Salt Lake City International Airport has got the punctuality thing down, it seems.

It is one of only six U.S. airports — and the busiest among them — to earn a top five-star rating for on-time performance over the past year.

The airport saw 86.5 percent of its departures and arrivals occur within 15 minutes of scheduled times, according to the flight-information company OAG for the period of June 2017 to May 2018. The data include cancelled flights.

OAG issues five-star ratings to the top 10 percent of global airports that have at least 600 takeoffs and/or landings a month. They had to score higher than 85.1 percent this year to receive that rating.

Three airports in the weather paradise of Hawaii won five-star ratings: Hilo, 91.4 percent; Lihue, 89.3 percent; and Honolulu, 87.9 percent.

Besides Salt Lake City, two other mainland airports earned five stars: Grand Junction, Colo., 87.1 percent, and Boise, Idaho, 85.5 percent.

Salt Lake City is the busiest airport among five-star U.S. airports, handling 243,683 operations — takeoffs and landings — a year. Honolulu was second with 156,650.

Nancy Volmer, spokeswoman for the airport, said among reasons for its high on-time ranking is “we have an award-winning snow-removal crew. We’ve been recognized nationally by the American Association of Airport Executives for excellence in performance for snow and ice control.”

She said all employees deserve some credit — from those who work for the airport to airlines, ground transportation crews, the Federal Aviation Administration and the Transportation Security Administration.

“It comes down to the people who work out here, who make sure passengers can get to their gates, on the plane and in the air on time. We all work together very well,” she said.

Salt Lake City International is the 25^th busiest airport in North America and 85^th busiest in the world. More than 330 flights depart there daily to 95 nonstop destinations. It is currently undergoing a $3.6 billion reconstruction project, with the first phase scheduled for completion in 2020.

OAG said 44 U.S. airports also earned four-star ratings, “which is quite impressive when compared to the performance of their global peers,” said John Grant, senior analyst with OAG.

Among the big airports in the four-star group were Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International, 83.1 percent; Houston George Bush Intercontinental, 83 percent; Denver International, 82.7 percent; and Washington Dulles International, 82.1 percent.

OAG also issues ratings for airlines. Hawaii Airlines, with 87.4 percent on-time performance, was the only U.S. carrier awarded five stars.

U.S. carriers that won four stars were Alaska Airlines, 84.1 percent; Delta Air Lines, 83.8 percent; and United Airlines, 80.7 percent.

Utah County Sheriff Jim Tracy says he’ll leave office at the end of the month in protest over what he says is a budget shortfall of up to $1 million and plans to release up to 128 inmates and possibly eliminate 20 employee positions.

He said the decision to quit effective Aug. 1 came from a dispute with the commission over how to plug a budget gap he says was created by the high health-care costs of one of the jail’s inmates.

Tracy surprised the County Commission when he took the microphone during public comment at the end of Tuesday’s meeting and announced his resignation. He was set to retire at the end of his fourth term in January.

“I will also take that effort to close two pods in the jail and work out a system that is currently under review to eliminate 128 beds and release those individuals into the community,” Tracy said.

In a phone call later, Tracy declined to elaborate on the issue and said he’d put out a written statement.

”I expressed my concerns privately to the commission on what my reasoning is behind stepping down and resigning,” Tracy said. “It’s counterproductive to get into a bunch of verbal arguments over something that is not going to be an easy or a quick fix.”

The two commissioners present at the meeting were surprised because they say the sheriff’s office has plenty of money in its medical account to get by until the commission can reopen the budget and cover any remaining bills.

They also said the county has enough money to keep the jail fully open — without releasing any inmates — and to avoid staff cuts.

Yet they acknowledge there’s an issue with an inmate’s skyrocketing medical costs.

“We have one inmate who shouldn’t even be in this country because of a previous conviction who has currently cost us over $500,000 in medical expenses,” Commissioner Nathan Ivie said in an interview Tuesday afternoon.

Ivie said the inmate’s medical bills had been at about $800,000 but the county was able to negotiate to bring the cost down. The inmate is still in custody and receiving treatment, Ivie said, and costs will continue to climb.

“We’re looking to the federal government and federal delegation to step up,” Ivie said. “It’s their responsibility to enforce these laws. It’s their failure to act that’s created this situation.”

Tracy said he’d been raising the issue with the commission for two months but hadn’t heard back. He said he took that as a vote of “no confidence” in his ability to lead the department he’s overseen since 2003.

Ivie and Commissioner Bill Lee said the concerns haven’t been ignored. Lee said he talked to members of Utah’s congressional delegation and brought up the issue with White House staff during a visit late last month.

“It was my No. 1 issue. I talked about it in the meeting,” Lee said. “Yet I’m being called out as not” listening.

Lee said he spoke to Tracy later on Tuesday and the sheriff told him the job has “just taken too much toll on his health, so it’s better for him to step down.”

If the sheriff defies the commissioners and moves to shutter a part of the jail before resigning, he said he’d look at “longevity of inmate service” and “severity of crime” before choosing which inmates to release.

Baltimore • A man charged with slaying five people at a Maryland newspaper sent three letters on the day of the attack, police said, including one that said he was on his way to the Capital Gazette newsroom with the aim “of killing every person present.”

Sgt. Jacklyn Davis, a spokeswoman for Anne Arundel County police, said the letters were received Monday. They were mailed to an attorney for The Capital newspaper, a retired judge of the Maryland Court of Special Appeals and a Baltimore judge.

The letter Ramos sent to the Annapolis newspaper’s Baltimore-based lawyer was written to resemble a legal motion for reconsideration of his unsuccessful 2012 defamation lawsuit against the paper, a columnist and then-publisher Tom Marquardt.

Marquardt shared a copy of the letter with The Associated Press.

“If this is how the Maryland Judiciary operates, the law now means nothing,” Ramos wrote. He quoted a description of the purpose of a defamation suit, saying it was intended for a defamed person to “resort to the courts for relief instead of wreaking his own vengeance.”

”‘That’ is how your judiciary operates, you were too cowardly to confront those lies, and this is your receipt,” Ramos wrote.

He signed it under the chilling statement: “I told you so.” Below that, he wrote that he was going to the newspaper’s office “with the objective of killing every person present.”

In a letter attached to what appeared to be the faux court filing, he also directly addressed retired special appeals court Judge Charles Moylan, who decided against Ramos in his defamation case. Ramos sued the paper after pleading guilty to harassing a high school classmate.

“Welcome, Mr. Moylan, to your unexpected legacy: YOU should have died,” he wrote. He signed it: “Friends forever, Jarrod W. Ramos.”

Douglas Colbert, a University of Maryland law professor, described the letters as “very powerful” evidence of intent that the state will make full use of at trial. Colbert said as long as it’s established in court that Ramos authored the letters, they will be used to show his “planning and deliberate actions” on the day of the attack.

The apparent admissions by the defendant will weaken a defense lawyer’s strategy of suggesting that he was “suffering from a mental disease or defect” that would impair his ability to understand the consequences of his actions, Colbert said.

Ramos, 38, has a well-documented history of harassing the paper’s journalists. The defamation suit was thrown out as groundless, and he often railed against current and former Capital staff in profanity-laced tweets. Police found him hiding under a desk after Thursday’s attack and jailed him on five counts of first-degree murder.

At a memorial service Monday night for one of those killed, editor Rob Hiassen, Marquardt said he once slept with a baseball bat by his bed because he was so worried about Ramos. He also said that they “stepped up security” at the newspaper years ago, and posted Ramos’s photo around the office. “But then he went dormant for about two years and we thought the problem has been solved. Apparently, it was just building up steam,” he said.

The mourning in Annapolis continued Tuesday, marked by a lowering of U.S. flags to honor the victims. President Donald Trump ordered flags flown at half-staff on federal property through sunset.

Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley said Monday that Trump, who has repeatedly called journalists the “enemy of the people,” said he had been told his request to lower the flags had been denied. The White House said Tuesday that Trump ordered the flags lowered as soon as he learned of the mayor’s request.

Buckley expressed frustration Monday afternoon when he was told by a Maryland congressman’s office the request had not been granted. He said he considered lowering flags on his own, but decided to follow protocol. He said he received a call from White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders just after 11 p.m. Monday, asking him for confirmation if he personally was making the request.

“She was very sympathetic,” Buckley said in an interview. “She felt for our community. She said ‘I’ll get back to you in the morning,’ and she called me 7:16 this morning to say the president had issued a proclamation, and we’re very grateful for that.”

Hiaasen was remembered Monday evening in stories, poems, prayers and songs at the “celebration of life” ceremony Monday evening. He was fatally shot last week at the Capital Gazette along with colleagues Gerald Fischman, John McNamara, Rebecca Smith and Wendi Winters.

___

This story has been corrected by replacing a paraphrase with the verbatim quote from the letter.

___

Associated Press writer Brian Witte in Annapolis, Maryland, contributed to this report.

President Trump wants more tax cuts. And for once, I agree with him!

Sort of.

In a Fox News interview that aired Sunday morning, Trump touted his one and only major legislative achievement — his deficit-funded $1.9 trillion tax cut — and expressed great enthusiasm for slashing taxes further.

“We’re doing a phase two,” he said. “We’ll be doing it probably in October, maybe a little sooner than that.”

He was vague about what “phase two” would contain, beyond shaving off another percentage point from the corporate rate. Without explaining how, Trump declared that “the rest” of his tax cuts “would go right to the middle class.”

This happens to be exactly how he described “phase one,” despite the fact that most of its benefits befell the richest households.

In any case, calling for another round of tax cuts may seem a bit puzzling.

Trump’s “phase one,” after all, has been a huge dud among voters. Its approval rating has been stuck around 36 percent since April, according to a rolling average of polls aggregated by RealClearPolitics.

Even fewer Americans — 20 percent — believe that they personally benefited from the tax cut, according to the most recent YouGov data. This is despite the fact that most Americans will indeed get at least some reduction in their taxes in 2018. What happens after 2025, however, when nearly all the individual provisions sunset, is a different story; extending these provisions may be what Trump now has in mind, given other comments by House Republicans.

Republicans love to blame the “Fake News” media for supposedly brainwashing Americans into believing their taxes haven’t fallen. But the real issue is the typical household’s tax cut is too modest to be noticed — especially since it’s being doled out in dribs and drabs over the course of the year through lower paycheck withholding.

The average household’s federal income tax withholding is currently about $50 per month lower than it was in the last quarter of 2017, as Evercore ISI’s policy economist Ernie Tedeschi pointed out. That $50 gets overwhelmed by the many other variables that affect take-home pay month to month.

The fact that most Americans overlooked their slightly higher paychecks shouldn’t be surprising. Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama both dramatically slashed taxes, too, in plans that were much more generous to the middle class than Trump’s was. Yet when Americans were surveyed after the Bush and Obama cuts passed, almost nobody realized their taxes had fallen then, either.

