San Juan County

The San Juan School District is still working on getting internet access to all of its students on the Navajo Nation. The project was supposed to be completed by the summer, but it ran into some delays.

The latest Utah news from Friday evening, May 7, 2021.

Utah’s public school students are required to wear masks, unless they have certain medical conditions. But at least two school districts in the state are now granting exemptions for students without a doctor’s note.

The lawsuit involves public land between Bears Ears and Hovenweep national monuments. It claims drilling there could cause irreparable damage to cultural sites.

The Navajo Nation is considering lifting a restriction on in-person education. That would allow schools in San Juan County that serve Navajo students to re-open, but only if parents are ready.

The Navajo Nation announced it will begin lifting COVID-19 restrictions due to a steep decline in cases across the reservation.

The San Juan School District is close to completing a project to bring the internet to its students on the Navajo Nation. Not all students are online yet, but teachers said it’s already making a difference.

A bipartisan bill to help build a visitors’ center at Bears Ears National Monument is moving through the Utah Legislature. It passed a Senate committee unanimously Tuesday and pro-monument groups support the legislation.

All healthcare workers and teachers in Utah are eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine. But public health directors in the southeast part of the state report many are opting out.

Energy Fuels executives are touting the potential of their uranium mill in San Juan County to process ore for rare earth elements. They say it will help keep the mill open, but it’s not likely to create many jobs.

Clinics on the Navajo Nation in Utah are vaccinating their employees this week, after receiving 850 doses of the Pfizer vaccine. The vaccine is a ray of hope for communities where the virus is over five times more deadly than the rest of the state.

It may be an understatement to say a lot happened in Utah in 2020, both on and off the Wasatch Front. KUER southern news bureau reporters Kate Groetzinger, based in Bluff, and Lexi Peery, based in St. George, spoke with All Things Considered host Caroline Ballard about some of the biggest stories they covered in 2020.