Happy New Year!

Greetings and Happy New Year! 2018 was a wild ride for our family, what with my running to serve in the Utah Legislature. June saw lively and competitive primary elections all over Utah, but right here in House District 24, we experienced the state's first ever (and to date, the only) 4-person primary. There was a little bit of criticism about our state's evolving primary process, most notably because with that large of a field, no one received a majority of the vote. Instead, the primary was won with a plurality, in this case with a winning tally of just over 35 percent. Some called for a run-off election, which would have been costly for Salt Lake County, costly for candidates (possibly putting the ultimate winner at more of a disadvantage going into the General Election), and exhausting for voters. I don't claim that the process is perfect. It may be a little unsettling when one can credibly claim that our district is being represented by an individual for whom a majority of voters did not vote, but I do believe that it is a necessary compromise in order to ensure that more people have access to ballot via the signature-gathering process.

In the end, after the 2018 General Election in House District 24, with record voter turnout (18,275 total voters), a candidate was selected with a strong majority of voters. The shortcomings of a primary-election plurality have been mitigated. And further, voters in our district came out in droves to support a new state senate candidate, incredible Democratic candidates for Congressional District 2 and the US Senate, and - very importantly - three groundbreaking ballot initiatives (I'll save a future post for the activity that has since occurred regarding Proposition 2, our state's Medical Cannabis law).

In preparing for the 2019 General Session, having been given the incredible honor of serving on behalf of Utah's House District 24, I am working to make sure that the constituents I serve have ready access to information about important work occurring in our state, and to finding ways to ensure everyone gets information in meaningful ways which are conducive to how each prefers to get that info. I will always strive to be very accessible to my community, to be transparent, hard-working and sincere. To that end, I'll post regularly on this blog, post in social media, and schedule regular public meetings at a variety of locations inside our district.

And please don't hesitate to reach out to me! My legislative email, available on January 1, will be jdprovost@le.utah.gov (be sure to identify yourself as a constituent in the subject line - those are the emails that I'll read first). To track the bills that I'll be sponsoring this year, you can visit www.le.utah.gov.

Happy 2019! Thank you for the opportunity to serve!