticize you — and that’s OK.”

New Orleans trailed by 10 at the start of the fourth quarter but forced overtime with Drew Brees’ 20-yard touchdown pass to Taysom Hill and Wil Lutz’s 49-yard field goal with 2 seconds left.

“They made more plays than we did,” Payton said. “They ran the ball better than we did.“

Hill was the Saints’ leading rusher with 50 yards and Alvin Kamara was held to 21 yards rushing on seven carries.

“Both defenses played well,” Payton added. “Shoot, here you are in overtime and they made a few plays right there at the end that obviously were significant.”

Seahawks 17, Eagles 9

Philadelphia • Jadeveon Clowney knocked out Carson Wentz. Then, Russell Wilson and the Seattle Seahawks knocked off the Philadelphia Eagles.

Wilson threw a 53-yard touchdown pass to DK Metcalf, Marshawn Lynch had a rushing score and the Seahawks beat the Eagles 17-9 in the wild-card round of the NFC playoffs on Sunday night.

“To come back here, back East, it’s a long ways, we were able to do it, pull through,“ Wilson said. “We’ve been road warriors and it’s exciting. We’ve got a great defense, too.”

Making his first career playoff start, Wentz lasted two series before exiting with a head injury following a helmet-to-helmet hit from Clowney.

Nick Foles wasn’t around to rescue Philadelphia this time.

“I didn’t intend to hurt him. I hope he’s OK,” Clowney said.

Referee Shawn Smith told a pool reporter: “He was a runner and he did not give himself up. We saw incidental helmet contact, and in our judgment, we didn’t rule it a foul.”

Forty-year-old Josh McCown stepped in, becoming the oldest quarterback to make his playoff debut. But he couldn’t lead the Eagles (9-8) into the end zone.

“I didn’t get the job done,” said McCown, who was quite emotional on the field afterward.

The Seahawks (12-5) lost three of their final four games, including a 26-21 defeat at home against San Francisco in Week 17 that cost them the NFC West title.

But they traveled to Philadelphia for the second time in six weeks and became the third team to win on the road this weekend, improving to 8-1 away from home this season.

Wilson threw for 325 yards and led the team with 45 yards rushing. Metcalf had seven catches for 160 yards.

The Seahawks had a season-high seven sacks from six players.

“We made up our mind to not let them score,” All-Pro linebacker Bobby Wagner said. “It was a mental thing more than execution.”

Wilson drove Seattle 82 yards late in the second quarter and Lynch powered in from the 5 for a 10-0 lead.

Wilson connected with Metcalf for 26 yards and David Moore for 38 on third-down, catch-and-run passes to keep that drive going.

McCown finally got the offense going on the opening drive of the third quarter. He connected with Zach Ertz for 32 yards and Boston Scott ran 15 yards to the 5. But a false start, fumbled snap and sack followed. Jake Elliott’s 26-yard field goal cut the deficit to 10-6.

The Seahawks answered quickly. Metcalf stretched to catch Wilson’s deep pass, got up and tumbled into the end zone for a 17-6 lead.

“I caught the ball, I didn’t feel anybody touch me,” Metcalf said. “I got back up and I wanted a touchdown. I wanted a touchdown, real bad.”

Down 17-9, Eagles coach Doug Pederson passed up a 42-yard field goal attempt with 6:24 left and went for fourth-and-4 from the Seahawks 24. Miles Sanders couldn’t catch McCown’s pass.

Philadelphia had another chance after Shelton Gibson, just signed earlier in the week, drew a 39-yard pass interference penalty to the Seahawks 13.

On fourth-and-7 from the 10 with two minutes left, Clowney sacked McCown.

Wentz was forced to watch from the sideline following knee surgery when Foles led the Eagles to the franchise’s first Super Bowl title two years ago. He was out with a back injury last year when Foles led Philadelphia to a wild-card win in Chicago.

