On May 21, the page for the January 8, 2026, GOEO Board Meeting on the Public Notice Website was updated to include two (2) documents categorized as “Public Information Handout[s]”—the kind that would be handed out to the public or available to download BEFORE the actual meeting, NOT over four (4) months after it was adjourned and only a week before a related Appeal hearing before the Director of the Government Records Office:
Date added: 2026/05/21 02:57 PM
Date added: 2026/05/21 02:57 PM
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| (Image links to offsite backup copy) |
The “Proposed Motion for IAA grant.pdf” was displayed during the meeting—as the audio recording mentions.
The red text at the top of the image reads:
PROTECTED BY 63G-2-305(35)
This refers to Utah Code § 63G-2-305(35), part of the Government Records Access and Management Act (GRAMA). It breaks down like this:
Subsection Thirty-Five—“(35)”—specifically refers to records that discuss deals between a business and the government about grants, loans, or other incentives to get the business to open or grow in Utah that can be considered confidential if sharing them would actually hurt the business’s finances or make it harder for the government to compete with other places.
I'm sure the BIG RED STAMP is supposed to suggest that this is the state-level equivalent to classifying something as Top Secret. In reality, it's more like the trust one would place in their accountant to ensure they're not gossiping to complete strangers about how much money their clients make.
The PDF metadata indicates it was created on the morning of May 21, 2026. The source document from which it was exported was likely drafted before the January Board meeting.
A more interesting observation concerns the other PDF with the slide deck presentation.
| (Image links to offsite backup copy) |
Underneath the title on that first slide can be read:
“The Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity.
“January 8th, 2026”
Then there's the name of PDF document itself:
Do you see it?
“...presentation to GOED board...”
NOT “GOEO.”
House Bill 475 (2026)—which happened to revert the name of the “Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity (GOEO)” BACK to the Governor’s Office of Economic DEVELOPMENT (GOED)(emphasis added)—was not introduced to the Legislature until February 20, 2026, and only went into effect on May 6, 2026.
Consider that for whatever it may be worth.
Posting the proposed motion and slide deck in May effectively backfills the public record for a January decision, rather than showing that those materials were available to the public when the Board took up and voted on a multi‑million‑dollar IAA grant.
For GRAMA purposes, it undercuts GOEO’s claim that “there are no records to provide” or that everything material was already public, because these documents show there were written, decision‑shaping materials that were simply not disclosed until after the GRAMA appeal was underway.