Utah Inland Port Authority leaders unveil new brand, promise transparency

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SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Inland Port Authority doesn’t want to see the Crossroads of the West occupied by a sea of warehouses and it certainly doesn’t want to see Utah’s roads congested with cargo trucks.

On Wednesday, the port authority’s leaders unveiled its new brand identity and vision for the future, with a specific emphasis on transparency.

“The branding process for the Utah Inland Port Authority has provided an excellent opportunity to refocus the port around our core mission and values,” said Ben Hart, executive director of the Utah Inland Port Authority.

The new logo also comes with a new and improved mission for the port authority.

“We maximize long-term economic benefits in Utah by developing and optimizing economic project areas and logistics-based infrastructure,” Hart said.

So what does that mean?

Essentially, it means reducing what Hart classified as Utah’s “over-dependence” on roads and cars, especially when it comes to transporting goods. Instead of clogging the state’s roads, the port authority wants to create “multimodal” transportation options with a particular emphasis on rail transportation.

Doing so will give Utah companies a competitive advantage in both national and global markets “thanks to the world-class shipping and logistics infrastructure that we have here in the state of Utah,” said Miles Hansen, Utah Inland Port Authority board chairman and president and CEO of World Trade Center Utah.

Hart noted that this won’t be accomplished by simply building ports, though they do have an important role to play in modernizing Utah’s cargo transportation options.

“(Our focus is) building a better statewide logistics system,” Hart said. “Inland ports play a key role in that strategy in our efforts to take trucks off of (the) road at access points throughout the state of Utah.”

Furthermore, Hart said inland ports provide jobs and help inject more life into the local economies they’re situated around.

“In coordination with inland port rail projects, we are also collaborating with communities to create employment hubs that will lift all areas of the state economically,” Hart said.

The Utah Inland Port Authority’s board of directors in April unanimously approved the Iron Springs Project Area resolution, creating Utah’s first-ever rural inland port in Iron County.

Hart said that the move will help support and boost a rapidly growing southern Utah.

More transparency

Utah Rep. Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, a Utah Inland Port Authority board member, thanked Hart and the rest of the port authority team during Wednesday’s brand unveiling, saying the dedication and hard work over the last year has allowed the port authority to “finally get to a point to where we can realize what the true goals are of the inland port.”

A legislative audit of the Utah Inland Port Authority last September said the board needed to outline clear goals for the future — which it hadn’t done at the time of the audit — before starting to spend some of the $150 million in bonds approved in 2021.

Auditors said they found a few “concerns,” including “financial commitment without adequate planning, gaps in organizational structure that reduce internal controls, and the need for stronger procurement and contract management.”

The report also noted contractors were largely “sole sourced” by the Inland Port Authority, meaning it solicited contract proposals from only one business at a time rather than going through the typical competitive request for proposal process.

Shortly after, a second audit of Utah Inland Port Authority practices said the agency should adjust its contract agreement policy, which state auditors said “lacks adequate transparency and accountability.”

Following the audits, the port authority and its board of directors decided to pause “all major capital projects” until it developed a Northwest Quadrant Master Development Plan.

“If our planning efforts determine a transload facility is right for this market, there will be robust engagement with neighborhoods on the west side of Salt Lake County and the business community,” Hart, who was the newly named director at the time, said in a statement to KSL.com. “A project of that size would also require a board resolution passed in a public meeting. Until then, we’re talking with all our stakeholders to ensure this master plan reflects what best suits Utah and its logistics needs.”

To Hart and the rest of the board, Wednesday’s unveiling can hopefully signify a move away from the issues that plagued the Utah Inland Port Authority over the last year which Hart himself previously described as “some super sketchy crap.”

“We needed a significant change at the port,” Hart told members of the Utah Legislature’s Business, Economic Development and Labor Appropriations Subcommittee in January. “I appreciate the fact that (state auditors) have given us a little bit of time to get this house in order because it really needed to happen. … There was some super sketchy crap going on at the inland port.”

There’s not anything happening behind closed doors, we have to bring it out. We found good government happens in the light, when everyone gets a chance to contribute and have their voice heard.

– Ben Hart, Utah Inland Port Authority executive director

Schultz said it’s imperative for the new board to not be hampered by the same issues that marked the time of the port authority’s previous leaders.

“I feel like the previous board had the vision but got sidetracked with a whole bunch of other things,” Schultz said. “Now, it’s incumbent upon us to move forward with that vision.”

Hart — who wasn’t involved with the Utah Inland Port Authority during the timeframe the audits criticized — added that the audits gave the new board a game plan in terms of things they needed to identify and do in a more “transparent manner.”

“We’ve been meeting with several stakeholder groups that have certainly pushed us a little bit and invited and asked us to be more transparent than what we were being,” Hart said. “(For) more significant documents such as a project area plan and budget, we’re doing a two-meeting public meeting cycle. Both meetings are required to have public comment prior to our board being able to adopt them and we’re also posting those documents 10 days prior to (the public meetings).”

The board has also reworked its procurement policy to make sure funds are being used in the way that the board outlined.

“There’s not anything happening behind closed doors, we have to bring it out,” Hart said. “We found good government happens in the light, when everyone gets a chance to contribute and have their voice heard.”

Hart noted recent community opposition to the Utah Inland Port Authority establishing a Tooele County Project Area, saying that the port authority will take more time with that proposal and meet with local stakeholder groups to hear their concerns.

“Whether it’s by rail, by road or by air — as Utah is becoming not just the Crossroads of the West but the crossroads of the world — we have to stay on the cutting edge of all transportation options or we’re going to be left behind,” Hansen said. “The importance of the port authority is that we are uniquely responsible for modernizing Utah’s infrastructure for the next generation of shippers.”

Contributing: Carter Williams

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