FLAGSTAFF, AZ (AZFamily) — The Rock Canyon Fire, burning in northern Arizona near the border with Utah, doubled in size overnight to 4,512 acres and was 5% contained.

The fire has caused firefighters to evacuate hikers and campers in the area, and some roads in the Kaibab National Forest are closed.

People in Jacob Lake — less than 20 miles from the Rock Canyon Fire — say the new fire is stirring up anxiety after last year’s devastating fire season. They say they’re confident in firefighters, but after the trauma, they’re still holding their breath.

Memories of last year’s fires

For over 100 years, Jacob Lake Inn has been serving cookies to guests who want to visit the North Rim of the Grand Canyon or explore the Kaibab National Forest. Melinda Rich Marshall’s family has owned the inn since 1923.

Last year, they were evacuated during the White Sage Fire that burned close to 60,000 acres, and then the Dragon Bravo Fire, which destroyed nearly 150,000 acres, shut down the North Rim.

Now the Rock Canyon Fire has already burned thousands of acres north of the inn.

“I mean, honestly, our reaction was not again,” Rich Marshall said. “I mean, that’s really what it was.”

Rich Marshall said last year was hard enough, so once they heard about this new fire, it brought back bad memories.

“I’d say we have a little PTSD from it, seeing smoke and smelling smoke and all those things,” she said.

Fire burning in old burn scar

The Rock Canyon Fire was sparked over the weekend by a lightning strike.

Parts of it are burning in the White Sage burn scar. Bureau of Land Management spokesperson Dolores Garcia said old burn scars will usually slow down a new fire, but this time it’s actually fueling the flames.

“In some of those areas, we’re seeing quite a bit of fuels,” Garcia said. “We’re not seeing that the burn scar is helping much, especially with the winds as strong as they’ve been in some days and as dry as it’s been, those fuels are just tender and cured and really flammable.”

She said firefighters are attacking it from the ground and the air, but the high winds are limiting their ability to make water drops.

Hikers and campers were evacuated from the area. Garcia said she knows how stressful this must be to the surrounding communities after last year’s fires.

“We still understand that, it’s still a very fresh wound to many of the people who live up there, who’ve recreated up there for years,” she said. “That’s definitely at the forefront of our minds.”

Rich Marshall said while it’s scary, they have full trust in the firefighters.

“We’re really just grateful to see them and know the work that they are doing,” she said.

Rich Marshall said this is usually their peak season, but they’ve seen a bit of a slowdown even after the North rim reopened. She said people can support them by staying there or even just stopping in and getting some of their famous cookies.

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The NBA Draft is less than a week away, and the Utah Jazz have a big decision to make. What’s difficult for the Jazz is that there isn’t an obvious choice between some incredible prospects at the top of the draft: AJ Dybantsa, Darryn Peterson, and Cam Boozer. Obviously, everything depends on what the Washington Wizards decide to do with their pick. But with all the smoke screens we’ve seen, it’s not clear who will be available to the Jazz.

That’s where you come in. If you were the Utah Jazz and you had the chance to choose between AJ Dybantsa, Darryn Peterson, and Cam Boozer, who would you choose?

Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across the NBA. Throughout the year we ask questions of the most plugged-in Jazz fans and fans across the country. Sign up here to participate in the weekly emailed surveys.

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah is no stranger to discourse surrounding early child literacy.

While the Beehive State generally performs higher than other states in terms of proficiency measures, its leaders still recognize — especially post-COVID — that it’s a real issue that demands serious solutions.

A legislative audit released Tuesday said Utah school teachers and administrators should focus enhanced attention not only on third-graders, the traditional benchmark for early literacy, but also on first-graders, where data starts spotting early literacy challenges in young students.

Then, Utah first lady Abby Cox on Wednesday added to that discussion, speaking with Utah education and policy leaders about the need to meet the literacy crisis head-on and ways Utah has worked to do just that.

“We’re not in the best place that we can be, and we’re a little ahead of the national average; we always have been, but that still isn’t great. We’re in a moment where everybody’s starting to realize this … business community, educators, all of us coming together to realize there’s an issue here,” Cox said.

She mentioned the passage of SB241 during the 2026 legislative session, which committed $25.6 million to literacy coaching, increased the statewide goal to have 80% of third-graders reading at grade-level by 2030 and includes an intervention measure requiring struggling third-graders to repeat the grade — “except in cases of certain good cause exemption.”

“I know we can get 97-plus percent of our kiddos reading on grade level by third grade. We can do this,” Cox said.

She also emphasized the need to get “attention-sucking machines,” AKA cellphones, out of classrooms — something top lawmakers in the state have made strides to emphasize.

July 1 will mark the start of a new Utah law ushered in with the passage of SB69 that essentially places a bell-to-bell ban on cellphones at Utah’s K-12 public schools, unless a school or district opts for a looser policy.

The latest piece of legislation was built upon a similar bill passed during the 2025 session that set a default policy barring students from using their phones during class time.

Despite those restrictions, many lawmakers and educators argued they didn’t go far enough, which led to SB69.

“I don’t think we all know enough about how wonderful this is going to be,” Cox said, adding that data has shown library book checkouts have skyrocketed in schools that have instituted daylong cellphone ban policies.

“I talked to a principal who, after the first day of going bell-to-bell, walked into his high school lunch room, thinking there was a fight, because there was all this chaos and noise … and it was just (students) communicating with each other, playing cards, bringing little games,” Cox said. “It was just beautiful to see, and I think we’re going to see an incredible resurgence as we implement this statewide.”