- Ronald Reagan

Ilove to dig up quotations by President Reagan that showcase his trademark slams on "big guv-ment." I especially like those quotes that wrap so neatly around our own Utah conservatives. They love to ravage all those free-spending liberals, but scarcely blink at writing out a fat check if it suits their own needs.

Case in point: Late Monday, Utah House Speaker Greg Curtis issued a news release announcing the creation of a new layer of state bureaucracy known as his "chief of staff," and named Nancy Workman's former campaign manager, Chris Bleak, to the post. The salary range was listed as $77,256 to $116,030. Curtis told me in a telephone interview that Bleak would be earning in the "mid- to high 80s."

It's a first-of-its-kind position in state history. How did the House of Representatives ever grind out its work for 150 years without a top assistant to field phone calls, attend luncheons and gab to Rotarians on behalf of the speaker?

Curtis and other Republican legislative leaders are positively charged about this, because as the speaker tells me, Bleak "will run the administrative side of the office in my absence and will assist me in meeting the many demands and pressures put on this office over the last several years."

He also says the time was right for this move, because two of his top three assistants have retired. The third, Kat Dayton, has been serving as Curtis' House leadership majority assistant, but is leaving soon to spend more time with her family. Her husband is former Salt Lake County Deputy Mayor Alan Dayton, now a lobbyist for Intermountain Health Care.

And speaking of lobbyists, they like the idea of getting cozy with the speaker's chief of staff, too. On Sunday, lobbyists LaVarr Webb (a Republican) and Frank Pignanelli (a Democrat) cheered the move in their weekly Deseret Morning News political column, each calling the new chief of staff a vitally important "alter ego" to the speaker.

This second-in-command puts the speaker on par with Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., who has a chief of staff, a press aide and numerous helpmates, flacks and go-betweens who work hard to keep a distance the length of Earth to Venus between him and the press, and, by extension, his constituents.

I ask you: Just because the guv has one, does it reasonably follow the speaker, already head of a bloated office with six full-time staff members, needs a chief of staff, too?

And for a part-time Legislature (45 days in late winter, the occasional special session and monthly interim meetings) that takes pride in its aw-shucks, streamlined approach to governing? We're not California, after all, with its full-time Assembly and a population 15 times the size of Utah's.

Curtis says he typically spends three days a week on speaker business, which detracts from the time he spends as a lawyer specializing in zoning and other land use issues. "I get paid $2,500 a year extra" for the speaker's job, he says. "I am trying to make a living."

When I ask if this just creates one more layer for reporters and citizens to bore through in order to reach an elected official, Curtis responds: "I have tried to make myself extremely accessible to the public. There are interns and others you work through in that regard to do this work. Those who want to be critical of this decision will find something to be unhappy about."

Darn straight. Although it never seems to matter. Somehow that ravenous Utah government baby keeps eating, its Republican parents all too eager to stuff its gullet.

hmullen@sltrib.com