SALT LAKE CITY — Utah’s Republican governor on Friday signed a collective bargaining ban that experts are calling one of the most restrictive labor laws in the country, despite overwhelming opposition from union members.
Beginning July 1, unions serving Utah teachers, firefighters, police officers, transit workers and other public employees will be banned from negotiating on their behalf for better wages and working conditions.
Gov. Spencer Cox announced his decision Friday evening following a week of rallies outside his office in which thousands of union members from the public and private sector urged him to veto the bill. The Republican-controlled Legislature had narrowly approved it last week after its sponsors abandoned a proposed compromise that would have removed the outright ban.
“I’m disappointed that, in this case, the process did not ultimately deliver the compromise that at one point was on the table and that some stakeholders had accepted,” Cox said in a statement announcing he had signed the bill.
The measure did not pass with veto-proof margins, meaning that if Cox had rejected it, Republican supporters would have needed to pull in more support to override his veto.
Utah joins North Carolina and South Carolina as the most restrictive states for public sector unions, said John Logan, a labor expert at San Francisco State University.
Many educators, who are the state’s most frequent users of collective bargai