Jason Curry, director of the Division of Outdoor Recreation, told the Utah Off Highway Vehicle Advisory Council that the state has more than 227,000 registered off-highway vehicles and that the division has been moving increasing amounts from the OHP restricted account into grants and projects.

Curry said the annual appropriation used for the OHP grant program is $3,500,000, and noted that earlier one-time appropriations and under-spending in earlier years boosted available grant funds so the program was able to award roughly $6 million in recent years. “There are 227,000 plus registered OHVs in the state,” Curry said during his presentation.

He described three bills from the 2025 legislative session that affect the division and the OHP program: HB 439 (technical changes to grant and funding rules), HB 456 (the Outdoor Recreation Mitigation Grant funded by a hotel-tax increase aimed at helping rural counties with search-and-rescue, EMS, roads and solid-waste impacts), and SB 52 (measures to make it harder to avoid Utah registration and sales taxes by registering vehicles out of state).

Curry also reviewed two large appropriations the legislature approved this year. Lawmakers set aside $21 million in capital funding for a maintenance shop (with $13 million from the OHP restricted account in the coming fiscal year) and $600,000 for a ranger residence at Flaming Gorge, split 50/50 between the boating and OHV accounts. Curry said the division intends to minimize how much it draws from the OHP account for the maintenance shop and will seek other funding where possible.

The council also heard about the division’s trail-crew program (roughly $400,000 per year of current OHV-restricted funding for trail crews), the statewide OHV education course (adult completions in the hundreds of thousands), and continued support for law-enforcement patrolling on trails and waterways.

Curry asked advisory council members to be more involved in upcoming budget and policy conversations and said the division will send legislative updates during the session so council members can give input.

Ending: The update framed several near-term decisions — the maintenance-shop planning, the mitigation grant rollout, and ongoing grant allocations — as items the division expects to develop with council input in the coming months. The division said it will circulate more information on implementation and timelines and seek the council’s advice on spending priorities.