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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- A former state employee has lost an appeal on a whistleblower lawsuit filed against two state legislators who crafted a budget cut that eliminated his position.
Ron Ivie, formerly a Utah Health Department sanitation and safety manager, claimed St. George Republicans Sen. Bill Hickman and Rep. Stephen Urquhart unfairly cut his position.
Hickman engineered a budget cut eliminating Ivie's job after Ivie enforced swimming pool water quality rules at a St. George condominium complex.
Hickman said he thought the rules were intrusive.
The Utah Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's dismissal of the suit in a ruling Thursday, determining that Ivie could not claim protection under Utah whistleblower laws because his employer was the Health Department, not individual legislators.
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
