Greening up: Getting homebuilders to adopt higher energy-efficiency standards is usually a tough sell, but Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker may have just the right incentive, and he's willing to use it. The mayor is crafting an executive order that would let builders jump to the front of the permitting queue if they agree in advance their projects will achieve an Energy Star rating, or if they meet or exceed the "silver" level of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. Becker also hopes developers will use their green design as a marketing tool, thus promoting the idea to others. Plus, homeowners could save big on their energy bills. Sounds like synergy to us.

thumbdown Oh deer: The offense: trespassing at Red Butte Garden, and browsing on valuable plants. The defendants: a pair of mule deer does. Extenuating circumstance: Some stupid human left the gate open on the deer-proof fence, and the deer wandered in and found a smorgasbord. The sentence: to be determined. But there's a distinct possibility that the death penalty could be imposed. Deemed too dangerous to herd, and given just a 50-50 chance of surviving a tranquilize-and-transfer attempt, the animals may be killed instead. That would be a grave injustice. All they did was trespass, and the punishment should fit the crime. Give them that half a chance.

Buyer beware: One goal of the newly organized Utah Securities Association, an industry group for securities traders, will be to warn Utahns to beware of unlicensed brokers hawking investments that sound too good to be true, and usually are. Utah is notorious for producing bumper crops of homegrown financial scam artists and the gullible and/or greedy folks they prey upon. So this should be fertile ground for the new group's message. We wish them the best. Of course, historic performance is no guarantee of future returns.