The Eagles were decimated by injuries throughout the season and had to rely on five offensive players off the practice squad during a four-game winning streak that sealed the NFC East title.

Wentz started all 16 games for the second time in his four seasons and played his best down the stretch with backups surrounding him. But he finished the season injured the same as the previous two.

“I’m disappointed for him,” Pederson said. “I wanted this for him. I think a lot of his teammates did, too. The team and the organization did. He’s battled through a lot.”

Seattle had plenty of injuries, too. The Seahawks lost running backs Chris Carson, Rashaad Penny and C.J. Prosise, forcing them to sign Lynch.

But Seattle has Wilson — and he has the Seahawks heading to Green Bay to face Aaron Rodgers and the Packers in the divisional round.

“We’re anticipating some snow,“ Wilson said with a smile. “They obviously have Aaron, they have a lot of great players, they have a great defensive line.”

This is a comment on Katie Ward’s and Karl R. Walker’s letters regarding possible ways we could spend some of the LDS Church’s $100 billion.

Karl Walker suggested the church could build a $5 billion state-of-the-art homeless shelter. But you could build something much better for much less: tiny homes.

The average tiny home is $30,000 to 40,000 (according to a Reader’s Digest interview of Chris Dorsey, who helps produce the “Tiny House, Big Living” TV show).

The homeless population has remained under 3,000 according to an article published by Deseret News on Aug. 19 of this year. You could house all of them in their own $50,000 tiny home for a mere 3% of that $5 billion figure.

Utah currently spends $100 million each year on the homeless. As I just solved the homeless aspect, Utah could instead put that $100 million into community centers that provide laundromats, public bathrooms, cafeterias, phone booths, computer labs and other resources for job hunting.

I think tiny homes would be better than a large shelter because the dignity from having a little privacy is something everyone deserves.

Maybe the homeless don’t deserve a free handout. But if you want someone to pull themselves up from their bootstraps, they have to have bootstraps in the first place.

Chris Paul, Sandy

Submit a letter to the editor

Judges in Utah’s busiest courts feel overwhelmed.

They are juggling more cases than ever, which often means long waits for defendants — some sitting for hours handcuffed in holding cells for a quick appearance before a judge.

Court officials asked for reinforcements and more money from the Legislature but received only half of what they sought.

So now they are trying to find ways to spread out the cases.

They’ve decided to start randomly assigning cases between West Jordan and Salt Lake City, a move that many in the criminal justice system have criticized. And a change starting this week will put juvenile court judges in a new role over adult cases.

Third District Presiding Juvenile Court Judge Renee Jimenez usually deals with delinquency cases and child welfare hearings. But Jimenez and nine other juvenile court judges will start presiding over first court appearances for adults and make decisions about whether to grant protective orders or stalking injunctions.

Jimenez and the other judges have received training over the past month, sometimes sitting side by side with a district court judge to learn how to handle the shuffle of adult defendants coming before the court for the first time after being charged with a crime.

“They’re really not that much different,” Jimenez said of the adult and youth courts. “[Judges read] the nature of the charge and set a date for the next hearing. It’s extremely similar.”

But there are some differences, Jimenez acknowledged. The adult courtrooms are generally more packed.

And while she frequently makes decisions about whether a young person should be kept in a detention center, Jimenez doesn’t assign bail amounts for youths like she’ll now do for adults. She’ll also probably have to weigh an adult’s risk to public safety differently than she does with children, who tend to be lower-risk because of their age.

The shift is expected to be temporary. The 3rd District juvenile court judges have only made a one-year commitment. This case-sharing is new for this district — which covers Salt Lake, Summit and Tooele counties — but court officials say it happens much more frequently in rural courts.

Juvenile court judges farther north often help with protective orders and stalking injunctions, according to courts spokesman Geoff Fattah. And those in rural areas to the south often help with signing warrants, overseeing speciality courts and issuing protective orders.