Recognizing their one and only major legislative achievement is politically useless, today’s GOP has pulled ads about the law. Even Trump can’t stay on message. At events billed as celebrating the tax law, Trump has declared the topic “boring” and moved on to sexier issues such as illegal immigration.

Despite all this, there’s one set of taxes Trump would be wise to start slashing, at least if he really wants to help the middle class: all those idiotic new taxes he himself imposed in the last six months.

By which I mean his tariffs on steel, aluminum, washing machines, solar panels, semiconductors, plastics and about 1,000 other intermediate, capital equipment and consumer goods.

Yes, Mr. President. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but tariffs are taxes!

Regardless of who pays them statutorily, the costs of tariffs are passed down the supply chain, with middle-class consumers ultimately footing at least part of the bill. So when Trump threatens a 25 percent import tax on autos and auto parts for dubious “national security” reasons, that’s going to raise the price of cars that American consumers purchase by thousands of dollars. The costs of an all-out trade war would more than offset whatever benefits Americans might get from Trump’s income-tax cuts.

Curiously, this fact seems to have escaped Trump’s notice. In one breath he might celebrate his (imagined) role as the biggest tax cutter of all time; in the next, he’ll tout the $250 billion of new taxes he plans to levy on Chinese goods. Which will be largely borne by U.S. businesses and households.

Instead of doubling back on his misbegotten import taxes, Trump wants Congress to give him even more power to raise import duties, as laid out in a leaked draft of his “United States Fair and Reciprocal Tariff Act.”

Yes, you read that right. The White House is proposing legislation that literally abbreviates to the “U.S. FART Act.” The bill would effectively allow Trump to hike U.S. tariffs whenever he likes, including without congressional consent and in defiance of World Trade Organization rules.

I wonder who came up with that stinker.

Catherine Rampell’s email address is crampell@washpost.com. Follow her on Twitter, @crampell.

On this week’s episode of “Trib Talk,” Tribune reporter Benjamin Wood chats with Austin Cox, campaign manager for Our Schools Now, about November’s non-binding public vote on a 10-cent gas tax increase to support Utah’s public education system.

A lightly-edited transcription of their conversation is included below.

Benjamin Wood: Last summer, a group of Utah business and education community leaders formally launched the Our Schools Now initiative, a campaign to enact $700 million in tax increases for education through a public vote.

Over the last year, things have changed. Negotiations with lawmakers led to a compromise in which Our Schools Now agreed to halt its initiative in exchange for property tax changes that will net some $200 million for public education, and a non-binding ballot question in November asking Utahns to support a future 10-cent gas-tax increase that will indirectly support schools.

Recent polling by The Tribune shows majority opposition to the gas-tax hike. And last week, Gov. Gary Herbert softened his support, suggesting new sources of sales tax revenue could provide the extra funds for schools.

But Utah schools are still among the lowest-funded in the nation, with some of the country’s largest class sizes and least-paid teachers, who have watched the promise of Our Schools Now fade from $700 million, to $300 million and now, perhaps, to just $200 million.

From The Salt Lake Tribune, this is Trib Talk

I’m Benjamin Wood, joined today by Austin Cox, campaign manager for Our Schools Now.

Austin, I want to start by first stating that the numbers we’re going to be throwing around are ballpark, rough estimates. But also I was hoping you could break us down what the Our Schools Now initiative is in its current form.

Austin Cox: Sure, thanks Ben. I appreciate the time that we’ve got this morning. As you know, we gathered a whole lot of signatures prior to the legislative session. In total, we collected 165,000 signatures for our ballot initiative, which was going to put on the ballot a sales and income tax proposal for Utahns to consider.

We went through the legislative session and were prepared to move forward, still hoping for a legislative compromise, but weren’t sure that it was going to happen and in the last 10, or seven days or so, it materialized where we were approached to maybe consider changing our proposal to a gas-tax proposal.

As you know, over the last several decades, the Transportation Fund hasn’t been keeping up with the transportation needs. And so they’ve been dipping into the General Fund, which reduces the amount of funding available to public education. By increasing the gas tax, a small 10-cent gas tax increase, that funding would go to transportation, freeing up or making more available funds for education.

So Our Schools Now is now supportive of that. The Legislature asked us to support that, the governor asked us to support that. They want it to succeed so we’re out there preparing a campaign for this fall for what I think will be called ballot question number one. We’re still waiting for confirmation from the Lieutenant Governor’s Office, but we’re supporting ballot question one, which will be a 10-cent gas tax proposal to increase education funding by $150 per student. In the grand scale of our compromise that we reached, it is part of an $850-per-student increase.

Wood: And all told that lumps together to be 300-something million, correct?

Cox: In new revenue, it’s about $350 [million], just close to $400 million in new revenue. The Legislature, as kind of the third part of this, has said that they will continue to fund growth in new student enrollment and inflation in the coming years as well. This was kind of a five-year agreement, for the next five years we’re going to work as close together as we can to increase funding for education. And the Legislature said, as part of this, we’re not just saying that this new revenue is sufficient and we’re done funding education.

They’ll continue to do what they’ve been doing the last several years to make sure we don’t increase momentarily and then just drop back down to where we were. They’ll continue to build on this increase if the voters approve it later this year.

Wood: I wanted to follow up, you mentioned the negotiations with lawmakers. And like you said, Our Schools Now went into the session in a much different form than what came out of the session.

Cox: You called it. I remember reading your chat, you gave it a 50-50 shot.

Wood: I did.

Cox: I remember. I was like “I don’t think that’s going to happen.” But sure enough, you knew more than I did.

Wood: Well, I got lucky on that one. And obviously a lot of that was in meetings that I was not privy to. What can you tell us about the decision to pivot from income and sales tax to this property and gas tax compromise?

Want to know what Lawmakers and @ourschoolsnow have cooked up for a compromise? We've got the details. via @sltrib #uted #utpol https://t.co/WKlZfhujFc pic.twitter.com/6HMT3B5fyo

— Benjamin Wood (@BjaminWood) March 6, 2018

Cox: Our position was we wanted to work with the Legislature. When we set out, eight years ago, to try to make education funding more of a priority in the state’s policies and politics, we were never doing it to oppose the Legislature or make the Legislature or legislators look bad in this. We wanted to work with them, we wanted to find a solution. We weren’t necessarily set on one tax or the other tax. You can make the case that all of our taxes — the property, the sales, the income — they’ve all decreased over the last 20 years, which is why we’re at this tipping point or this crisis in education funding. You look at The Utah Foundation where they found the tax policy changes over the last 20 years are now resulting in $1.2 billion less for K-12 schools each and every year.

A lot of taxes over the last 20 years have been reduced and now we need to find ways that we can invest in public education. The Legislature believes that an income-tax increase would kill our economy. We have a 5 percent — or a 4.95 percent — rate now, and our economy is beating a lot of states that have a zero percent income tax rate. So our economy is doing fine with a marginal income tax. We felt as business leaders — Gail Miller, Scott Anderson, the Salt Lake Chamber, a lot of the top-notch business leaders in our state — that increasing it marginally to 5.5 or 5.8 percent wouldn’t have killed our economy, but would have made it even better because we’re investing in education and creating a workforce that will succeed.

But we weren’t necessarily dead-set on that. We just wanted increased funding for education and that’s when they approached us with the gas tax. They understand they have not funded local roads, which would get some additional funding through this as well. They understand that they haven’t been funding education to some degree that their constituents would like. And they also realize that they’ve been kind of using this pot of money to fund that fund and this pot of money to fund that fund, so it’s really a win-win-win as the governor is calling it.

Wood: Let’s talk a little about the polling, which is part of why we’re here today. In the original version of Our Schools Now, The Tribune ran a few polls that showed a slim, but consistent, majority support. Since it has pivoted to the gas-tax question we saw a majority opposition.

Now the armchair statisticians will tell you that is bad news. That if you’re asking people to raise their own taxes you need to be starting from a strong position. There are people saying this initiative is dead, we saw the governor softening his support but not saying he’s opposed. I’m curious what makes you optimistic that this can still happen between now and November.

Cox: And hopefully we can talk about the governor, because there are discussions there as well.

Wood: Absolutely, we’ll circle back.

Cox: We’re feeling really optimistic. I don’t want to look at necessarily just one poll as we’re looking at this. First of all, we’ve been polling for eight or 10 years on this issue and Utahns continually say that they want to pay more for education. We’ve done polling since the legislative session ended on this specific gas tax and a lot of entities out there, a lot of publications, have done some polling and shows that we still maintain that majority support.

We have internal polling that shows Utahns are still willing to pay more this November if they know that it’s going to their local school, if it’s going toward teacher salaries, if it’s local control, things like that, which are all part of our plan. So we remain confident. Keep in mind that our campaign hasn’t even started yet. A lot of people still aren’t sure what happened during the legislative session.

Wood: Let me interrupt you then. When is the start? We’re in summer, we’re past the primary [election]. Isn’t now kind of the time to get that going?

Cox: I think we’re targeting more of a back-to-school [launch], when kids go back to school and parents start tuning in again and kids are in school and teachers spending four or five hundred dollars out of their pocket.

Wood: And education is on people’s minds.

Cox: Education is on people’s minds. And teacher turnover. We’ve talked to some principals and they’re turning over about half of their schools, half of their faculty, each year. I know that doesn’t shock you, you’re very well informed about that. So we have a lot of messaging and a lot of information that we need to get out there because people don’t understand that transportation has been taking from education and how a gas tax, necessarily, will relate to increased funding at the local level for teachers and students.

Once we have the resources and are focused on getting that message out there, then you’ll see a campaign that is in full swing.

Wood: Now we should state that the ballot question is nonbinding, so Utahns will be voicing their support or opposition for a gas-tax increase which lawmakers will then come back and consider next year.

So let’s talk about the governor’s comments. If I’m understanding the governor correctly, what he said was “vote for the tax increase, show that support, but when the lawmakers get together in session we may not have to do it because we may have other revenue that can fill that hole.”

Gov. Gary Herbert says a proposed 10-cent-a-gallon increase in Utah gasoline taxes — which polls show is unpopular — might not actually be neededhttps://t.co/nt3nniONPf

— The Salt Lake Tribune (@sltrib) June 29, 2018

Is that how you took his comments to mean? Or what did you take from the governor’s comments last week?

Cox: From a policy perspective, I can appreciate where he wants to continue having discussions and thinking about other ways to approach this. I think it’s going to be a quick discussion though, because to my understanding a lot of the, at least some and maybe a majority, of that online sales tax that’s being collected is already doing so voluntarily. So that funding is already in the state’s budget and is already being spent.

The Legislature, to my knowledge as well, also passed a bill this last legislative session, that dedicates most of that new funding if it becomes available through the recent Supreme Court decision to some sort of tax credit for manufacturing companies. So from what we’re understanding is there’s not a lot of new revenue that’s going to be available to invest in education as a result of this new online sales tax. Also keep in mind, we’re not even sure how much money is out there right? There’s not a lot of firm estimates that are there.

