SALT LAKE CITY — A panel approved a bill that would let people carry guns on buses and trains and a committee unanimously approved a bill that would let 12-year-olds apply for certain hunting permits. Here's what happened during Utah's legislative session on Thursday.

Bill would lower age to apply for certain hunting permits

Utah lawmakers considered HB84 Thursday that would allow 12-year-olds to apply for specialty hunting permits.

Rep. Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, told the House Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment Committee that in surrounding states, children as young as 10 can apply for limited-entry and once-in-a-lifetime permits and start earning bonus points.

Currently, Utah law allows kids to apply for those special permits and begin accruing bonus points at age 14.

The bill received a unanimous recommendation from the committee.

Bill would allow disabled veterans free access to state parks

Disabled veterans may soon be granted free access to Utah State Parks.

HB135 specifies that an honorably discharged veteran who is at least 50 percent disabled would receive a free day-use pass to state parks.

"It's really nothing more than an attempt to say thank you for the service that our veterans have given us," Rep. Lynn Hemingway, D-Millcreek, told the House Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment Committee on Thursday.

The received unanimous support from the committee.

Panel OKs bill removing ban on carrying weapons on buses, trains

A state lawmaker says peacefully carrying a concealed weapon on a bus or train should be no different than carrying a gun or knife on the street.

A Utah hijacking law makes it felony to conceal a dangerous weapon, which Rep. Norm Thurston, R-Provo, said could be a pocketknife or a baseball bat in a gym bag, on a bus or train.

"If somebody's getting on the bus with a dangerous weapon with intent of hijacking the bus, the least of our worries is that they actually brought a weapon with them," Thurston told the House Transportation Committee on Thursday.

HB67 eliminates the prohibition of carrying a gun on a bus with no criminal intent.

The committee passed the bill to the House floor on a 9-1 vote.

Social service advocates call for lawmakers to 'end the earmarks'

A coalition of social service organizations held a news conference Thursday at the Capitol to protest the more than $500 million in earmarks in the state budget.

The group of about a dozen social service groups said in a statement that earmarks "meet newly identified needs, primarily in the area of transportation, rather than identifying a new revenue source to finance those needs."

According to the coalition, that takes away money from human services within the state and has a "detrimental impact on the state's ability to meet its obligations and help those in greatest need."

Without those earmarks, there would be more funding for recovery programs, the social service advocates said. Spending more on recovery, they said, would decrease state incarceration costs by keeping people out of jail.

Yesterday's roundup:

Extended-day kindergarten, $30M to classrooms get early approval

Lawmakers gave early approval to extended-day kindergarten, a bill to divert sales tax to water development advances and lawmakers are considering using postal workers to help in disasters. Here's a roundup of what's happening on the hill.

State senator wants to revamp Utah hate crimes law

A state senator introduced a bill Thursday to include sexual orientation, sexual identity and other categories of people in Utah's hate crimes law.

Current law doesn't identify specific groups, and prosecutors rarely use it.

Republican Sen. Steve Urquhart's bill, SB107, would more clearly define a hate crime as an offense against a person or person's property based on a belief or perception about their ancestry, disability, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, national origin, race, religion or sexual orientation. It also provides for enhanced penalties for someone convicted of a hate crime.

Urquhart of St. George, last year co-sponsored Utah's law that protects religious rights and bans discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in the workplace and housing.

Troy Williams, Equality Utah executive director, said the hate crimes law on the books isn't working.

"It's a toothless tiger," he said. "The words hate, bias and prejudice don't actually appear in the statute, so who are we protecting?"

$14 million price tag for public lands lawsuit gives governor pause

Gov. Gary Herbert said Thursday he's still reviewing whether he supports going forward with a proposed lawsuit against the federal government over its control of public lands, given the high price tag.

"I think the thing that gives us all pause is the cost," the governor told reporters during his first media availability of the 2016 Legislature. "You kind of have to handicap (it). We're going to spend $14 million and our chances of success are what?"

At the same time, members of the House GOP caucus were listening to legal arguments for Utah asserting control over public lands made by attorneys brought together by the Legislature's Commission for Stewardship of Public Lands.

House Speaker Greg Hughes, R-Draper, told the caucus it's time for the state to make a decision.

"I think we're coming together, finally, in a way we can accelerate the pace in terms of this argument," he said. "Frankly, if we're not going to do it, if we're not going to move the needle on this, we've got to quit talking. We've got to do something."

No position was taken by the caucus, but no one spoke against legal action. Members of the Republican-controlled commission voted in December to pursue a lawsuit after hearing that recommendation from the team of lawyers they'd hired.

Contributing: Emily Larson, Dennis Romboy, Lisa Riley Roche

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