But it’s a first for Utah’s biggest district, where the number of adult cases have been rising with the growing population. In 2014, there were 15,095 cases filed, spread out among 28 judges. Six years later, that number has jumped to more than 18,000 for 31 judges.

That trend is reversed in the juvenile courtrooms. Recent juvenile justice reforms intended to keep kids out of the court system altogether have meant fewer Utah children have been in front of Jimenez and the other juvenile court judges in recent years.

Jimenez said the juvenile court judges are excited to take on the new challenge, and to help out the district court judges.

“I hesitate to say we’re less busy,” she said. “We’re working as hard as we ever have. We’re just going to be spending some of our time in the district court.”

Third District Presiding Judge Mark Kouris said the juvenile court judges chipping in will help free up about two weeks of time for each of the district court judges. Their schedules, he said, have gotten “too unruly” — sometimes as many as 170 defendants are scheduled to have their cases heard in the same day in front of the same judge.

This often means people who are supposed to be in court at 8:30 a.m. may not have their cases called until well into the afternoon, Kouris said. Those scheduled for afternoon hearings may not be before the judge until after 7 p.m.

That means defendants are either sitting in courtrooms waiting for their turn — or if they are in custody, it could mean hours spent in a holding cell.

“Needless to say, it’s a strain on everyone,” Kouris said, “and, obviously, that poor defendant.”

Kouris said it’s also been a challenge for attorneys to schedule hearings when the judge’s caseloads are so bloated, which often drags out cases longer if the next available block of time is several months out.

The presiding judge says he’s never had to juggle this many cases before. When he first took the bench 20 years ago, he handled maybe 30 cases each day. Now, it’s not unusual to have 120 and in some rare days, up to 170.

Kouris said he hopes that with juvenile court judges pitching in and other changes, judges will be able to see that number go down and consequently reduce the wait time for defendants.

“This will cause every judge to be able to spend more time with each defendant,” he said. “I think that’s a huge advantage.”

The shift comes after the courts had asked for more funding for 3rd District judges during last year’s legislative session. Chief Justice Matthew Durrant said during the annual State of the Judiciary address that they really needed nearly seven judges to handle the growing caseload — but they sought funding for four.

“The people need our careful attention to this matter,” he told lawmakers last January. “They rightfully expect timely service from, and access to, our courts, and we can’t deliver it without your assistance and support.”

Legislators ended up funding two new judge positions.

Court officials say it’s likely they’ll ask again for more funding for judges. But in the meantime, the courts have made another move in an attempt to even out caseloads.

Last fall, court officials announced that cases will soon be assigned at random between the downtown Salt Lake City courthouse and the location in West Jordan — courthouses that are 14 miles and about a 20-minute drive apart.

Kouris said then that the change was intended to bring more equity to the system, because judges in West Jordan were shouldering a much heavier caseload than those who worked downtown.

The announcement was met by pushback from dozens of government officials, who expressed concern that the policy change will make it more difficult for defendants and witnesses to get to court. Previously, the cases were assigned geographically.

But Kouris shows no sign of changing course, and that change is expected to roll out next month. Instead, Kouris is focused on keeping the wheels of justice rolling and having fewer people appear before a judge on any given day.

I disagree with Ann Cannon’s feelings and advice to the grandmother who decries the activities and actions of the younger family members who are changing holiday recipes and other traditions. I am an old grandma, and I love to see this happening. It means I have done my job in setting examples for our family and preparing them to be confident and competent and ready to face the future in their own ways. If the time comes that they completely take over, I will be happy to sit back as an honored guest and enjoy the new traditions they are establishing.

Alice Reis, West Valley City

Submit a letter to the editor

Soon, it seems, the question will become: “Who isn’t running for governor?”

Thomas Wright became the latest Republican to jump into the race and if you don’t know Wright, you’re probably not alone.

