 | |
| Adopted | October 6, 2020 |
|---|---|
| Design | Blue and white horizontal stripes with a white lily in the top left corner |
| Designed by | Arianna Meinking and Elio Kennedy-Yoon |
The flag of Salt Lake City, Utah consists of two horizontal bars of blue and white with a sego lily in the canton. It was adopted in 2020 after a city-wide contest to replace a previous flag.
| Historical flag | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
 | 1969–2006 | A white background with an artistic rendition of Salt Lake City in the center. |
 | 2006–2020 | A dark green and blue bicolor with a modern artistic rendition of Salt Lake City in the center. |
The first adopted city flag was designed in 1963 by J. Rulon Hales, the winner of a contest run by the Deseret News . The first version of the flag was made by art students from Highland High School and officially adopted for use on November 13, 1969. [1] [2] It included seagulls, pioneers, a covered wagon, and the sun rising over the Wasatch Mountains in the middle of a white background. [1] The center was in the general shape of a beehive, which is a symbol of industry and relates to the founding of Salt Lake City and its Mormon heritage. [3]
The second design of the flag was approved on October 4, 2006, by the Salt Lake City Council. [4] Rocky Anderson, the mayor of Salt Lake City at the time, had sponsored a contest in 2004 to redesign the flag. Anderson argued that the "old flag was too exclusive and focused entirely on the city's Mormon heritage." [4]
The contest, which received more than 50 entries, did not produce any designs that the city council felt had the "symbolic visuals that could be associated with Salt Lake City". [5] They then formed a subcommittee to work with the mayor's office to create new designs for the flag. [5] The final design was approved with a 4–2 margin. [4]
In May 2020, the city government opened a two-month contest to redesign the flag with a $3,000 prize for the winning entry. The city received over 600 design entries, of which eight finalists were selected in July by the Flag Design Review Committee for public review. [6] [7] [8] The winning design, announced in September 2020, was created through the merger of two finalists created by Arianna Meinking and Elio Kennedy-Yoon from West High School. [6] The design features a sego lily, the Utah state flower, in the canton amidst horizontal fields of blue and white. It was sent to the city council for consideration with the endorsement of mayor Erin Mendenhall and adopted on October 6, 2020. [9] [10]
Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake City Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), which had a population of 1,257,936 at the 2020 census. Salt Lake City is further situated within a larger metropolis known as the Salt Lake City–Ogden–Provo Combined Statistical Area, a corridor of contiguous urban and suburban development stretched along a 120-mile (190 km) segment of the Wasatch Front, comprising a population of 2,746,164, making it the 22nd largest in the nation. With a population of 200,133 in 2020, it is the 117th most populous city in the United States. It is also the central core of the larger of only two major urban areas located within the Great Basin.
The Territory of Utah was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from September 9, 1850, until January 4, 1896, when the final extent of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Utah, the 45th state. At its creation, the Territory of Utah included all of the present-day State of Utah, most of the current state of Nevada save for that portion of Southern Nevada, much of modern western Colorado, and the extreme southwest corner of present-day Wyoming.
The Beehive Flag is the official flag of the U.S. state of Utah. It is a horizontal tricolor with irregular bands of blue, white, and red. The middle white band contains a blue hexagon outlined in gold. Within the hexagon lies a gold-colored beehive, and below it sits a five-pointed white star.
The 1999 Salt Lake City tornado was a rare tornado that struck downtown Salt Lake City, Utah, United States, on August 11, 1999. It was among the most notable tornadoes to hit west of the Great Plains in the 20th century and the second tornado to hit in Utah that resulted in a fatality. This was the sixth significant tornado in Utah since June 1963, and one of only two F2 tornadoes to have hit Salt Lake County since 1950.
The Salt Lake City and County Building, usually called the "City-County Building", is the seat of government for Salt Lake City, Utah. The historic landmark formerly housed offices for Salt Lake County government as well, hence the name.
