Flags fly at the Utah State Capitol on Dec. 21, 2023. (Photo by Alex Goodlett for Utah News Dispatch)
The following story was reported by The Utah Investigative Journalism Project in partnership with Utah News Dispatch.
State officials are required to disclose if their “immediate family” are involved in businesses that could receive public funding.
Recently obtained records, however, show that some heads of state agencies have interpreted the disclosure rules to mean they don’t have to disclose business interests for their siblings. In two cases, agency heads didn’t disclose family connections to companies that have received state funding and major tax incentives, the records show.
Initially the state refused to release the conflict of interest documents claiming they were private. After news of the refusal was reported the governor ordered them released in the interest of transparency. Experts say the forms are important for informing the public that government officials aren’t cashing in on their taxpayer-funded jobs to benefit themselves financially.
The Utah Investigative Journalism Project received 241 pages of documents from disclosure filings for all of the Cabinet heads for 23 state agencies. The agencies regulate everything from natural resources and state prisons to the environment and economic development in the state.
A review of the filings show that at least two Cabinet members did not disclose that their siblings were involved in companies that had benefited from state programs with funding or were regulated by state agencies.
The Division of Technology Services Chief Information Officer Allan Fuller did not disclose his brother’s role in a company, Lucid Software, from which the state had previously bought software licenses.
Ryan Starks, the head of the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity, did not disclose that his brother was the CEO of the Larry H. Miller Company that in 2023 received approval for a tax incentive in South Jordan. His brother is also a part of the Big League Utah coalition seeking to bring a Major League Baseball team to Utah.
The Division of Technology Services, Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity and the governor’s office have denied any wrongdoing and say the disclosures are in line with state law that would only require them to disclose conflicts involving their spouses or children.
What the documents show
The conflict-of-interest forms are thorough for Cabinet heads. Experts have noted the documents are essential for the public to have trust in government officials by requiring them to disclose information that would show if there is a risk they might use their position for their private benefit instead of the public good.
The officials are expected to list past work experiences, disclose lawsuits they may be involved in, and disclose criminal backgrounds and issues with substance abuse, if any. They are also expected to identify their plans after they leave office and whether anyone has offered them a job after they leave government service.
Margaret Busse, director of the Utah Department of Commerce, for example, disclosed half a dozen companies that a family trust had invested in that could be subject to regulation by her agency. Joel Ferry, the head of the Department of Natural Resources, disclosed that his family’s farm had benefited from several programs common for Utah farmers.
The documents also ask Cabinet members about the possibility of conflicts of interest arising from “immediate family members.” The forms do not specifically define which family members fall into that category.
Tracy Gruber, director of the Department of Health and Human Services, disclosed that her brother was CEO of two residential youth service treatment centers.
“These facilities are part of the industry that has recently been featured in the media regarding treatment of children in care, although the facilities where he is the executive have not been part of these stories,” Gruber wrote. She stated in her disclosure form that she would have a deputy oversee licensing for her brother’s facilities and promised to not discuss regulatory issues about the facilities with her brother.
What the documents don’t show – Fuller brothers
Alan Fuller became the head of the Division of Technology Services in March 2021. When he filled out his form he answered “No” to a question asking if he, his spouse or any “other immediate family member” had received any compensation from the state in the past five years.
Alan Fuller’s brother Owen was at the time still head of Lucidpress, a division of Lucid Software which had received funds from the state, though Owen Fuller left the company several months after his brother became head of DTS. In 2020 the state put funding toward an initiative during the pandemic “to increase the ability of state employees to work remotely,” according to a statement from DTS spokesperson Stephanie Weteling.
Other records show that Lucid had sent an invoice to DTS for over $177,000 in December 2020, a few months before Alan Fuller took over the agency.
“Alan Fuller did not report Owen Fuller’s employment on a disclosure statement because Alan understood the question to be asking about his spouse and children,” Weteling said in the statement, adding that Alan was not involved in the 2020 decision to buy Lucid software products. “DTS strives to give employees effective software tools to efficiently complete their work, and Lucid is a tool used by organizations around the world,” Weteling wrote and linked to a press release from Lucid.
While other Cabinet members chose to identify siblings as members of their immediate family, Alan Fuller did not. But the family connection came up early on when he came to head DTS.
Records obtained by The Utah Investigative Journalism Project show that Dave Grow, the chief operating officer of Lucid, sent Alan Fuller an email on Oct. 18, 2021, letting him know that “I have worked with your brother Owen for several years as he led out on building the Lucidpress business,” he wrote. He then asked about a meeting since “Lucid’s partnership with Utah has grown significantly to support agencies’ key cloud and collaboration initiatives statewide.”
Alan Fuller, however, needed a nudge and it wasn’t until a few weeks later that his brother Owen sent an email to him and to Grow that Alan Fuller started a correspondence and set up a meeting.
DTS spokesperson Weteling noted in her statement that Alan Fuller still negotiated a fair price for the state of Utah in the dealings, especially for his first deal with the company for 2022.
“Lucid quoted a renewal price for the enterprise license for all employees at a cost of $500,000 for calendar year 2022. DTS declined that initial proposal, and instead negotiated a significantly better renewal price,” Weteling wrote.
Lucid was invoiced that year for $314,000 in products and $299,000 in 2023 for similar products.
The emails show that Alan Fuller and the leader of Lucid had close contact. In December of 2021, Grow emailed to say he was looking forward to reconnecting, adding that “I’m only disappointed it’s not over another huge stack of pancakes, Alan!”
Initially the state paid for the product for all state employees, but later changed the agreement to sell licenses to state employees if they requested them. According to Weteling, state employees currently use 1,240 Lucid tools.
