If you believed that planners would finally get a break from lots of new laws and requirements being imposed by the legislature, making it tough to stay up-to-date on what needs to be done to be in complete compliance with state code, well, you didn’t really believe that, did you?

Last week, the Legislative Management Committee met and, among other things, adopted the list of interim study items – that is, those things the committee assigned to each of the interim committees to study and possibly make recommendations for next year’s legislative session.

And, you guessed it, a number of planning, land use and housing items are on that list.  Here’s a brief look at that list.

Once again, housing is top of mind for the legislature.  No fewer than three different interim committees have this as one of their assigned study topics.  The Economic Development and Workforce Services Interim Committee is assigned to “identify and review existing statutory housing policies and programs. Continuation/implementation of HCR14.”  HCR14 (House Concurrent Resolution) was passed by the legislature this year, and says the legislature “supports consolidating housing policies to more efficiently and effectively address the attainable homeownership shortage, implement recommendations from the 2023 housing policy audit, reduce redundancy, and streamline government.”

Meanwhile, the Political Subdivisions Interim Committee drew the assignment to “work with cities and counties to find a better balance of zoning policies that are more conducive to the building of smaller housing and more affordable housing, while honoring the needs of individual cities to tailor growth to unique local needs.” That’s pretty broad language, leaving a lot of room for the kinds of things that could be looked at.  Also, with the Governor’s Office currently working on a State Housing Plan, the committee was charged to follow up on whatever may come out of that plan: “The Governor has been working on a statewide housing plan, which should come into better focus this interim. The committee should review those efforts and study any recommended statutory changes that would help implement the best parts of that plan.”

Even the Transportation Interim Committee is getting in on the housing bandwagon, being asked to “Study several items related to transportation planning, including: … land use including Station Area Plans, Housing and Transit Reinvestment Zones, and other density tools.”

Some other planning and land use topics assigned for study:

• Long-range transportation planning, including planning for population growth (does that mean for more than just transportation?) – Transportation committee
• How to help farmers participate in and benefit from agritourism activities, such as possible changes to the regulation of the use of farm buildings – Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment committee
• How to minimize the loss of Utah’s agricultural land (this should be interesting, as part of the argument as to why housing is so expensive is because there is less available land for new development, driving up the cost of land; so will preserving ag land exacerbate the housing affordability crisis?) – Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment committee
• Study water-related issues recommended by the Water Development Commission – Natural Resources committee
• Study Utah’s critical mineral portfolio, including minerals currently in production, defined resources, exploration projects, and potential prospects (does that include the sand and gravel pits hot topic?) – Natural Resources committee
• Study the municipal annexation statutes, annexation plans, zoning requirements of unincorporated areas pre-annexation, and the plans for zoning in those areas post-annexation, possible prohibition against applying a more restrictive zoning for at least one year after annexation, and compensation for property value reduction attributed to annexation or incorporation. (see SB322, 2025) (this is a hot topic for me as I was the lead for a working group on annexation the last couple of years. This group intended to start talking about policy changes to the annexation process, including how it could be a better growth management tool, akin to what is being done in a number of other states) – Political Subdivisions committee
• Study permitting requirements for solar power plants (this came up in a bill this past session, SB241, which had some controversies about how local land use regulation would be handled, but the bill did not pass) – Public Utilities, Energy and Technology committee
• Ongoing examination & discussion of nuclear energy development (topic of another bill this session, HB249, which did pass with wording that “electrical energy development zones” should conform to local plans – PU, Energy committee

Well, that’s plenty for the coming year, don’t you think?  And there will still be whatever comes out of the Land Use Task Force and Commission on Housing Affordability, and we didn’t even see anything specific about the “Beehive Development Authority” – whew!