So we’re moving forward, full steam ahead. The governor still supports us. We’re still standing behind the agreement. We withdrew our signatures and that obviously took a lot of good faith effort on our part to remove those signatures. We still remain behind this gas tax and the Legislature wants it to pass, the governor wants it to pass. It will do a lot of good, not only for our students and our schools and our teachers, but also for local government and their local road funding. It’s much cheaper to invest in roads now, proactively, than it is to repair and replace them for much more expensive and costly ways down the road.

It also fixes some of the budget gimmicks that have been going on over the years, so we still believe that we have the governor’s full support and that he’ll be campaigning with us and for us this fall. I think at this point there’s just too many uncertainties regarding online sales tax to pivot a different direction. We’ve been open to changing our plan and we’ve done that three or for times over this, to try and solve this problem. But we don’t think moving to online sales from this gas-tax compromise is the right way to do it.

Wood: The governor is perhaps saying “vote for the gas tax and maybe we won’t need it.” The opposite, however, seems like a much harder lift. If Utahns vote against this gas-tax increase, I have a hard time seeing the Legislature coming back and doing it anyway. If this doesn’t succeed in November, where does that leave this compromise that was enacted with Our Schools Now?

Cox: We fully believe that we’re going to be successful this fall.

Wood: I love the optimism. Let me ask the question differently then. During the session, half of this was enacted. The property tax elements, there was a special budget created to take this money from the gas tax and give it to schools. We’ve already seen school districts adjusting to that with some of these one-time stipends and some of these appropriation things they’re doing with their salaries.

Just realistically there have been laws enacted in anticipation of this gas-tax increase. I know that you’re fully optimistic and you expect it to pass, but I just want to talk about it policywise. Where does that leave our education budget if that revenue doesn’t come in the way that you thought it was in March.

Cox: I think we would look at other polling that would show that Utahns still believe education is the number-one issue and education still needs to be invested in. There was a recent poll that said 80 percent of Utahns believe our teachers are underfunded and teacher salaries need to be increased.

If Utahns don’t support, necessarily, this gas tax proposal on the ballot this fall, I think we would still work with the Legislature and the governor to find other ways to increase education funding. I think we’re all in this together at this point and we all believe, from a policy and political perspective that this is the right way to do it and we’ll see if the public gets there as well. If the public doesn’t get there, our schools still need to be invested in and our teachers still need resources. Our students still need opportunities to learn and receive a high-quality, world-class education.

The need will still be there. And at that point we’ll go back to the Legislature, lawmakers and the governor to see if there are other ways out there that we can solve this problem. But we really believe that if we’re going to do it soon and going to do it right, it involves this 10-cent gas tax.

Wood: I spent many years as an education reporter. I’ve just now started to pivot away from that. And I’ve heard a million times, as I’m sure you have also, that more money doesn’t necessarily mean better education.

At the same time we know there is a correlation. If we gave our schools no funding at all, then students would be sitting on the ground in an empty field without a teacher and no textbooks. It wouldn’t work. Conversely, if we gave a million dollars per student we’d have individual tutors and cutting-edge technology, so there is some sort of a correlation that I think most people can agree on.

The middle area, where we’re at kind of right now, is where it gets harder to draw those clear-cut lines. Fundamentally Our Schools Now is saying “more money will improve schools” and there are many people in Utah that disagree with that basic premise. How do you convince them that what Our Schools Now is asking for would make a difference?

Cox: I think when people make that argument or try to approach that premise, they’re doing it on a national level and looking at national data. This is a Utah issue, so let’s look at Utah data and Utah-specific examples.

There are countless examples here in our state where some additional funding, whether it be through a private donation or a pilot program or a federal grant, where the local district and the local teachers have utilized that and maximized that investment to help their students learn.

Let’s take here in Salt Lake City School District, there is a teacher-mentoring program that I know you’re very familiar with. The Legislature funded it for a couple of years, it worked, there were great improvements in [increasing] teacher success, finding the good teachers, finding the teachers that needed improvement, keeping the teachers there, giving them the resources and the tools that they needed to be more successful. Then after a couple years the Legislature said “Great, if you want to use it, use your local dollars. But we’re not going to expand it.”

Wood: Yeah, they essentially said it’s working so well that we’re not going to pay for it anymore.

Cox: You’ll have to explain it to me, I don’t know what that means.

Wood: That program is called Peer Assistance Review if any listeners care to look that up. Sorry, I didn’t mean to cut you off.

Cox: No, that’s great. Another example in Weber School District, a local business man was disappointed in the high school graduation rate. [He] put up some of his own funding, they hired some counselors and some data people to figure out what the issues were for their students. They decreased the absenteeism there, got the kids to come to school, and now they have one of the highest graduation rates in the state. They increased the cohort rate by 19 percent.

There’s counselor programs, there are early childhood education programs at local districts that if invested in, are proven to succeed here in our state. We’ve got great parental engagement. We’ve got great teachers who are dedicated. We’ve got a business community that is supportive. So here we have all the right ingredients for success in education in our state, if it’s properly funded.

I’m not sure of ways you can increase teacher salaries in our state without additional funding. Likewise, there are some programs here that can’t be implemented or can’t be expanded statewide if there’s not additional funding put into it. That’s our proposal, let’s put the funding in the hands of the locals where they know the needs of their students. But let’s measure it, let’s account for it, let’s make sure it’s being used properly and that it’s being used to invest in the specific needs of each student. Their needs in St. George are different than Alpine, that are different from Cache County, right? So putting it in the hands at the local levels but making sure it’s being used to invest in programs that are proven to actually make a difference. We’ll see outcomes increase as a result of our investment increasing.

Wood: After the compromise came out the Tribune’s editorial board wrote a piece that was skeptical of the negotiations with lawmakers. To reiterate, I’m not a member of the editorial board, I have no involvement in editorials. They are allowed to have an opinion, I do not.

I want to read a little bit, they talked about this pivot from the signature gathering and the binding ballot question for an income and sales tax increase, to instead this nonbinding question of a gas-tax increase.

They wrote: “The tens of thousands of people who thought they were part of a true paradigm change were reduced to being leverage in talks they couldn’t join.”

I’m curious, after the session ended I think some people were probably caught off guard to see that Our Schools Now had evolved into this new entity than what they had been campaigning for for weeks and months, or at least supporting and going to meetings and signing petitions for.

What would you say to those educators, parents and even students who perhaps feel left behind by the compromise that was struck?

Cox: Ben I was one of those people gathering signatures, right? I talked to thousands of people. The thing that came back from those people is that they want to better invest in education. They weren’t necessarily signing their name for a 0.45 percent income tax increase or a 0.45 percent sales tax increase. They wanted to send a message to the state Legislature that we care about education funding, we want to invest in our local schools, and we want our teachers and our students to have the opportunities that they need to be successful.

That’s the message that we took to the Legislature. You even saw during the session some proposals come and arise to the public front where if this passes, we’ll gut it. Or if this passes, we’ll repeal it or we will overturn the will of the people and just do what we want anyway.

Utah lawmaker has a bill to undo the @OurSchoolsNow tax increases if voters approve them in November, via @sltrib https://t.co/Cf3tCEbtBa #uted #utpol pic.twitter.com/bqJDPmYT32

— Benjamin Wood (@BjaminWood) February 2, 2018

I don’t think the people who signed our petition would want that to happen. And so we, wanting to do what’s right for education and our teachers and our students, giving them an opportunity to be invested in, were willing to work with the Legislature because we wanted something that was going to be long-lasting, significant and long-term.

If we go to all this work and yes, we have 165,000 signatures, and the people pass it by 65 percent, nothing would stop the Legislature from reducing current funding, stripping this new funding. And so we always thought, and we were open with this even prior to gathering signatures, so I’m not sure it would come to a surprise that we believed the best solution was a legislative solution.

But we had been up there advocating for six to eight years, asking them to make education funding more of a priority beyond just inflation and growth. Let’s really make a difference to invest in these programs that will make a difference for our teachers and our students. And they weren’t willing to do that until we gathered those signatures.

I wouldn’t say it was leverage. I think it was a mechanism available to us through our state’s constitution, to send a message to the Legislature. And keep in mind, we’re still going to the people this fall and getting their input. So they were part of a movement, they were part of an effort that will give them a voice in this. And I assume that the people who signed it, 165,000 of them, are still grateful to have that voice and will still support us this fall.

Wood: There are a lot of questions on the ballot this November. And one of the things that we’ve been talking about throughout the year is this idea of ballot fatigue or voter fatigue.

At this point voters are going to be looking at a gas-tax increase, allowing the Legislature to call themselves into special session, medical marijuana legalization, independent redistricting, Medicaid expansion. There’s others that I literally can’t remember right now because there’s so many questions on the ballot.

The opponents seeking to block voters from weighing in on a medical marijuana ballot measure have dropped their lawsuit — for nowhttps://t.co/wpHuraTJ6p

— The Salt Lake Tribune (@sltrib) July 2, 2018

Are you worried about this proposal — because it is complex, this is a complex and complicated funding scheme — are you worried about it getting lost in the shuffle?

Cox: I wouldn’t say we’re worried about it getting lost. Like I said, I think we’re ballot question number one. So we’ll be higher on the list than some of those other ones. But each campaign has their own uniqueness and intricacies that make it a little bit different from the other ones. We’ll do everything we can to get our message out there so people know that this is funding for education.

“To provide additional funding for public education and local roads, should the state increase the state motor and special fuel tax rates by an equivalent of 10 cents per gallon?” — Proposed Our Schools Now ballot language

Yes, it’s a gas tax. But the ballot question itself is about 15 words. It’s very simple: to increase funding for local schools and local roads, should the state increase the state gas tax by the equivalent of 10 cents?

It would cost the average driver $48 a year. That’s about $4 more a month. I know it seems gimmicky, right? But if you look at it that way there’s probably a lot of things that, as an average Utahn, you spend $4 on that if you compare it to everything else in your budget, there’s probably a good argument to say investing it in my local schools is going to be what’s best for my kids, my family and our state’s future.

Yeah, there’s ballot fatigue. I’m not sure why there’s so many this given year. We’ve been out talking about this for many years, so I think Utahns are ready and expecting a question on education funding. We’ll make sure our information is out there so they can make an informed decision.

Wood: Austin Cox, campaign manager for Our Schools Now, thanks so much for being on “Trib Talk” today.

Cox: Thanks Ben.

Wood: “Trib Talk” is produced by Sara Weber, with additional editing by Dan Harrie. Special thanks to Smangarang for the theme music to this week’s episode. We welcome your feedback at sltrib.com. Or you can also email the show at tribtalk@sltrib.com.

You can tweet to us @tribtalk on Twitter, or to myself @bjaminwood. We’ll be back next week, thanks for listening.