While DTS scaled back purchases of Lucid products from the days of the pandemic, the company was still a close ally. On Jan. 27, 2022, for example, Lucid COO Grow told Alan Fuller that Lucid was planning on becoming a public company and wanted a reference from the state of Utah.
Alan Fuller agreed. At one point he wanted to put in a quote in the reference from himself as a personal endorsement but was cautioned against it in an email from Weteling.
“We don’t generally provide direct quotes to vendors, so that we don’t appear to favor one vendor over another,” Weteling wrote in February 2022.
A few months after Alan Fuller took the helm of DTS, his brother Owen left Lucid. Besides working in software, Owen Fuller has since 2021 also served as a director on the nonprofit Utah’s First Lady Foundation with Cox’s wife, Abby Cox.
Owen Fuller was asked about his connections through that organization, as well as if he still has any stocks or current ownership in Lucid even after leaving the company. He did not respond to specific questions other than to deny there was a conflict of interest.
“I flatly reject that there was any misconduct here and the facts back that up,” Owen Fuller wrote. He noted that he was no longer a Lucid employee when he connected his brother with the company’s COO.
“I was not and have not been involved in discussions between Lucid and the State regarding their long-standing relationship. I am proud to have previously been an employee of Lucid, an outstanding Utah company, and I am proud of the excellent service that my brother, Alan, is providing the state as CIO.”
Lucid spokesperson Ashlyn McKasson provided a statement from the company also to note there was nothing unusual in the relationship.
“As part of standard business practices, our leadership regularly engages with key decision-makers across the organizations we support, and there was nothing unique about the interactions between our leaders and leadership at the State of Utah,” McKasson wrote.
What the documents don’t show – Starks brothers
Ryan Starks, executive director of the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity, filed his most recent disclosure in January of this year. He was asked if he or his “immediate family” were involved in any business “that is regulated by or receives direct financial benefits from any department, agency, or institution of the State of Utah?” Starks disclosed his brother Aaron Starks was involved in an association representing the aerospace and defense industries and received state funding.
He did not disclose that his brother Steve Starks is CEO of the Larry H. Miller Company.
In March of 2023, the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity led a special Housing Transit Reinvestment Zone committee hearing in South Jordan. The committee heard a joint proposal from the city of South Jordan and the Larry H. Miller Company to receive a tax incentive to develop high-density housing near a South Jordan TRAX stop. The incentives were offered to projects that make at least 10% of their housing units affordable.
The HTRZ process came as a result of 2021’s SB217, legislation meant to help tackle the affordable housing crisis by providing incentives to developers to build higher-density units, like taller buildings, near transit hubs.
Under the legislation the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity takes applications from cities and developers for granting HTRZ incentives. GOEO analyzes them and the director of GOEO picks a member of the agency for special ad hoc committees that review and confirm or deny the applications for incentives.
The Larry H. Miller Company and South Jordan received an incentive for a housing project that over the next 30 years would be worth $160 million. At the March 2023 committee hearing, GOEO’s Ryan Starks recused himself from representing the state agency in the meeting.
The incentive request was approved, despite concerns that more affordable housing could have been added to the project. The committee even rejected the idea that a hard incentive cap of $160 million be put in place — meaning the value of the incentive could potentially exceed that amount.
In a statement, GOEO spokesperson Lindsey Lebaron noted that the HTRZ committee awards incentives to cities and municipalities, not directly to developers. In a statement she also noted that Ryan Starks was not involved in the HTRZ decision affecting the South Jordan/Larry H. Miller application and that Ryan Starks has no financial interest in the Larry H. Miller companies.
In the statement, Lebaron said Ryan Starks was not required in the disclosure to identify siblings, only his spouse and children, but that he disclosed a potential conflict with his other brother Aaron “out of an overabundance of caution—above and beyond the requirements of the law—even though the state law does not require disclosure of his relationship with his brother.”
In Ryan Starks’ January 2024 conflict disclosure form he also answered “No” to a question about whether “the nature of employment for your spouse or other immediate family member is related in any way to the position you currently hold.”
The legislative session began shortly after he signed that conflict disclosure form. In that session lawmakers passed HB562 which would invest at least $900 million in efforts to build a major league baseball stadium and a new hockey arena.
The baseball project is pushed by the Larry H. Miller Company, which is looking to find a team and has plans to develop the stadium area on Salt Lake City’s west side. Ryan Starks’ brother Steve Starks, the CEO of The Larry H. Miller Company, is also a member of Big League Utah, a coalition advancing the MLB expansion to Utah that includes other politicians, the governor among them.
Governor stands by his officials
Rob Carrol, director of communications for the governor’s office, said the potential sibling conflicts were not a cause for concern because the form is looking “to manage conflicts that might exist in relation to a spouse, child or other household member.”
He noted that Owen Fuller had never promoted Lucid to the governor and Alan Fuller underwent a typical evaluation and hiring process.
“With his long career as a senior leader in the private technology sector, the state was tremendously lucky that Alan was willing to join the governor’s team,” he said.
With Ryan Starks, Carroll said the governor’s office is not concerned since the MLB expansion is not overseen by GOEO and the previous HTRZ application was awarded to South Jordan, not directly to the Larry H. Miller company.
The HTRZ application, however, clearly made the pitch for the incentive as a partnership with the city and the developer.
Incentives the Larry H. Miller Company received in 2023 for the South Jordan project have already helped play into the company’s grand baseball plans for Utah. A key part of expanding the major leagues to Salt Lake City also involves moving the minor league Bees to Larry H. Miller’s Daybreak development in South Jordan.
On Oct. 19 the company had a groundbreaking for the new Bees stadium in the area where the tax incentive was approved. At the ceremony, South Jordan Mayor Dawn Ramsey gave a lot of credit to the tax incentive for making the stadium possible.