Salt Lake Tribune, April 8, 2009
Donald W. Meyers

PROVO--Richard Davis is not going to take what he sees as Republican disenfranchisement anymore.

Davis, Utah County Democratic chairman, is taking Rep. Stephen Clark, a Republican, to task for not telling voters that when he ran against Democrat Don Jarvis in the 2008 House race, he was thinking about a run for Provo mayor this year.

Clark should have, at least, told voters that there was a chance he wasn't planning to serve a full term, said Davis, who wants the state representative to apologize to voters.

If Clark were to become mayor, then Republican delegates would choose his successor in the House -- a move Davis said disenfranchises voters.

"He deprived them of the information that voters need to cast an intelligent ballot," Davis said.

Clark told The Salt Lake Tribune in December that he was considering a run for mayor, a statement he recently repeated to a Provo newspaper.

Clark acknowledged that he had thought about running against Mayor Lewis Billings before November's election, but there's a simple reason he didn't tell voters he was looking at a city post: He hadn't decided to do it yet.

"I'd been thinking about it all along, but I didn't commit to it," Clark said.

Davis said Clark's move appears to be a tactic to guarantee that the legislative seat remains firmly in GOP hands. He said Clark isn't the first to do something like that.

In 2006, then-Rep. Jeff Alexander, R-Provo, stepped down shortly after the election to join the Governor's Office of Economic Development.

Chris Herrod was selected by then-state GOP Chairwoman Enid Greene after delegates deadlocked between Herrod and John Curtis.

Curtis, owner of Action Target, also is running for mayor this November.