Washington • The Trump administration is rescinding Obama-era guidance that encouraged schools to take a student’s race into account in order to promote diversity in admissions, a U.S. official said Tuesday.

The shift would give schools and universities the federal government’s blessing to take a race-neutral approach to the students they consider for admission.

The action comes amid a high-profile court fight over admission at Harvard University as well as Supreme Court turnover expected to produce a more critical eye toward schools’ affirmative action policies.

The high court’s most recent significant ruling on the subject bolstered colleges’ use of race among many factors in the college admission process. But the opinion’s author, Anthony Kennedy, announced his resignation last week, giving President Donald Trump a chance to replace him with a justice who will be more reliably skeptical of affirmative action.

A formal announcement was expected later Tuesday from the Justice and Education departments, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak on the record.

The new policy would depart from the stance taken by the Obama administration, which in a 2011 policy document, the administration said schools have a “compelling interest” in ensuring a diverse student body, and that while race should not be the primary factor in an admission decision, schools could lawfully consider it in the interest of achieving diversity.

“Institutions are not required to implement race-neutral approaches if, in their judgment, the approaches would be unworkable,” the guidance said. “In some cases, race-neutral approaches will be unworkable because they will be ineffective to achieve the diversity the institution seeks.”

The administration issued a similar guidance document in 2016 aimed at giving schools a framework for “considering race to further the compelling interests in achieving diversity and avoiding racial isolation.”

The Obama approach replaced Bush-era policy from a decade earlier that discouraged affirmative action programs and instead encouraged the use of race-neutral alternatives, like percentage plans and economic diversity programs.

The Trump administration signaled it planned to reinstate the Bush administration’s philosophy. Such guidance does not have the force of law, but schools could use it to help defend themselves against lawsuits over their admission policies.

The Justice Department in the Trump administration has sided with Asian-American plaintiffs suing Harvard University who argue that the school unlawfully limits how many of Asian students are admitted.

Students for Fair Admissions, the group suing Harvard, is led by Ed Blum, a white legal strategist who also helped white student Abigail Fisher sue the University of Texas for alleged discrimination in a case that went to the Supreme Court. Blum said Tuesday that the organization “welcomes any governmental actions that will eliminate racial classifications and preferences in college admissions.”

Civil liberties groups immediately decried the move, saying it went against decades of court rulings that permit colleges and universities to take race into account.

“We condemn the Department of Education’s politically motivated attack on affirmative action and deliberate attempt to discourage colleges and universities from pursuing racial diversity at our nation’s colleges and universities,” Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said in a statement.

In 2016, the Supreme Court, in an opinion written by Kennedy, granted affirmative action policies a narrow victory by permitting race to be among the factors considered in the college admission process.

Kennedy wrote that the University of Texas’ admission plan was in line with past court decisions that allowed for the consideration of race to promote diversity on college campuses.

The ruling bitterly disappointed conservatives who thought that Kennedy would be part of a Supreme Court majority to outlaw affirmative action in education. Justice Antonin Scalia died after the court heard arguments in the case but before the decision was handed down.

The new affirmative action guidance could add to an already contentious fight over the next Supreme Court justice. With Trump expected to announce his nominee next week, the issue should be a central part of any confirmation process, said Howard University School of Law Dean Danielle Holley-Walker.

She called the new guidance “highly unfortunate and counterproductive” and said the decision is another indication that the Justice Department, under Attorney General Jeff Sessions, is likely to be fairly aggressive toward schools that do continue to factor in race in admissions decisions.

“People have been talking about precedent in regard to Roe. v. Wade” — the landmark 1973 ruling affirming a woman’s right to abortion — “but it’s important to remember that affirmative action has been a precedent for the past 40 years,” she said. “This is a clear attack on precedent. Any Supreme Court nominee needs to be asked if they support precedent related to affirmative action.”

Eight states already prohibit the use of race in public college admissions: Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington.

The Wall Street Journal first reported the move.

___

Associated Press writers Mark Sherman and Jesse Holland in Washington, Collin Binkley in Boston and National Writer Errin Haines Whack in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

We can only speculate what Scott Pruitt thinks about when he eats lunch. But he looked relaxed at his table at Teaism on Monday afternoon — exactly 500 days into his directorship of the Environmental Protection Agency; five days after the agency’s top ethics official recommended widening an investigation into accusations that he misused his power; about five hours before The Washington Post reported that Pruitt once asked a subordinate to help find his wife a job, and less than five minutes before Kristin Mink wiped a smile off his face.

A few tables from the EPA administrator, Mink was wrangling her 2-year-old into his seat while she waited for her pancake to arrive from the kitchen.

The 33-year-old teacher was spending the day showing out-of-town relatives around the muggy heart of Washington and she might not have even noticed the EPA administrator had her husband not pointed him out.

“He said, ‘Scott Pruitt’s having lunch here right now,’” Mink recalled. “I’m really bad at recognizing faces, but he said he was 100 percent sure.”

Mink looked across the diner and, yeah, there he was: the climate change skeptic-turned-environmental chief, with an elbow on the table and an empty taco shell holder on his tray. He was chatting amiably with a man in a suit across the table.

“I instantly knew I had to say something,” Mink said. “It was just a matter of figuring out what.”

While her day job is teaching sixth grade at Sidwell Friends (where President Barack Obama sent his daughters), Mink has lately spent much of her free time protesting President Donald Trump’s administration. She organized a fundraiser to replace a church banner defaced with a pro-Trump, white supremacist message last year. Just last week, she went to a rally in front of the Department of Justice to protest the detention of migrant children.

But Mink had never been so close to one of Trump’s top deputies before. So she began scribbling bullet points on the back of her pancake receipt, occasionally consulting her phone to refresh herself about Pruitt’s past 500 days.

The circumstances were not ideal for speech drafting. Mink’s 2-year-old was still protesting his seating, and two of the out-of-towners at her table were cautioning her against making a scene.

“They kept saying things about ‘civility,’” she said. Mink was aware of the public debate: recent tableside protests against other Trump officials caught dining; the owner of the Red Hen asking Trump’s press secretary to leave; a Democratic congresswoman calling for the harassment of Cabinet members. She had read The Washington Post’s editorial on the matter — “Let the Trump team eat in peace.”

She understood the argument for civility over confrontation, and rejected the premise.

“I think that talking to people is civil,” Mink said. “I think other protests are a part of civil discourse. They should want to hear from us and hear how we feel. . . . Don’t go out in public if you don’t want to talk to people.”

Mink didn’t put it as clearly as that in the moment, as she sat at her family table of seven, rushing to write down what she wanted to say to the EPA administrator before he walked out of Teaism and her small, brief sphere of influence.

In the end, she just made up her mind she would do it.

“The message is as much for others as for him,” her husband told her, she said. “This should definitely be recorded.”

So he took out his phone, and she stuffed a pacifier into her back pocket and scooped up their still-restless 2-year-old, thinking she’d found a way to kill two birds with one stone.

”[My son] was saying he wanted to go outside,” Mink said. “I said, ‘Okay. Let’s go outside. We’ll stop by this table that happens to be on the way.’ ”

Pruitt’s dining companion had a hand on his tray when Mink walked up to the table, cradling her boy between her shoulder and speech notes.

The administrator looked up at her and smiled, at first. “Maybe he thought I was a superfan or something,” Mink recalled.

“Hi,” she told Pruitt. “I just wanted to urge you to resign for what you’re doing to the environment in our country.”

Pruitt’s smile drooped.

“This is my son,” Mink continued. “He loves animals. He loves clean air. He loves clean water. Meanwhile . . . ” She briefly consulted her receipt. ” . . . you’re slashing strong fuel standards for cars and trucks for the benefit of big corporations. You’ve been paying 50 bucks a night to stay in a D.C. condo that’s connected to an energy lobbying firm, while approving their dirty-sands pipeline.”

Pruitt had by now taken his elbow off the table. He covered one hand with the other, his ring finger twitching on the table beside an empty bowl.

“Um, we deserve to have somebody at the EPA who actually does protect our environment,” Mink continued. “Somebody who believes in climate change and takes it seriously for the benefit of all of us, including our children. So, I would urge you to resign before your scandals push you out.”

End of speech.

Pruitt made another half-smile, not really a happy one this time, before the video cut off.

“I wish he’d kept filming,” Mink said. But her husband had noticed two men watching them from an adjacent table, both with ear pieces, neither eating. One of the Pruitt controversies that Mink did not mention is the millions of dollars the public has spent on his personal security detail.

“The two security guards were behind my husband,” Mink said. “And I think he was hustling to get us out of there.”

Her husband had been right that this was the real Pruitt, by the way. EPA officials confirmed that the confrontation took place, though the agency disputed Mink’s account of what happened after her husband turned his camera off.

“Administrator Pruitt always welcomes input from Americans, whether they agree or disagree with the decisions being made at EPA,” spokesman Lincoln Ferguson wrote in a statement. “This is evident by him listening to her comments and going on to thank her, which is not shown in the video.”

Mink, however, said Pruitt did not speak a word during or after her speech.

In fact, she said, she never saw him again after she turned from his table.

She reneged on her promise to take her son outside, and instead walked back to her own table. “I felt like I had to sit down,” she said. By the time she got the toddler seated and looked up, she said, Pruitt’s table and the guard’s beside it were both empty, and the four men were nowhere in sight.

“He had simply finished his meal and needed to get back to EPA for a briefing,” the agency spokesman wrote. “His leaving had nothing to do with the confrontation.”

Mink doesn’t believe that. She called Pruitt a coward and wrote that he “fled the restaurant” when she posted the video to Facebook that afternoon — and that’s how she tells the story in the nonstop news interviews she has given since the video went viral.

The whole interaction — from sighting to speech draft to “resign” — had taken just a few minutes. By late Monday afternoon, Pruitt would be back in the news with yet more accusations of ethical scandals.

Mink eventually ate her pancake, then took her family to see the White House.

A 15-year-old girl who was forcibly separated from her mother after fleeing to the U.S. from El Salvador described to a Washington State investigator how she was crammed into a windowless room with 60 other girls and deprived of proper sleep or food for three days.

The room was divided by wire fencing into three cages, with each one holding 20 separated girls — some as young as 3 years old, according to an affidavit filed late Monday in federal court in Seattle. The girls, who weren’t told when they’d see their parents again, called it the “icebox.”

“The place was freezing because they kept the air conditioner on all the time, and each child was given a mat and an aluminum blanket,” the investigator for Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson wrote. “The girls placed their mats in the floor very close to one another, since there was not enough space.”

The affidavit is part of a lawsuit by 17 states and the District of Columbia that seeks to block the child-separation policy on constitutional grounds. The states on Monday asked the court to order the government to begin quickly turning over evidence.

“The states have repeatedly demanded basic information about their well-being, but were answered with silence,” according to the filing.