He’s a former Utah Republican Party chairman and current Republican national committeeman. He runs a successful real estate brokerage, but outside of those circles, isn’t widely known. The most recent poll by Utah Policy had him registering at 1% support among Republicans.

Wright has some things going for him, most notably a good network within the GOP, and add in his connections in business and politics, he should be able to raise quite a bit of money.

Like every candidate, however, he is beatable and, as I have done previously with the other Republican contenders — Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox, businessman Jeff Burningham, Salt Lake County Councilwoman Aimee Winder Newton, and former Gov. Jon Huntsman — here’s a little blueprint on how to do it.

Make it expensive

The interesting thing about this field is that, with the likely exception of Winder Newton, none of them have any problems with financing. It’s largely a group of millionaires, and Wright adds to the tally.

Consider that Burningham, a political newcomer who isn’t well known, has raised more than $1.5 million (though more than half is from his own pocket). Cox has raised more than $900,000, and former House Speaker Greg Hughes has about half a million raised before he officially announces.

Wright, as I mentioned, won’t have much of a problem raising money, on top of what he can contribute himself. But he doesn’t have an established base or group of followers, so his first challenge is introducing himself to voters, and that’s not easy or cheap.

The other candidates can make that difficult just by campaigning aggressively, occupying as much of voters’ bandwidth as possible. This is normally not a busy time of year for campaigns, but to the extent they can be active and aggressive, it makes it harder for candidates like Wright to get a toehold in the race.

Build him up

This sounds counterintuitive, but with Wright barely registering in the polls right now, to the extent the top-tier candidates — Cox and Huntsman — acknowledge him, there’s no advantage to punch down, and even a potential benefit to being positive.

Praising a candidate like Wright could actually make it more challenging for others in that second tier to build a solid base of support and become a real threat. If voters aren’t supporting you, you’d rather have them supporting Wright than someone who is a more immediate threat.

That strategy may help down the road, too. As we saw in the similarly crowded Salt Lake City mayoral primary last year, voters want to feel like their votes matter. So when Election Day approached, we saw many Salt Lake voters jettison their favorite candidate — think of the Stan Penfolds and David Garbetts — in favor of a more viable option. Being these voters’ second choice with a shot at winning helped Luz Escamilla and Erin Mendenhall surge at the end and make it through the primary.

It stands to reason that if we have five or six candidates in the Republican primary next year, we’d see similar movement from the long-shots to the front-runners. And in a race that could be won with as little as 25% of the vote, even a bump of a single percentage point could be the difference between winning and losing.

The same applies to the rest of the field, as well. If you can’t be the first choice, make darn sure you’re the second.

Block him off

We’ve seen it in the Democratic presidential primary: With a flock of combatants, it’s hard for any of them to rise above the din. It’s why things proved so challenging for people like Julian Castro and Beto O’Rourke. They were saying largely the same things as the folks leading the field but, because the front-runners are front-runners, they are the ones who get heard and talked about.

That will be the challenge for Wright and others polling in the single digits, to come up with a message that is clear and compelling enough to distinguish one voice from the others.

And it should be the mission of everyone else in the field to keep that from happening by playing messaging whack-a-mole. If he’s gaining traction talking about education, for example, you talk about education.

If you’re blocking Wright’s lane, he won’t have any running room and if he can’t build up a head of steam, he won’t break away from the field and he certainly won’t be leaving you in the dust.

Focus on experience

Wright has two things in common with Burningham: They have the same hairstyle and they are the only two candidates in the race who haven’t held political office.

Wright is certainly more politically connected than Burningham, as a former state party chairman, but he still doesn’t have much of a record to run on (or against).

It can be done. Huntsman, Mike Leavitt and Scott Matheson all won their bids for governor without holding prior political office. But there is a steep learning curve and that inexperience can be exploited early, especially by such a seasoned field.

This week, former House Speaker Greg Hughes — who we have known for nearly a year would be in the field — will announce his candidacy, which means you can look forward to my five-part series about how to beat him. (Just kidding, Greg.)

