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Inland Port opponents criticize naming of oil and gas advocates to new technical committee

In advance of the Inland Port Authority Board’s meeting on Monday, a group opposed to the planned development are raising concerns about the inclusion of fossil fuel interests on a new committee.

Board Chair Derek Miller proposed the technical committee at last month’s meeting as a way for experts to begin answering the economic, transportation and environmental questions posed by what has been billed as the state’s largest-ever economic development project.

He pitched the inclusion of the Utah Department of Transportation, Department of Environmental Quality, Gardner Policy Institute and Wasatch Regional Council.

But Rep. Francis Gibson, a board member and incoming Utah House majority leader, said there were other voices that hadn’t been considered for the committee: “people from the extraction and mining industry” and those from rural Utah.