More than 5,000 entries for Utah’s next state flag unveiled

MILLCREEK, Utah — Utah’s subsequent state flag will come from one among greater than 5,700 entries that have been obtained over the previous 5 months.

The Utah Division of Cultural and Group Engagement held an open home on Thursday, permitting their design subcommittee members to get their first look of all of the submissions they obtained.

“We had submissions from all 29 counties within the state, nearly 200 of the 346 zip codes have been represented,” mentioned David Wicai, Director of Strategic Initiatives for the Utah Division of Cultural and Group Engagement.

Wicai mentioned they initially anticipated solely getting round 2,000 to three,000 submissions.

“We have all the pieces in these designs,” mentioned Wicai.

The present state flag has been round for just a little over 100 years. Wicai defined the flag has gone by way of just a few iterations and does characterize our state.

Nevertheless, about one-third of the folks of their preliminary survey, Wicai mentioned, felt they noticed themselves represented within the present state flag.

The state legislature handed a invoice final yr to start the method to revamp the present state flag, which has been criticized prior to now for being each uninteresting and complex.

Lieutenant Governor Deidre Henderson stopped by to look over the designs.

“I’ve seen loads of beehives, I’ve seen loads of bees, loads of mountains, it’s going to be attention-grabbing to see what designs rise to the highest,” mentioned Lt. Gov. Henderson.

The Lieutenant Governor is the co-chair for the flag process drive with Governor Spencer Cox.

“For those who take a look at all the states within the 4 corners area, Utah must up our recreation on our, on our flag, our flag just isn’t very memorable and as in comparison with, you understand, Colorado’s and Arizona is in New Mexico, so I am excited to, to affix the cool flag membership,” mentioned Lt. Gov. Henderson.

The Lieutenant Governor says they’re taking a look at how unifying a flag will be and the way it may also help finally determine us at one Utah.

It is one thing Wicai feels will ultimately be present in one the flag entries they obtained.

“I’m very assured that on the finish of this course of, sure, we may have a state flag that every one Utahns can really feel part of that identifies us as a state,” mentioned Wicai.

The following step within the evaluation course of shall be on Friday. Wicai says they’re going to begin to look over all the designs that have been submitted and slim them all the way down to as few as 100.

He says they’ll put 20 to 30 designs on their web site for public suggestions in August.

Within the fall, Wicai says the legislature will finally vote on one of many advisable flag designs put ahead by the duty drive.