Editor’s note: Former Gov. Jon Huntsman is the brother of Tribune owner and Publisher Paul Huntsman.

In 2018 and 2019, a Vatican Energy Transition Dialogue was convened by Pope Francis. Its purpose was to build an effective commitment to reducing carbon emissions.

CEOs of major oil companies — such as Exxon, Shell, BP and Respol — major investment funds and multilateral groups such as the World Bank met with the pope for two days of study and debate.

Result: They all personally signed an agreement to transition to a low-carbon emissions future, relying heavily on carbon pricing.

These CEOs committed to detailing the financial mechanisms supporting their strategic plans for “significant acceleration” of carbon reduction. Importantly, they also committed to “full transparency” about these plans with their boards of directors and their major investors, ensuring accountability.

In 2020 they will convene to detail with “Just Transition” strategies, ensuring that their plans for carbon reduction will protect vulnerable populations.

Imagine if President Russell Nelson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints convened such a dialogue, with CEOs of major companies such as Rocky Mountain Power, EnergySolutions and Wolverine Fuels? Such a “Tabernacle Dialogue” among top leaders might move the church, and Utah’s economy, while leveraging the growing grassroots efforts, such as Citizens Climate Lobby, to deal with our climate crisis.

Nancy McHugh, Salt Lake City

Submit a letter to the editor

People need to understand who their real enemies are in this country, and it isn’t their fellow Americans.

Too few people seem to be able to connect the dots, or are just unwilling to see the connections because they enjoy a false sense of superiority over their fellow Americans, without the benefit of any real knowledge.

The problem in this country isn’t Donald Trump. Trump is just the thing that oozed out the rear end of a broken and corrupt government and political process. He is a symptom of mass failure and greed on the part of our elected officials, Wall Street and corporations.

Trump will be gone sooner or later, but the corrupt machine that created him will still be in place. The politicians who inhabit Congress and pretend to be either his ally or his prosecutor are no better than Trump.

The problem is the deliberate and systematic dismantling of our government and our political process in order to appease corporations, Wall Street and the wealthy. Leaving us with no voice.

Voting isn’t enough. It won’t get the job done. We need to rise up as Americans and engage in mass revolutions of civil disobedience and resistance.

Daniel Fjeld, Taylorsville

Submit a letter to the editor

Is bankrupting U.S. government Trump’s exit strategy?

The current White House resident (I refuse to call him president because he fails to exhibit the dignity we expect of our leader and because he has, by his actions, become the laughingstock of Europe) is setting record budget deficits — where are those fiscal GOP conservatives that were so active during the Obama administration? — as well as increases in the national debt.

Considering his lack of knowledge of the Constitution and laws in general, I wonder if he thinks Article II, which he mentions frequently as his source of power, gives him the power to declare the U.S. government bankrupt so he can walk out from under the debt as he has, in the past, with a number of his failed commercial enterprises.

Kermit Heid, Salt Lake City

Submit a letter to the editor

I am delighted that the “knight on horseback” sign built by Lloyd Coley in the 1950s from the old Sugar House Costume Company has been preserved. Having read The Tribune article “Sugar House sign preserves the past amid rapid redevelopment,” I am more confident that Salt Lake’s version of urban renewal will at least make efforts to preserve and protect landmarks of the past. That particular neon sign even survived a 1963 fire. Having the sign alight atop a 19-unit apartment complex, at its original location of 1700 S. 1100 East, will give the area an ambiance of pride in the past. Although originally the site of a costume company that once stood there, that old sign reminds me of my late dad, who was a member for 52 years of his life in the fraternal Masonic order, the Knights Templar, which had as its theme medieval chivalry. Too often, new developments are sterile structures. The past and present can coexist. By giving vintage signs new life, it will enhance the neighborhood, plus lighten things up, literally.

James A. Marples, Provo

Submit a letter to the editor