This is your daily news rundown for Tuesday, Jan. 20. In this edition:
- The 2026 legislative began on Tuesday and will run until early March
- Wasatch County had three snowmobile accidents in one hour on Monday
- Affordable housing is the top priority for Utah voters this legislative session
Utah leaders open the 2026 legislative session
The 2026 Utah Legislative Session kicked off on Tuesday, which means that for the next month and a half, lawmakers will be considering, debating, and voting on legislation that could affect Utahns’ everyday lives.
Senate president J. Stuart Adams opened the session with a speech that touched on topics ranging from medical research to AI to higher education.
With each topic, Adams recognized someone present at the Capitol Building who was involved in those sectors, including Brigham Young University's Academic Vice President and the co-founder of the nuclear energy company Hi Tech Solutions.
After opening remarks from Adams and Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz, lawmakers got to work introducing legislation.
Over the next 45 days, hundreds of bills will be considered and voted on. Every bill introduced this year can be found on the Utah State Legislature’s website.
Wasatch County had three snowmobile accidents in one hour
It’s not just cars on the road that get into accidents — Wasatch County Search and Rescue responded to three snowmobile accidents within an hour on Monday.
One involved a 65-year-old woman who reportedly crashed her snowmobile into a tree in the Pine Canyon drainage just above Midway.
Search and rescue were able to get the woman to the trailhead and then to the hospital via ambulance.
An hour earlier, crews responded to a snowmobile near the Timber Lakes that caught fire, which involved no injuries, and then just minutes later were called to an accident near Daniel’s Summit.
The crashes also come a day after a helicopter crashed in the Uinta Mountains in Wasatch County, leaving one person in critical condition.
Affordable housing is voters’ top priority this legislative session
One issue seems to be on voters’ minds more than any other as Utah’s legislative session begins — affordable housing.
That’s according to a new Deseret News and Hinckley Institute of Politics poll, which asked 800 Utah voters to pick one top priority for lawmakers.
Across both political and age divides, about a third of respondents chose affordable housing — more than double the next-ranked topic.
Other top issues in the survey included health care, water and Great Salt Lake, tax cuts, and preparing for threat of a recession.
Some housing-related legislation has already been introduced, including one that would create a housing division within the governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity and another that would allow individual requests to build homes on smaller lots than typically allowed.
