Now state lawmakers left out of crafting the governor's blueprint for changing Utah's outdated tax structure say Walker's efforts could be hampered by her exclusive process.

"We haven't been involved. So there's going to be a natural inertia against proposals we have not been involved in," said Senate President-elect John Valentine.

Once touted to be the policy paper that would shape the 2004 election debate, the study Walker is scheduled to release Monday is more than three months behind schedule and could be headed for a shelf.

The governor announced her bold initiative to change Utah's tax system last December. She named four of her closest advisers, two members of the Utah Tax Review Commission and a Brigham Young University economist, among others, to a streamlined task force and promised an Aug. 1 deadline.

When Walker failed to win the Republican nomination at the state GOP convention in May, she still pledged to release her tax plan in time to influence the governor's race. Both Democrat Scott Matheson Jr. and Republican Jon Huntsman Jr. were briefed as the original deadline passed.

The governor still hopes her plan - a "review of the total system" - will be taken seriously. Walker's task force considered everything from removing the sales tax on food to eliminating tax loopholes for corporations. The group's suggested changes are supposed to balance increased revenue with other cuts.

Gov.-elect Huntsman has not dismissed Walker's plan entirely, pledging to offer his own tax-reform package after he takes office. Huntsman Chief of Staff-designee Jason Chaffetz says the new governor's plan could borrow from Walker's. "This is something that has to be done. We're fully supportive," Chaffetz said. "We're going to rely heavily on the task force that's been established. And we'll go from there."

Huntsman and his staff will be briefed along with legislative leaders at the Governor's Mansion just before its public release Monday morning.

Legislative leaders say Walker should have included lawmakers earlier.

"The Legislature is going to be asked to review this and enact part of the plan," said House Speaker-elect Greg Curtis. "It's inherently advantageous to get legislators involved from the beginning. It's like me shopping for my wife. If I don't involve her, sometimes I'm successful, sometimes I'm not. It's a gamble."

Walker spokesman Justin Smart said the governor's tax committee was deliberately small to avoid the time-consuming task of involving both rural and urban, Republican and Democratic lawmakers. "The governor was interested in keeping the group small and nimble enough to move quickly," Smart said.

Walker still defends her decision to take on the weighty job of reforming the state's tax structure in her last and only year in the governor's office.

"I made the analysis that whoever is governor, it's going to be a very, very difficult task to take it on," she said at her monthly KUED television news conference this week.

"I looked at the position I was in and had to say, 'If not now, when? If not Olene Walker, who?' ''