Utah's Budget
✱ And How I'd Change It ✱
This tool has been designed to help you follow how Utah brings in and spends money. Here I present the actual 2026 budget, then my plan implemented over the next 6 years. It is fully paid for by cuts to corporate welfare, programs that unfairly benefit the wealthy, and administrative inefficiencies, with no tax rate increases.
This is ALL the money Utah spends: state funds, federal grants, dedicated credits, and other pass-throughs combined. The Legislature only directly controls about $11.8B of it; the rest comes with strings attached from Washington or is earmarked by law.
Dedicated credits are money that state agencies earn by providing specific services or goods. Instead of going into the general state fund, this money is "dedicated" back to that agency to fund their specific operations.
This is the money the Legislature has the most control over. Money from taxes and other revenue are held in bank accounts or "funds." Income tax is constitutionally earmarked for education and is split into the Uniform School Fund (which generally goes to K-12 schools) and the Income Tax Fund (higher ed, special ed, disability services, etc.). The General Fund pays for pretty much everything else. Federal funds, dedicated credits, and other pass-throughs are separate from state fund appropriations.
State fund appropriations
Select a year and watch how my plan would change the flow of money. anything to see details.
NOTES: "yoy" means year over year. Discretionary state funds only. Federal funds, the transportation fund, federal mineral leasing, dedicated credits, and other sources are not shown. This chart is simplified; minor cross-flows between funds have been grouped with "other" categories for clarity. Totals may not sum due to rounding. Estimated growth in revenue comes from the state budget and general economic projections.
My plan does not include any tax increases.
The savings account: one-time investments
Utah holds $1.6 billion in reserves across five accounts. We keep about 25% banked as an emergency floor. The rest, combined with $125M from a cancelled prison expansion, $1.7B freed by cancelling the I-15 lane expansion, and $130M in agency efficiency savings, gets deployed once into lasting assets: the Great Salt Lake, K-12 School Upgrades, my Small Developer Program, and Public Transit.
LEGAL HURDLES: Deploying 75% of all reserves toward the Great Salt Lake and housing faces serious constitutional constraints. The General Fund Reserve, Medicaid Reserve, and Disaster Recovery Fund ($509M combined) can be redirected with a Legislative supermajority. But the Income Tax Fund Budget Reserve ($904M) and the Public Education Stabilization Account ($441M) are constitutionally dedicated to education, and that's a good thing. Spending them on environmental or housing programs would require passing a statewide constitutional amendment, which would need voter approval. Maybe it's best those funds stay dedicated to education, but we should try our best to balance all the many crises we are facing. One alternative pathway is issuing revenue bonds backed by future growth to finance the Great Salt Lake investment, bypassing the constitutional restriction entirely. The K-12 one-time investment (infrastructure, technology, deferred maintenance) is a necessary and clean use of the constitutionally protected education reserves, no amendment needed.
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