More than 2,000 children were taken under the Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy for prosecuting illegal border crossings and sent to states across the U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order to halt the practice started by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, but the directive may conflict with the zero-tolerance policy. The administration, which hasn’t yet answered the suit, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The girl from El Salvador, identified as “G” in the filing, said agents kicked their mats daily at 4 a.m. to count them, and woke them again for meager meals. The guards refused to provide comfort to the youngest detainees and wouldn’t allow them to make phone calls, according to the filing.

Maricela Batres, a mother from El Salvador whose 8-year-old son was taken in May, described in another affidavit how she fled to the U.S. after the MS-13 gang threatened to kill them if she didn’t pay $300 a month as “rent” for the store she ran — money she didn’t have.

Immigration agents detained Batres and her son at the border and put them in what she called a “kennel,” where they slept on the ground with aluminum blankets. That’s when she and others were informed their children would be taken away, she said.

“One said, ‘It is the price to pay for crossing the border,”’ she said.

New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood described in a filing how a distraught boy from South America was rushed to a hospital after trying to jump out of a second-story window in the group home where he was being held. At least 300 children were moved to New York, she said.

The search for Gorsuch 2.0 is underway at the White House. The best choice for the opening is Judge Raymond Kethledge of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit.

The 51-year-old judge from central casting - just like Neil Gorsuch - is not as well-known as front-runner U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit Judge Brett Kavanaugh. But the longtime Michigan resident brings political upside to the process that Kavanaugh and several other contenders cannot.

The president sounds like a man who wants a second term, which means keeping his most high-profile and decisive campaign promises. During the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump pledged his Supreme Court nominees would be thoroughgoing “originalists” in the mold of Justice Antonin Scalia. So the first question is: Has the nominee ruled steadily in a fashion consistent with the original intent of the Constitution and its amendments and faithful to the statutes passed by the executive and legislative branches?

Kethledge’s record shows that in his case, the answer is a resounding “yes.” He has stood strongly with free exercise rights, siding for example with a church and its volunteers against the Labor Department’s bureaucrats, writing a separate concurrence to emphasize “The Department should tend to what is Caesar’s, and leave the rest alone.” He has an exemplary record on Second Amendment rights, concurring with his colleague Judge Jeffrey Sutton’s declaration of the right to bear arms as “fundamental” in a crucial en banc case on the amendment. Kethledge has also dissented in a Fifth Amendment takings case from the decision of his colleagues to punt back an aggrieved party to state court in a way he concluded indicated that the court had “lost our constitutional bearings” on property rights.

In these and many more cases, Kethledge has been faithful for more than a decade to the originalist approach. White House staffers will have read every word of Kethledge’s many writings, and they will conclude: Gorsuch 2.0, especially with regards to a willingness to challenge so-called Chevron deference toward the vast administrative state, a doctrine dangerous in its corrosive effect on self-government.

Kethledge is also not another Harvard Law or Yale Law attendee, and with eight of those remaining on the court - Ruth Bader Ginsburg got her J.D. from Columbia, but her first two years were spent in Cambridge - the University of Michigan Law School credential sends an important message to the country. (Full disclosure: It’s my law school alma mater too, but I’ve never met the judge except through his opinions.) Married 25 years and a man of faith, he’s also an avid hunter and fisherman, a not insignificant detail in these matters. Imagine Sen. Jon Tester or Sen. Heidi Heitkamp explaining to their voters this fall why they voted against an honest-to-God outdoorsman.

Character in a judge is essential. Kethledge’s is not in doubt, and we have full-field FBI background checks to rely on there. Furthermore, when White House staff read the book Kethledge co-authored with Michael Erwin on leadership through history, they will conclude not just that he’s a beautiful writer but also that his core is not for changing.

Assured he is a candidate of character, talent and originalist disposition, how about longevity? He’s 51 and, as noted, I am told by those who do know him, he is in superb physical shape.

Which brings me to the business of politics.

The nomination of Kethledge or his colleague Judge Joan Larsen puts Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow in a bind (just as choosing Judge Amy Barrett of the 7th Circuit would box in Indiana Sen. Joe Donnelly). Would she vote against a homegrown product because other Democrats demand it? Stabenow’s likely challenger John James hopes she does. The nomination process is a windfall to every GOP nominee in every Senate race, but it would especially benefit James (and thus Mitch McConnell and the president) by adding an upset special to the long list of vulnerable incumbent Democrats, especially in states the president won handily.

Finally but crucially, how will the judge do under the heat of the lights and the often absurd questions and histrionics of the hearings? We won’t know until they get there, but those who know Kethledge assure me it would be a replay of Gorsuch’s commanding performance: knowledge mixed with grace and humor. In other words, a nightmare for the Democrats.

Don’t make the easy ones hard, Mr. President. Pick a staunch originalist from the heartland that elected you. Nominate Raymond Kethledge.

As wildfires blaze across a dry Utah, public officials are asking residents to respect bans on fireworks that range from areas inside cities to the entire town of Park City to wide swaths of public and private land in southern Utah.

And although Sugar House Park won’t have a professional display for the first summer in years, cities around the Wasatch Front plan to light the skies at dusk on Independence Day.

A new law this year gives Utah municipalities more leeway in banning fireworks over fire hazards. The law also reduced the number of days fireworks can be discharged over the July Fourth and Pioneer Day holidays, from 14 to eight days. Where they are permitted at all, fireworks may be used from July 2 to July 5, and from July 22 to July 25.

The Unified Fire Authority has an interactive map online, and the Utah Department of Public Safety is updating its list of restrictions, but both urge residents to check with local municipalities for the latest information.

Where to see fireworks displays

Check city web pages for additional displays planned around the state on Wednesday. Among the largest shows on the Wasatch Front:

Davis County

Clearfield • Fireworks are scheduled at the conclusion of a free concert with five Utah bands at Fisher Park, 934 S. 1000 E, Clearfield. Earlier events at http://www.clearfieldcity.org/living_here/events/july_4.

Kaysville • 10 p.m. at Barnes Park, 950 W. 200 North, Kaysville. For earlier events, see www.kaysvillecity.com/667/4th-of-July.

Layton • At dusk, launched from the Layton High School baseball field. See other events at https://www.laytoncity.org/LC/Events/LibertyDays.

Salt Lake County

Holladay • 10 p.m. at City Hall Park, 4580 S. 2300 East. See http://cityofholladay.com/community/events/4th-of-july/ for earlier events.

Magna • 10 p.m. at Magna Copper Park, 8900 W. 2600 South, Magna. For earlier events, see magnautah.org/events/fourth-of-july.

Murray • 10 p.m. at Murray Park, 296 E. Murray Park Ave., Murray, at the park’s softball field. Visit www.murray.utah.gov/332/Fun-Days-Activities for earlier events.

Riverton • 10 p.m. at Riverton City Park, 12800 S. 1450 West, Riverton. For earlier events, see rivertoncity.com/departments/parks_and_recreation/riverton_town_days/index.php.

Salt Lake City • Fireworks are scheduled after the Salt Lake Bees vs. El Paso Chihuahuas game, which will begin at 6:35 p.m. at Smiths Ballpark, 77 W. 1300 South, Salt Lake City. Tickets: https://www.milb.com/salt-lake.

Salt Lake City • 10 p.m. at Jordan Park, 1060 S. 900 West, Salt Lake City. More information is available at www.slc.gov/calendar/events/4th-of-july-fireworks-in-jordan-park. Free.

Salt Lake City • See holiday fireworks shows across the valley from the Natural History Museum of Utah’s Canyon Terrace, at the conclusion of its Fourth of July Blast, scheduled from 6 to 9 p.m. at Rio Tinto Center, 301 Wakara Way, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $5 and will be available at the entrance. For more information, visit nhmu.utah.edu.

Sandy • 10 p.m. at South Towne Promenade, 10000 S. 175 West, Sandy. For earlier events, see sandy.utah.gov/departments/community-events/fourth-of-july.

West Jordan • 10:15 p.m. or after the Western Stampede Rodeo ends, at Veterans Memorial Park, 1985 W. 7800 South, West Jordan. Visit westernstampede.com/events/2018-07-04/ for earlier events.

Summit County

Henefer • 9:30 p.m. at Henefer Park after a country music concert. For more information, visit http://www.heneferutah.org/.

Oakley • Fireworks are scheduled to begin after the Oakley PRCA Rodeo, which starts at 8 p.m. Visit oakleycity.com/4th-of-july-celebration.htm for information.

Park City • At dusk at Park City Mountain Village; for earlier events, visit parkcitymountain.com/explore-the-resort/during-your-stay/event-detail-page.aspx?id={7331d440-2602-4e0c-a579-a1aeff48dbbc}.

Utah County

Lehi • 10 p.m. at Thanksgiving Point; more information at https://www.thanksgivingpoint.org/events/4th-of-july-celebration/.

Pleasant Grove • At sundown at Discovery Park, 1435 N. 100 E, Pleasant Grove.

Provo • The Stadium of Fire celebration at BYU’s LaVell Edwards Stadium, featuring OneRepublic, claims to include the largest stadium fireworks show in the nation. See tickets.byu.edu/stadium-fire for ticket information. For earlier events, see freedomfestival.org/event/grand-parade.

Where fireworks are banned

Among the fireworks restrictions announced so far for this summer:

Salt Lake County

• All of unincorporated Salt Lake County.

• Cottonwood Heights, all city parks, schools and wildland interface lands.

• Draper, east of 1300 East, south of 13800 South, west of Interstate 15, and in the area from 12300 South running north along 1000 East to the north city boundary, then following the city boundary west to 700 East, then south to the UTA TRAX line, then following the TRAX line to 12300 South, to be known as the Mehraban Wetlands area.

• Herriman, within 200 feet of any undeveloped property or agricultural field.

• Holladay, east of I-215 including the freeway right-of-way, the Cottonwood area, the County Road area, Spring Creek, Neff’s Creek and Big Cottonwood Creek, Creekside Park and Olympus Hills Park.

• Kearns, in Oquirrh Park, Mountain Man Park, Kearns High School and along railroad lines.

• Magna, all city parks and undeveloped areas.

• Midvale, undeveloped land west of Main Street, and along Jordan River Parkway.

• Millcreek, east of Wasatch Boulevard, south of 4500 South and east of Farm Meadow Lane, west of 700 West, along Mill Creek between 1300 East, and Honeycut Road (crossing Highland Drive) and north of Skyline High School.

• Murray, along the Jordan River Parkway and Little Cottonwood Creek, in Murray City Park, and at Wheeler Farm.

• Riverton, along Laurel Chase Drive, Time View Drive, Dove Landing Drive, Provo Reservoir Canal, Midas Creek and Rose Creek.

• Salt Lake City, fireworks and open flames are banned east of 900 East (including the University of Utah campus, north of South Temple, in City Creek Canyon, west of Redwood Road, and in all city parks and wildland urban interface areas). The ban includes such neighborhoods as Rose Park, Glendale, the Avenues, Federal Heights, Harvard/Yale and Sugar House.