Originally, the Salt Lake Valley was inhabited by the Shoshone, Paiute, Goshute and Ute Native American tribes. At the time of the founding of Salt Lake City the valley was within the territory of the Northwestern Shoshone, who had their seasonal camps along streams within the valley and in adjacent valleys. One of the local Shoshone tribes, the Western Goshute tribe, referred to the Great Salt Lake as Pi'a-pa, meaning "big water", or Ti'tsa-pa, meaning "bad water". The land was treated by the United States as public domain; no aboriginal title by the Northwestern Shoshone was ever recognized by the United States or extinguished by treaty with the United States. Father Silvestre Vélez de Escalante, a Spanish Franciscan missionary is considered the first European explorer in the area in 1776, but only came as far north as Utah valley (Provo), some 60 miles south of the Salt Lake City area. The first US visitor to see the Salt Lake area was Jim Bridger in 1824. U.S. Army officer John C. Frémont surveyed the Great Salt Lake and the Salt Lake Valley in 1843 and 1845. The Donner Party, a group of ill-fated pioneers, traveled through the Great Salt Lake Valley a year before the Mormon pioneers. This group had spent weeks traversing difficult terrain and brush, cutting a road through the Wasatch Mountains, coming through Emigration canyon into the Salt Lake Valley on August 12, 1846. This same path would be used by the vanguard company of Mormon pioneers, and for many years after that by those following them to Salt Lake.
The Utah Pride Festival is a festival held in downtown Salt Lake City in June celebrating Utah's diversity and gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (LGBTQ) community. The event is a program of the Utah Pride Center, and includes the state's second-largest parade, after the Days of '47 Parade.
Jackie Biskupski is an American Democratic politician, who served as the 35th Mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah. Upon taking office, Biskupski became Salt Lake City's 35th mayor, the city's first openly gay mayor, and the second female mayor. She is also a former member of the Utah House of Representatives, representing the 30th District in Salt Lake County from 1999 to 2011.
Ralph Elihu Becker Jr. is an American politician, planner, and attorney who served as the Minority Leader of the Utah State House of Representatives and the 34th mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah.
D. Chris Buttars was an American politician who served in the Utah State Senate representing the 10th Utah Senate District. He began his service as a state senator in 2001 and resigned in 2011 citing health problems.
Ensign Peak is a dome-shaped peak in the hills just north of downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. The peak and surrounding area are part of Ensign Peak Nature Park, which is owned by the city. The hill's summit is accessed via a popular hiking trail, and provides an elevated view of Salt Lake Valley and Great Salt Lake.
Luz Robles Escamilla is the Senator for the Utah State Senate's 10th District. Prior to redistricting she represented the 1st District, defeating Republican Carlton Christensen for the seat November 4, 2008 after having beaten incumbent Sen. Fred Fife for the party nomination earlier that year.
Independence is a town in Wasatch County, Utah, United States. Lying just east of U.S. Route 40 southeast of Heber City, Independence was incorporated in 2008 under a controversial, short-lived state law. The population was 164 at the 2010 census.
The municipal flag of Provo, Utah, United States, features the city's logo on a light blue field. It was adopted on January 6, 2015, after a multi-year debate to replace the previous one. The former flag, adopted in 1989, was ridiculed in particular for its perceived ugliness and its similarity to the Centrum logo, and was voted one of the worst American city flags by the North American Vexillological Association (NAVA).
The flag of Orlando, Florida is a horizontal bicolor flag of white and blue defaced with a stylized depiction of the Linton E. Allen Memorial Fountain in the center. The bottom blue stripe takes up one third of the vertical length. Surrounding the fountain is a golden depiction of the sun in the shape of the letter "O." The portion of the sun over the blue stripe is split by four thin blue stripes, creating the appearance of sunlight over waves.
Erin Mendenhall is an American politician and activist who has been serving as the mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah since 2020. Upon taking office as Salt Lake City’s 36th mayor, Mendenhall became the city’s third and youngest woman in the role. Prior to assuming office, Mendenhall represented the city’s 5th district on the Salt Lake City Council.
The flag of Spokane, Washington comprises a sun in the canton on a white-and-green field separated by a stylized blue river. The flag was adopted in 2021 and is the fourth to be used by the city government.
In August 2020, eight artists painted a Black Lives Matter street mural in Salt Lake City's Washington Square Park, outside the Salt Lake City and County Building, in the U.S. state of Utah. The city had commissioned the painting with a contest "to support and memorialize the national movement to eliminate systemic racism".
Mayoral elections are currently regularly held in Salt Lake City, Utah, every four years to elect the city's mayor.
The 2023 Salt Lake City mayoral election took place on November 21, 2023, to elect the mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah. The election was officially nonpartisan. Incumbent mayor Erin Mendenhall won reelection to a second term in office, defeating former mayor Rocky Anderson and filmmaker Michael Valentine. This was the first mayoral election in the city's history to utilize ranked-choice voting, although Mendenhall won a majority of votes in the initial round, so no ranked-choice tabulation was necessary.
