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SALT LAKE CITY — GOP legislative leaders are stirring up support for an override session to restore $4.5 million in funding for early education programs vetoed by Gov. Gary Herbert.
"These vetoed initiatives are proven and important," Senate Majority Whip Stuart Adams, R-Layton, said in a statement issued Friday by the Senate. "If we don't find a way to reinstate funding, the real losers will be Utah students."
House Majority Whip Francis Gibson, R-Mapleton, expressed a similar sentiment about the GOP governor's actions late Wednesday to strike about a third of the money appropriated last session for a K-3 reading and online preschool programs.
"We remain committed to these programs and working closely with members of our state board of education to ensure they have the tools necessary to enhance education for Utah's schoolchildren," Gibson said in a House statement.
Both Senate President Wayne Niederhauser, R-Sandy, and House Speaker Greg Hughes, R-Draper, said the required polling of lawmakers to determine their interest in an override session got underway Friday.
If at least two-thirds of the members of the House and Senate want to reverse any of Herbert's veto decisions, a special override session of the Legislature could be called on or before May 9.
Besides vetoing $1.5 million for the UPSTART online program and $3 million for the kindergarten through third-grade reading program, the governor also struck other budget items, including $275,000 for a teen reality TV cooking competition.
Herbert also vetoed bills dealing with grandparents' visitation rights, exempting some recyclable products from the definition of solid waste and exempting the Utah State Board of Education from some public hearing requirements.
Niederhauser said he expects to know if there's the needed support in the Senate for an override session by April 14, while Hughes said it will take until April 18 to poll members of the House.
House Minority Leader Brian King, D-Salt Lake City, said he's against an override session. King said he doesn't expect much, if any, support from Democrats for what he termed "vendor" legislation, seen as diverting education funds to private companies.
"It doesn't surprise me that some members of the House Republican leadership team want to go after the governor on these vendor bills," King said. "But the governor has the better end of the argument on these vendor bills."
Herbert questioned the effectiveness of the software used in the reading program and possible duplication of services with the online preschool program. His office has stressed he continues to support early childhood education programs.
Adams said that the online preschool program already "has been expanded several times with this governor's approval, to meet skyrocketing demand" and has a high rate of parent satisfaction.
Veto override sessions are rare. In 2011, lawmakers overrode Herbert's vetoes of bills earmarking 30 percent of future additional sales tax revenues for roads, and ending the state's four-day work week.
But two years later, they failed to muster enough support to overturn the governor's veto of a controversial "constitutional carry" gun bill that would have allowed concealed weapons to be carried without any permit.