• Sandy, in city parks, west of I-15, within 200 feet of waterways, trails, canyons, washes, ravines, vacant lots, or where natural or unmaintained vegetation is present — and also in any mountainous, brush-covered, forest-covered or dry grass areas, or within the wildland urban interface areas.

• South Jordan, within 200 feet of the natural vegetation border of the Bingham Creek and Jordan River Parkway open space and trail systems, or within 25 yards of undeveloped wildland.

• Taylorsville, all city parks and undeveloped areas.

• West Jordan, west of State Route 111, in all city parks, and within 200 feet of the Jordan River Parkway Trail (east of 1300 West), the Clay Hollow Wash and Bingham Creek.

• West Valley City, along Jordan River Parkway, along 6400 West from 4700 South to 5400 South, all properties immediately adjacent to ATK, all city parks and properties, and within 100 feet of any irrigation canal.

The Unified Fire District has an interactive map of restricted areas at unifiedfire.org.

Utah County

• Highland, Beacon Hills, Bull River, Chamberry Fields, Country French, Dry Creek Highland, Hidden Oaks, Highland Hills, Highland Hollow, Highland Oaks, Hunter Ridge, Mercer Hollow, Skye Estates, Sterling Pointe, View Point, Westfield Cove subdivisions; Highland Glen Park; Lone Peak High School; Mitchell Hollow Park and drainage areas; mouth of American Fork Canyon; state-owned property south of Lone Peak High School; Sunset Mountain properties; Town Center Splash Pad; west side of 10150 North.

• Lehi, north of Timpanogos Highway (including Traverse Mountain), along Dry Creek Corridor from 1200 East to Center Street.

• Payson, all incorporated areas of Payson City and everything south and east starting on south Main Street north to 1150 south, east to Payson Canyon Road, north to 800 South, east to 600 East, north to 400 South, east to Goosenest Drive and continuing to Gladstan Golf Course; all of the wildland, canyon, foothill areas, and any lands used for agricultural purposes.

• Provo, east of Canyon Road (from Foothill Drive north), east of Timpview Drive (between Foothill Drive and 2200 North), east of 900 East (between 2200 North and Birch Lane), east of Birch Lane/1200 East (from 900 East to 700 North), east of Seven Peaks Boulevard (from 700 North to Center Street), east of 900 East (from Center Street to 300 South), east of Slate Canyon Drive (from 300 South to 1400 South), and east of South State Street (south of 1320 South); anywhere on BYU campus.

• Saratoga Springs, Apricot Place, Autumn Sky Court, Autumn Sky Drive, Belmont Drive, Beretta Drive, Beth Circle, Blossom Court, Cantaloupe Court, Captains Street, Caracara Street, Casaba Court, Casi Way, Cimarron Avenue, Clydesdale Circle, Colt Drive (south of Wrangler), Crenshaw Court, Deer Canyon Drive, Flagship Drive, Meadow Side Drive, Parkside Drive (south of Grandview), Peach Place, Peak Place, Pear Place, Rocky Ridge Court, Sage View Court, Sego Lily Drive, Summit View Drive, Sunrise Drive, Sunrise Peak Circle, Tundra Circle, Valley View Drive, Zenith Circle.

• Spanish Fork, all areas south of the Spanish Fork River from the west end of the Spanish Oaks Golf Course, eastward to the city limits; anywhere near the mountainside or within 200 feet of any vacant field or lot.

Davis County

• Bountiful, east of Davis Boulevard.

• Centerville, east of 150 East (north of 1825 North), east of Main Street (from 1825 North to 1400 North), east of 325 East and 400 East (from 1400 North to 200 North), east of 600 East (from 200 North to 100 South), east of 700 East (south of 100 South).

• Farmington, in Woodland Park, and east of North Compton (north of 600 North), east of 100 East (between 600 North and State Street), east of 350 East (between State Street and 830 South), and east of 200 East (south of 830 South).

• Fruit Heights, east of Mountain Road, and in Nichols Park.

• Kaysville, an area in the northeast part of the city, north of 900 East and west of Fairfield Road.

• Layton, east of U.S. 89.

• North Salt Lake, east of U.S. 89.

Outside the Wasatch Front

• Any national park.

• State, BLM, U.S. Forest Service and private lands in unincorporated Washington, Iron, Kane, Garfield, Grand and San Juan counties.

• BLM land in Beaver, Carbon and Emery counties, and the Henry Mountains in Wayne County.

• State and private lands in unincorporated Emery and Carbon counties.

• Forest Service land in Piute County.

• The Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation.

Moscow • England ended its long run of penalty misery and reached the World Cup quarterfinals for the first time in 12 years, beating Colombia 4-3 in a shootout on Tuesday.

Eric Dier scored the decisive kick after a 1-1 draw.

England will play Sweden in the quarterfinals in Samara on Saturday. It is the furthest England has progressed in any tournament since the David Beckham era, when a golden generation of players exited the 2002 and 2006 World Cups in the last eight.

England took the lead in a scrappy match when Harry Kane scored from the penalty spot in the 57th minute. Yerry Mina headed in an equalizer in the third minute of stoppage time.

England trailed 3-2 in the shootout after Jordan Henderson’s shot was saved, but Mateus Uribe hit the bar and goalkeeper Jordan Pickford then saved Carlos Bacca’s kick.

Sweden upsets Switzerland in Round of 16

St. Petersburg, Russia • Shy, diminutive and without that distinctive ponytail, Emil Forsberg couldn’t be more different than the larger-than-life Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

They share an ability to conjure something out of nothing on a soccer field, though, as Forsberg showed in leading Sweden into the World Cup quarterfinals for the first time in 24 years.

Forsberg dropped his shoulder to create space at the edge of the area and scored with a deflected shot to earn the Swedes a 1-0 victory over Switzerland on Tuesday.

“It brings tears to my eyes,” Forsberg said, “and makes me so proud.”

The 26-year-old Forsberg arrived in Russia shouldering much of Sweden’s creative burden following the international retirement of Ibrahimovic, who ruled the national team for more than a decade and is the greatest player the country ever produced.

Forsberg was quiet in the group stage but the attacking midfielder’s skills and slick movement stood out against Switzerland in an otherwise scrappy game between two of Europe’s less-decorated nations.

“He has developed in terms of the holistic approach to his game,” Sweden coach Janne Andersson said. “Even if he doesn’t succeed in every dribble, in every part of his game he contributes in so many ways and he has those decisive moments.”

Forsberg didn’t get much power behind his shot and it was likely heading straight for Switzerland goalkeeper Yann Sommer. However, it took a deflection off the foot of center back Manuel Akanji and bounced up and into the net.

Sweden became the fifth European team to reach the quarterfinals and will next play England on Saturday in Samara. Limited but with a highly effective game plan, the Swedes should not be underestimated.

This was another opportunity spurned by the Swiss, who have reached the last 16 in four of their last five appearances at the World Cup only to be eliminated without scoring a goal. They haven’t scored in a knockout game in soccer’s biggest tournament in 64 years, when they last reached in the quarterfinals at home in 1954.

They finished the game with 10 men after right back Michael Lang was sent off in stoppage time for a professional foul on Sweden substitute Martin Olsson. The referee initially awarded a penalty kick but later gave a free kick on the edge of the area after a video review.

Switzerland was fortunate to still be in the match at that point.

Ibrahimovic, now 36 and playing out his illustrious career in the United States, would surely have put away some of the first-half chances created by his countrymen against a fragile Switzerland defense which was missing the suspended Fabian Schaer and Stephan Lichtsteiner.

Striker Marcus Berg was the biggest culprit, spurning two openings in quick succession, while Albin Ekdal volleyed over with the goal at his mercy.

The Swedes were limited but played to the strengths that got them past Italy in the two-leg World Cup playoff and to the top of a group containing defending champion Germany, Mexico and South Korea. Their long balls forward caused panic and they were more bullish in their tackling in midfield.

The Swiss certainly weren’t playing like a team ranked No. 6 in the world and with only one loss in their previous 25 games. Their build-up play was sloppy, with the best effort falling to Remo Freuler with a late header that was saved by Robin Olsen.

“They have done precisely what they’re very good at,” Switzerland coach Vladimir Petkovic said, “and that might have been enough to beat us.

“When they score a goal, it is always extremely difficult to crack that tough nut.”

The last time Sweden made it this far at the World Cup was in 1994, when the team reached the semifinals.

The Utah Jazz and Raul Neto have agreed to terms on a two-year contract extension, league sources told The Tribune on Tuesday.

Under terms of the deal, Neto will make $4.4 million over two years, with the second year being a non-guaranteed team option, sources say.

With the signing, the Jazz have 11 players under contract. This doesn’t include second-year forward Royce O’Neale, whose contract is a lock to be guaranteed next season, or restricted free agent Dante Exum, whom the Jazz are negotiating with.

Before free agency, general manager Dennis Lindsey told The Tribune he wanted to prioritize his incumbent free agents and re-sign them. So far, he’s stayed true to that word. He guaranteed Thabo Sefolosha’s contract on Sunday, signed starting power forward Derrick Favors to a two-year deal on Monday, came to terms with Neto on Tuesday, and hopes to come to terms with Exum in the near future.

Lindsey is keeping his options open for a loaded free agency class of 2019. The Jazz have structured all of their deals to have team options for next summer. If Utah chooses, it can have loads of cap space to chase marquee free agents.

In the meantime, Lindsey is keeping together a group that won 30 of their last 36 regular season games. That group went on to beat Oklahoma City in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs, before falling to the Houston Rockets in five games in the semifinals.

When an NBA head coach gets fired, he typically takes some time away from the spotlight. But when Jeff Van Gundy was dismissed by the Houston Rockets after four seasons on May 18, 2007, he was in the ESPN broadcast booth that very night, calling Game 6 of the Western Conference semifinals between the San Antonio Spurs and Phoenix Suns.

“I remember him coming right in, and we were thrilled for a number of reasons,” said Mike Breen, a voice on NBA telecasts for more than 25 years who worked that game alongside Van Gundy and Mark Jackson. “Both of us knew, because we knew him well, how knowledgeable he is and how smart he is, and second, how funny he is. We thought it would be perfect, and we really thought because we knew each other so well, there would be great chemistry.”

Little did Van Gundy know at the time but he was jumping into his next full-time gig.

“It just worked out that way,” he said from the sideline of June’s NBA Finals. “I was just gonna do it for that game. Then, when the Rockets let me go, ESPN asked me to take it from there.”

Over the 11 years since, Van Gundy has become basketball’s version of John Madden, an ever-present part of the sport’s biggest games and most memorable moments.

“Not in a million years could I have fast-forwarded to this,” NBA analyst Doris Burke said with a laugh. “He has become the voice of the NBA in my estimation. That’s a pretty incredible journey, and I think his overall journey is pretty incredible.”

