SALT LAKE CITY—There were a lot of upsets in last Tuesday’s primary election. One of the most significant was the unseating of incumbent Senate President Stuart Adams who lost to Stephanie Hollist, a newcomer to the political scene. Rep. Doug Fiefia also knocked out long time legislator Sen. Dan McCay and Commissioner Bob Stevenson won over incumbent Rep. Trevor Lee. 

Adams will be out at the end of his term and that creates some changes to Senate leadership. In addition to Adams, Sen. Jerry Stevenson, who is also in a leadership position, did not seek reelection. Stevenson has been in the legislature for 14 years and served as vice chair and chair of appropriations. Sen. Ann Millner is also retiring. Both Adams and Stevenson represent Davis County and Millner’s area also includes a part of the county.

“I expect it will make some big changes,” said Rep. Ray Ward, R-Bountiful. “I think they’re kind of hard to predict. In the Senate only half of the senators are up each time. So it’s about 15 that are up at any given time because there are 29, so it’s close to 30 and then it’s only half of those each electron cycle.”

There are six senate seats that will be changing to new people, he said. “That’s a pretty big change for the Senate. The biggest change of course is having Stuart Adams not there and missing his leadership. I’m sure we’ll get along but it will be a big change and Jerry Stevenson will also not be there.”

Ward said he’s not worried about Davis County as a whole. “We can point to a bunch of good improvements that we have had under the leadership of Stuart Adams and Mike Schultz and Brad Wilson before that.”

“President Adams is going to surely be missed,” said Stevenson. “I think he’s made a real impact on state government. He has kind of taken the office of president to a little different level.”

It’s almost international, Stevenson said. “He’s worked very closely with the church and in different projects they’ve had. He’s worked with the Sterling Foundation. These are international organizations that do a lot out of Utah. I think that influence he has had will be sorely missed in the legislature.”

Stevenson said he doesn’t think the change will impact Davis County though. “We’ve got good people up there. We’ve got Sen. (Todd) Weiler and other people who will step up and fill that bill. I’m not sure turnover is always bad.”

“I think it’s going to be a little chaotic,” said Weiler. “We’re going to have six new senators in January. That’s unprecedented. So it’s hard to guess. It’s going to be different for sure.”

In Davis County Stuart has been great in so many areas, he said. “Especially transportation, the project expanding I-15 is already underway and it’s already funded. I think Stuart has huge shoes to fill in many ways.”

Weiler said he thinks both the House and the Senate are pretty good at taking a statewide approach. “It’s not like if the Senate president is from Davis County that Davis County gets everything and the other counties suffer.”

It’s not like that, he said. “I’m glad that it’s not like that because even though we’ve had our Brad Wilson and our Stuart Adams, who have both been great leaders, I do think the legislature has more of a statewide approach.”

Weiler said when he sees legislators from Utah County, for instance, kind of locking arms and basically saying all the transportation money needs to go to Utah County he’s always disappointed in that. “Of course we should be advocating for our district but we’re a statewide legislature. If every legislator was up there just trying to do that to only get money for their own county it would be a colossal failure.”

Jerry and Stuart are irreplaceable in their own ways, he said. “But I don’t think Davis County is going to suffer. Especially in the short term as a result because I think we’re set up for a very positive future for years to come.”