SALT LAKE CITY — Flanked by his entire cabinet, Governor Spencer Cox announced a new initiative on Friday designed to create a more customer-friendly and efficient state government.
"GRIT" is "Government Reform, Innovation & Transparency." He has tasked the head of every single government agency and division within state government to look at ways to improve and report back to him by July on what they can change.
"What is actually working? What is wasting time and money? What needs to be rebuilt from the ground up?" Gov. Cox said Friday.
Asked if this was his version of Elon Musk's infamous "Department of Government Efficiency," the governor told reporters: "I would like to say this is the thinking man's DOGE."
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There are a lot of distinctions between DOGE and GRIT, Gov. Cox said. Where DOGE has been defined by mass layoffs and deep budget cuts on the federal level, Utah leaders did not signal layoffs within the ranks of state government. Instead, GRIT intends to lean on the 22,000 state employees for direct feedback on what can be improved for them and for taxpayers.
"This is a partnership with our state employees," said Sophia DiCaro, the executive director of the Governor's Office of Planning & Budget, which is overseeing some aspects of GRIT. "We’re trying to empower them. We’re trying to embolden them."
The Cox administration is also soliciting public feedback, rolling out ways for people to weigh in. At state-run liquor stores, a new QR code is being printed on receipts. When FOX 13 News visited the Department of Motor Vehicles on Friday? A poster on the wall had a QR code where people could give input on their experience.
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The DMV was singled out by the governor for being an agency that already has made improvements to help Utahns. Wait times have declined, he said, to an average of 10 minutes or less.
While he's very supportive of federal cuts in concept, Gov. Cox on Friday offered some criticism of DOGE.
"One of the concerns I have about DOGE is that there’s slashing going on, which we’ve desperately needed, but unfortunately they’re not looking at outcomes. Sometimes you slash something and the thing gets worse," he told reporters. "We want to make things more efficient and some of that is cutting time, right? Cutting wait times, processing things more quickly. Sometimes you have to add people to get the right outcome."
Gov. Cox's executive order establishing GRIT is already receiving some skepticism.
"Utah leaders need guts, not GRIT," said Elizabeth Hutchings with the Alliance for a Better Utah, a left-leaning policy group.
Hutchings said Utah government is already very efficient through its strict budgeting process and regular audits.
"How much of this is about actually improving the lives of Utahns and improving the role of government in Utah and how much of it is pandering to this national MAGA message of government efficiency?" she told FOX 13 News.
Gov. Cox acknowledged that Utah taxpayers' money is spent efficiently and the budget is already heavily scrutinized by Republicans and Democrats alike.
"We DOGE the hell out of our budget," he joked, likening the state budget process to a colonoscopy.
But the governor and members of his cabinet, who have already been working on GRIT for more than a week now, defended the initiative as another way to find ways to improve government interactions with Utahns.
Tracy Gruber, the executive director of the Utah Department of Health & Human Services, the largest state agency, told FOX 13 News she wants to cut through bureaucracy.
"Not only efficiency for us but efficiency for the public when they’re coming to us for services," she said. "No wrong door, quick responses to questions. That’s what this is really about and we’re excited to get going."