Van Gundy coached Jackson as a player, and he has known Breen, who calls New York Knicks for the MSG network, since his time as a Knicks coach from 1989 to 2001. But his relationship with Burke goes back even further, to the late 1980s, when he was a graduate assistant under Rick Pitino at Providence College and Burke was starring for Providence’s women’s program.

“When I first laid eyes on Jeff, he was exiting the Providence College men’s basketball wing, so to speak, this long hallway,” Burke said. “It was incredibly early in the morning. I want to say I was going in for a 7 or 8 a.m. individual workout with an assistant coach, and here comes Jeff in sweats, looking exhausted and like he’d been there for quite some time.”

Since then, Van Gundy has bounced from one job to another — an assistant at Providence, then Rutgers; working as an assistant under several coaches with the Knicks before coaching the team himself for parts of seven seasons; then landing with the Rockets and, eventually, television.

The Van Gundy name has been synonymous with coaching in the NBA for two decades, thanks to his success — making the playoffs in nine of the 10 years he finished with a franchise, including taking the Knicks to the 1999 NBA Finals — and that of his brother Stan, who has been a head coach with the Miami Heat, Orlando Magic and most recently, the Detroit Pistons. Jeff Van Gundy also has a knack for memorable moments, such as an infamous scene in which he futilely clutched onto Alonzo Mourning’s leg in a playoff series against the Miami Heat.

But it is Van Gundy’s work in the broadcast booth that turned him a household name for a generation of players and fans. After taking over last July as the coach of Team USA’s qualifying effort for next year’s World Cup, he learned that the hard way.

“We’re practicing and one guy, who hadn’t played with us before, he asked someone, ‘Has he ever coached?’ “ Van Gundy said. “I was like, ‘Wow.’ It was interesting. I said, ‘You know, I probably should have introduced myself a little bit deeper versus, “Hey, let’s get started.”’ But that sort of, it tells you how long I’ve done it, and also the power of TV.”

Television has also allowed Van Gundy to be choosy about when — or if — he will jump back into full-time coaching in the NBA. Right now, he’s paid well, gets to work with people with whom he’s had long-standing friendships and has far less stress.

“The benefit of having a really good job that you really like is that you can be more selective,” Van Gundy said.

What television can’t provide, though, is the level of adrenaline that coaching produces. Over the past year with Team USA, Van Gundy has again gotten a taste of that.

He landed back in coaching in the first place because of changes FIBA made to the qualifying process. Team USA would need to use G League players to qualify for the world championships next year in China, requiring a coach who wasn’t working during the season.

Enter Van Gundy, who not only has his own coaching record to fall back on, but a relationship with Team USA men’s national team director Sean Ford that dates back to when Van Gundy was coaching Ford’s brother, Ryan, a walk-on at Providence.

“Thank God for him,” said Ford, who spent summers with his brother and Van Gundy at Providence. “The consistency of what he brings to the table … you can get to where, ‘OK, now we’re 4-0, we’ve got some of the same players, we are playing teams for the second time.’ You can get complacent.

“I don’t even know if Jeff knows how to say that word, which is what we need.”

Breen and Burke both said they’ve seen the Team USA experience remind Van Gundy just how good he is at coaching, but they added that it has also opened Van Gundy’s eyes to the path G-Leaguers take to make it to the NBA.

As someone who toiled his way up the basketball ladder himself - going from Yale to Menlo College to Nazareth College as a collegiate athlete before making his way as a coach - that’s something Van Gundy recognizes and appreciates.

“They just need a break,” he said. “There are some of them who are ⅛in the NBA⅜ earlier in their career and they’re out now trying to get back.”

While several of the players Van Gundy has worked with have already gotten shots in the NBA, questions persist about his own future. He doesn’t believe, though, that there is a point in which he’ll have been out too long to return to the sideline.

“I don’t think you ever have to come to a point to make that type of decision,” he said. “Life sort of works out the way it works out.”

That, after all, is how Van Gundy went straight from the sideline into the broadcast booth 11 years ago.

“I’m not going to sound like I predicted it,” Breen said. “But I knew if he stayed committed, and wanted to do it, he would excel at it. He’s just so damn smart. His mind operates on a different level than most. If he puts his mind to it, and especially about a game he loves so much, he’d figure out a way to get it done.”

For his part, Van Gundy appears to be going with the flow.

“I never would’ve thought ⅛this would happen⅜. I never had a plan,” he said of his broadcasting career. “I still really don’t have a plan.”

This Pat Bagley cartoon appears in The Salt Lake Tribune on Wednesday, July 4, 2018.<br>You can check out the past 10 Bagley editorial cartoons below:<br>Dog Days of Independence<br>A Murder of Crows<br>Violence Against Journalists<br>Trumping Justice<br>Uncivil War<br>Yours,Ours and Mines<br>Deficit Deceit<br>Caught!<br>A Mother’s Grief<br>Freedom Festival Follies<br>Want more Bagley? Become a fan on Facebook.

Salt Lake City International Airport has installed 24 new electric vehicle charging ports — which are free to use, and available on a first-come, first-served basis.

The ports are at four locations: economy parking lot (four dual port stations); parking garage level P1 (one dual port), parking garage level P2 (three dual ports) and the employee parking lot (four dual ports).

Also, the Touch n’ Go Convenience Store at the airport that opened in December has one charging station.

The charging stations have an instruction video, and phone support is available around the clock.

Bill Wyatt, executive director of the Salt Lake City Department of Airports, said that in 2020 when the first phase of a $3.6 billion project to rebuild the airport is completed, it will have 50 recharging stations in its new parking structure.

And now, Dante Exum is back.

The Jazz and their prized restricted free agent agreed to a three-year deal worth $33 million on Tuesday, league sources tell The Tribune. ESPN.com was first to report on the agreement.

General manager Dennis Lindsey made Exum a priority during free agency, and sees him as a longterm piece for the Jazz. Exum is the only Jazz player this offseason to sign a deal guaranteed beyond next season.

Exum does have to stay healthy, however to realize all of his potential. After a rookie campaign in which he showed great promise defensively, he missed the following season with a torn ACL sustained during the summer.

Exum looked hugely impressive during summer league last year, then missed over 70 games with a separated shoulder sustained during preseason. But when he did return, he played well — especially against the Houston Rockets in the Western Conference semifinals.

The Jazz have limited money to use in free agency after re-signing Exum and Raul Neto earlier on Tuesday. They will have to decide on whether they guarantee the contracts of Ekpe Udoh and Jonas Jerebko. Beyond that, they appear to be almost finished, unless they decide against bringing Jerebko or Udoh back and dip into the free-agent market.

Just when you thought the Golden State Warriors couldn’t get any better, the team went out and signed DeMarcus Cousins to a one-year, $5.3 million deal. A torn Achilles’ will reportedly keep him sidelined until at least December or January, possibly February, but when Cousins is healthy he will give the Warriors a plethora of All-Star and All-NBA talent that had NBA players bemoaning their potency. But more talent won’t necessarily make the Warriors more successful next season.

On the surface, the Warriors’ lineup with Cousins on the floor would be overwhelming. Stephen Curry is a five-time All-Star and three-time scoring champ, earning back-to-back MVP awards in 2015 and 2016. Kevin Durant, the 2014 MVP, is a four-time scoring champ and an eight-time All-NBA team member. Draymond Green was the 2017 defensive player of the year and has been named to four All-Defense teams. Klay Thompson, the least decorated of the group, is a four-time All-Star and two-time All-NBA team member. When Cousins joins them on the court in 2018-19, Golden State will have five players who were All-Stars last season on the court together, which has not been done since the 1975-76 Boston Celtics did it with a lineup of Jo Jo White, Charlie Scott, Dave Cowens, Paul Silas and John Havlicek.

Cousins is an obvious upgrade over center Jordan Bell, who as a rookie split time with Zaza Pachulia last season, in almost every meaningful category. Cousins averaged 25 points, 13 rebounds and over five assists per game at the time of his injury while also shooting 35 percent from beyond the 3-point line. He was also worth more wins above replacement (8.9) than Bell (3.2) and Pachulia (1.9) combined. A healthy Cousins in the lineup would almost certainly mean the Warriors improve on last year’s performance, too, which included 58 regular-season wins and their second straight title that was capped with a sweep of LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

On paper, it will be tough to find a better lineup at any point in the NBA’s history. The 1975-76 Celtics boasted players who combined for 33 wins above what we could expect from replacement players. The Miami Heat super teams that featured a big three of James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade were worth between 16 and 19 wins above replacement from 2010-11 to 2013-14. The 2016-17 Warriors, the first with Durant in the fold, were credited with close to 24 wins above replacement, but then declined to 17 wins above replacement last season. That slide should end with Durant, Curry, Green, Thompson, Andre Iguodala and Cousins potentially worth that many wins above replacement themselves (17) by themselves based on last year’s performance — and that was with Curry missing 31 games due to injury and Cousins missing 34.

Yet how much Cousins helps will depend on how well he adapts his game to fit in with the Warriors offense.

For example, Cousins was responsible for 32 percent of the field goal attempts, free throws and turnovers when he was on the court during his stint with the New Orleans Pelicans last season, second only to Joel Embiid (33 percent) among centers playing at least 1,5000 minutes in 2017-18. Cousins also hasn’t seen his usage dip below 30 percent since 2012-13, his third year in the NBA. Pachulia and Bell, however, used 17 and 14 percent of possessions for Golden State, respectively, last season. With Curry, Durant and Thompson all more efficient with the ball in their hands, it makes sense for Cousins to defer to them more often than he has other teammates in the past.

Not only will Cousins likely have the ball less, he likely has to get used to cutting to the rim, which is how Golden State typically uses its centers. For example, Bell and Pachulia were asked to cut to the basket more than a quarter of the time, whereas Cousins cut to the rim on just 53 of his 1,277 (4 percent). Cousins also wasn’t as proficient, scoring 1.2 points per possession compared to 1.4 points per possession for Golden State’s centers. He can’t hold on to the ball as long as he has with other teams, either - his average time of possession is 2.6 seconds, almost double the time of Bell (1.7) and Pachulia (1.5) in 2017-18.

However, with such a strong supporting cast around him he won’t have to. Nor will he face as many double (or triple) teams when creating with or without the ball. For example, in 2017-18, Cousins was forced to take 55 percent of his catch-and-shoot attempts with a defender close by. Bell and Pachulia had unguarded catch-and-shoot opportunities 96 percent of the time, albeit on a much smaller sample size: 33 attempts compared to 243 for Cousins. Still, there are just too many weapons on the court for Golden State for Cousins not to see a higher quality of shot. Even Durant saw his share of unguarded catch-and-shoot attempts jump from 33 percent during his last year with the Oklahoma City Thunder to 37 percent since joining the Warriors in 2016.

