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SALT LAKE CITY — If you don't know what Utah's "Live On" campaign is, you haven't been paying attention.
The state's suicide prevention program has racked up over a quarter of a billion impressions through billboards, social media and TV since it was launched in 2020.
"The message is getting out," Rep. Steve Eliason, R-Sandy, said in February. "The calls to the National Suicide Prevention lifeline, the Utah Crisis Line (and) the Utah Warm Line have gone up dramatically. And, in data that will soon be unveiled, we'll see it's been making a difference, particularly in the lives of our youth, in terms of declining (suicide) numbers."
The campaign will now be featured on a new medium, as Gov. Spencer Cox signed HB13 Tuesday, setting aside a new specialty license plate that promotes Utah's "Live On" suicide prevention campaign.
The license plate will be one of two new designs that Utah car owners will likely have the option of choosing from by the end of the year. The Utah Legislature, after a few attempts, also passed a bill that creates the "Utah Dark Sky" specialty plate. That bill, however, is still on the governor's desk to be signed.
Another bill, dubbed "the bill to end all license plate bills," failed to clear the Utah Senate this year, meaning lawmakers will still weigh in on future designs for at least one more year.
HB13 is set to go into effect on Oct. 15; after that, proceeds from people who select the "Live On" license plate — $25 per plate — will go toward the campaign.
"This is a simple way for people to share the hopeful message that life's worth living; to live on and to also help create a funding source to ... a very good cause," Eliason said, when he first introduced the bill on Feb. 3.
Once signed, HB88 will do the same for dark sky preservation. Funds from the sales of that plate will go toward the Utah Division of State Parks, to "advance the Utah State Parks Dark Sky Initiative." There are nearly a dozen state parks in Utah certified as "dark sky parks" by the International Dark-Sky Association.
One bill that didn't end up on the governor's desk this year is one that would have completely changed how specialty license plate designs are approved.
HB368, which passed the House of Representatives on Feb. 22, would have set aside one new standard Utah license plate while directing colleges, charitable nonprofit organizations or state agencies looking to create a specialty plate to the Utah Department of Motor Vehicles for consideration, instead of the Utah Legislature.
The DMV would have had the power to grant plates whenever the sponsoring organization's application was approved. The bill presented the DMV with at least 500 complete preorder applications and it paid the cost for "startup fees."
It would have also set up a moratorium on any personalized plates. However, it didn't clear the Utah Senate this year.
Rep. Norm Thurston, R-Provo, said he believes he had the support from the Utah Senate but the chamber didn't get to vote on the bill before the session ended at midnight on March 4. He expects to bring the same bill back in the future but possibly earlier in a future session.
"We never speculated as to why or how or whatever but the answer is it was there, it was available and they just didn't get around to it," Thurston told KSL.com Wednesday. "This will be back next year, in a probably similar fashion because there's not a lot of refining it still needs; (if we) need to make minor changes, we will."
He still believes Utah needs to make "comprehensive changes" to the state's specialty license plate process.
That means HB13 and HB88 may be the last of their kind. Future specialty plates may go through a less intense and political process, especially if Thurston's bill does make it through next year.
"The problem with the way that we do it now is that every one of those requires legislation, so that creates a pretty high bar for an organization that wants to get it done because you've got to figure out how to get a legislator to sponsor your particular plate," he said. "The end result of it is it ends up being inefficient, it lacks transparency and it's not equally available to all the organizations that may want one."
