State Senator Buttars Backs Closed Police Records Bill, Sticks Foot in Mouth

By Christian Probasco, 2-17-08

West Jordan Republican State Senator Chris Buttars has been all over the local and national news for a supposedly racial remark he recently made in the senate and a controversial bill he introduced restricting public access to the disciplinary records of Salt Lake City police officers.  According to Provo’s Daily Herald, the motivation behind the bill was:

…one man’s requests to police departments across the Salt Lake Valley for disciplinary records of every officer on staff. Police chiefs believe he is trying to set up a database and charge defense attorneys for information.

The Salt Lake County police department already has such a provision on the books. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, the bill has the support of Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker.

The bill’s passage might be hampered by an apparent gaff Buttars made on the Senate floor on February 8th.  Responding to another senator who had referred to bill SB48 as an “ugly baby bill,” Buttars noted, “This baby is black.  It is a dark, ugly thing.”

After a break, Buttars returned to the floor to explain, “I made a comment that a lot of people could take racist. I didn’t mean it that way.”

It’s easy to see how the senator could indeed have made the comments without any racist intent.  But in his two terms of office, Buttars has made a lot of enemies who were not going to let the issue pass. Salt Lake branch NAACP president Jeanetta Williams asked for his resignation. Rebecca Walsh of the Salt Lake Tribune canvassed Jordan to find somebody who had actually voted for him. Paul Rolly, also of the Tribune, lambasted another of Buttars’ Senate bills that would invalidate Mayor Ralph Becker’s domestic partner registry.  As Rolly put it, “Buttars has said he fears a ‘homosexual agenda’ and will stamp out any effort that he believes would be a step toward equal rights for that class of people.”

In the past, Buttars has introduced legislation to outlaw gay and gay-straight alliance clubs in Utah’s schools. In 2006, Buttars sponsored an unsuccessful bill that would have required the teaching of intelligent design in Utah’s classrooms.