One area of concern is Cousins high turnover rate. He had the 13th highest turnover rate among bigs last season (19 percent) and Golden State’s turnovers were a thorn in coach Steve Kerr’s side all year, with Kerr saying he should have “broken a clipboard” after seeing his team commit seven turnovers midway through the first quarter in Game 4 against the San Antonio Spurs in the first round of the 2018 NBA playoffs. Perhaps those turnover issues subside if Cousins isn’t handling the ball as much and doesn’t have to force situations to make a play.

The bottom line is the Warriors were already the title favorites before this move — the Westgate Superbook had Golden State as the odds-on favorite (10-to-11 odds, implied probability of approximately 53 percent) when LeBron James announced he signed with the Los Angeles Lakers — and have only bolstered their claim as the top team in the league (4-to-7 odds as of Tuesday morning, 64 percent). The next best team per the oddsmakers in Vegas, the Boston Celtics, are being given a mere 18 percent chance. In order words, the Warriors went from a very likely championship team before adding Cousins to nearly a slam dunk after.

Warriors fans can obviously rejoice, but the rest of the league, and its fan base, are probably left wondering why even bother going through the motions at all.

There was some last-minute hearburn Tuesday surrounding America’s Freedom Festival in Provo, with one LGBTQ group getting a scare about its placement in the parade and the Provo mayor pleading for everyone to “be our best selves” during the Independence Day event.

With those theatrics out of the way, the parade — taking place in one of Utah’s most conservative communities — can now make history, as it will allow, for the first time, participation from several LGBTQ groups.

“We are happy that we were able to work out a situation that is a win-win for everybody,” said Paul Warner, the executive director of the parade, which kicks off Wednesday at 9 a.m.

Of course, that wasn’t the case earlier in the day when Provo Pride and PFLAG learned they might have to walk in the entertainment or “pre-parade” section of the event — and not what the Freedom Festival calls the “grand parade.”

Warner called the situation “a misunderstanding.”

“They’ll be in the grand parade with the other floats and marching bands,” he told The Salt Lake Tribune in a telephone interview.

“It’s disappointing that they initially tried to put us in the pre-parade,” said Brianna Cluck, Provo Pride spokeswoman, “but we are satisfied with our parade status now.”

The centerpiece of the Provo Pride and PFLAG entry is a quilt that showcases themes of unity, family and freedom.

”It is a beautiful expression of diversity and will be a phenomenal entry, “ said Utah County Commissioner Nathan Ivie, who said he would have been disappointed if the groups had not been in the “real parade.”

Tuesday’s drama was the latest involving the Utah County event. In June, parade applications from five LGBT organizations were denied by America’s Freedom Festival, which generated criticism from residents and accusations that festival organizers had breeched nondiscrimination clauses in its contracts with Provo City and Utah County, which provided $100,000 for the event.

The next day, representatives of Utah’s LGBTQ community met with festival organizers in an intense two-hour meeting, that ultimately resulted in a compromise.

Mormons Building Bridges will also participate in Wednesday’s grand parade after agreeing to build a float. The nonprofit is still gathering donations through crowd-funding to pay the $5,000 costs, said co-founder Erika Munson.

The float, entitled “Utah Salutes Our LGBTQ Veterans: United We Stand,” honors LGBTQ soldiers from all branches of the military, many of whom served when they were prohibited from being open about their sexuality, Munson said.

Encircle, an LGBTQ resource center for teens, will march in the “pre-parade.” Youths will wear matching t-shirts and carry red, white and blue balloons, said leader Stephanie Larsen.

In 2017, Encircle was cut from the parade, the day before the July 4 event. The Provo-based nonprofit was told it had been disqualified because it was an advocacy group.

“It’s a small step that means a lot,” Larsen said of being allowed to finally participate. “It really helps these kids, who often feel like they are outside of their community and not accepted or understood by others. They will feel just a little bit more a part of our great community.”

While Tuesday’s parade dispute was unfolding, Provo Mayor Michelle Kaufusi issued an open letter to residents asking them to be respectful.

“I call on each of us to be our best selves,” she wrote, noting the recent divide over LGBTQ participation in the parade.

“One of the freedoms we are so proud of in America is the freedom of speech,” she said. “Each of us is entitled to an opinion, and we have opportunities to share those opinions. What a fabulous thing!“

Kaufusi offered an open door to residents and encouraged then to bring their concerns to the her or the City Council.

As for Wednesday’s parade, she said, “I hope each of us will tap into our highest instincts. That we will focus on being good citizens and strive to come together in celebration of the miraculous formation of this country. Let’s show each other the neighborliness that helps make this a place we all love to be.”

Information can be incredibly powerful in the world of commercial real estate — and Amber Surrency and her crew from CoStar Group are in Utah to collect mountains of it.

Flying low over the Wasatch Front with a military-grade reconnaissance plane, employees with the global real estate information firm are scouring for new construction projects, capturing coordinates and high-resolution images in the midst of a building boom throughout the metro area.

CoStar Group’s data, maps and analytics are used by brokers, developers, investors, property managers and others to help make business decisions — from where to locate a new shopping mall to how much to charge for rent.

The Washington, D.C.-based company maps everything except for schools and single-family homes as it works to survey what is now a record-breaking commercial real estate market in Utah, with $2.2 billion in sales in 2017.

“CoStar has a lot of points of data,” said Surrency, an aerial research photographer, as she and other CoStar experts debriefed Friday after a flight over Ogden and Salt Lake City. “But we want to make sure we get them all.”

The company once sent hundreds of researchers out by car to crisscross more than 135 U.S. cities and scope out new apartment, retail, industrial and other commercial projects.

What once took months or more to complete is now a four-day project for the greater Salt Lake City area. In summer 2015, CoStar switched to a turboprop Cessna C208 “Grand Caravan” EX equipped with about $500,000 in advanced computers and a sophisticated high-resolution camera mounted beneath the plane.

The gyroscopic Cineflex camera vacuums up visual data as the plane makes concentric orbits over its urban targets, locking in geo-coordinates along with highly detailed still images and videos. Surrency said the images are so granular, the company’s analysts can often read phone numbers off “for lease” signs on the street.

Surrency, a former Marine, starts with a digital map filled with red dots, each one a hot prospect as a new construction project. She and pilots Rob Parks and Ben Hursa then navigate over each to gather data, while also watching keenly for previously unknown building sites.

“That U-shaped building … the white one … I’m seeing a crane in the courtyard,” Surrency tells Parks via her headphone microphone as they fly over downtown Salt Lake City.

“OK,” replies Parks. “I’ll head that way as soon as you get your eyes on.”

The Cessna then banks gently to the left as Surrency works a joystick to aim the camera. They hover briefly while she scoops up images, and they’re off again.

All the data — sometimes more than a terabyte per day — are then uploaded to the firm’s analysts, who research and add detailed information on all the projects before they are included in subscriber databases.

As with most other cities it covers, CoStar freshens its data over the Ogden-Salt Lake City-Provo area about once a year. Having just come from Seattle last week, the crew was on a regional sweep to cover Yakima and Spokane in Washington, and Boise, Idaho, along the way.

Even at one time a year, CoStar’s reconnaissance gathers data more frequently than online mapping services such as Google, Surrency noted.

According to CoStar Group CEO Andrew Florance, the airborne system is yielding more accurate data than traditional government and private collection systems, which are often based on pulling building permits at City Hall and driving city streets.

“This technology,” Florance said in 2016, “allows us to track construction activity in the United States in a way that no one has ever been able to do.”

Surrency said CoStar’s analysts had instructed the crew to gather data on about 130 construction sites from Ogden to Salt Lake City and Provo. But, after several days in the air, the crew already had detected and photographed 156 locations.

And Surrency said as she and the crew prepared to take off again, “we’ll probably find more.”

The movies of the Marvel Cinematic Universe contain multitudes and can cover any genre: war movie (“Captain America: The First Avenger”), political thriller (“Captain America: The Winter Soldier”), planet-hopping science fiction (the “Guardians of the Galaxy” movies), fantasy (“Thor: The Dark World”) and even action comedy (“Thor: Ragnarok”).

What the newest entry in the franchise, “Ant-Man and the Wasp,” does is even more daring: It’s a mix of buddy comedy and romantic comedy, showcasing three strong women characters in a series known for boys playing with their toys.

The new movie starts with Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) nearly done with the two years’ house arrest he got in a plea deal after fighting alongside Cap and the renegade Avengers. (Remember the superhero battle in the German airport in “Captain America: Civil War”? If not, do your homework.)

If Scott’s ankle monitor gets an inch outside his San Francisco home, FBI agent Jimmy Woo (Randall Park) and his team descend to search the house — in hopes of catching the fugitive scientist Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), who created Scott’s Ant-Man suit, and Hope Van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly), Hank’s daughter and assistant.

House arrest has been dull, so Scott has plenty of time for indoor play with his daughter, Cassie (Abby Ryder Fortson), and to aid his prison buddy Luis (Michael Peña) as he gets their security consultation business off the ground. But when Scott has a dream, or a vision, involving Hank’s wife, Janet (Michelle Pfeiffer) — lost and presumed dead when she shrank to the subatomic level into something called “the quantum realm” — he feels compelled to contact Hank and Hope again.

Hank and Hope have been busy in the interim, building a “quantum tunnel.” (“Do you guys just put ‘quantum’ before everything?” Scott asks at one point.) They plan to use it to rescue Janet, but they’re not the only ones who want it. There’s the black-market tycoon, Sonny Burch (Walton Goggins), who sees the financial benefit of such a device. And then there’s a mystery figure — played by Hannah John-Kamen, who had a busy spring with roles in “Ready Player One” and “Tomb Raider” — who seems to phase through objects.

The guys, including Laurence Fishburne as a former colleague of Hank’s, get the better one-liners in this humorous and well-worked script (credited to five writers, including Rudd). But it’s the women who get the glory: John-Kamen makes for an electrifying villain, Pfeiffer shines in her brief appearance, and Lilly’s tough-as-nails performance ensures The Wasp is not merely Ant-Man’s sidekick but a hero deserving of her place in the movie’s title (the first woman in a Marvel movie to earn that honor).

Director Peyton Reed, returning after the first “Ant-Man,” revels in the sight-gag potential of having people and things change size unexpectedly. And, since the movie is set in San Francisco, he can’t resist staging an old-school car chase through the city.

With its constant humor and the energetic chemistry between Rudd and Lilly, “Ant-Man and the Wasp” is the most playful of the Marvel movies, a marked tone shift from the downbeat “Avengers: Infinity War.” But stay to the end for the trademark Marvel post-credit stinger, a jaw-dropper of a cliffhanger that will have fans counting the days until next year, when “Captain Marvel” and the fourth “Avengers” movie finally arrive.

★★★½<br>’Ant-Man and the Wasp’<br>Strong comedy, and a bit of romance sparring, in this playful entry in the Marvel franchise.<br>Where • Theaters everywhere.<br>When • Opens Friday, July 6.<br>Rating • PG-13 for some sci-fi action violence.<br>Running time • 118 minutes.