A meeting with two Utah County lawmakers Monday focused on transportation funding and expensive gasoline, and one representative also expressed reservations about a popular law aimed at punishing sex offenders.

State Reps. Becky Lockhart, R-Provo, and Lorie Fowlke, R-Orem, talked to the Utah County Republican Women about past and potential legislative activities.

A letter distributed at Monday's meeting encouraged support for Jessica's Law, named for a 9-year-old Florida girl who was kidnapped and killed. The law would increase mandatory punishments for sex offenders, including longer prison terms, more monitoring and stricter enforcement of registration rules.

Fowlke, however, said Utah doesn't need the law, in part because it would bring mandatory minimum sentences to the state. Current sentences go up to life in prison, she said.

"That allows the Department of Corrections the flexibility to let people out when they're ready to get out," she said.

An approach like Jessica's Law is "a one-size-fits-all kind of thing that people impose when they have no trust in the judicial system," Fowlke sad. "I'm not one of those."

Fowlke also discussed bills she may present in next year's legislative session, including a proposal that school districts must discipline students while still keeping them in school, consumer protections from payday lenders and a "divorce education" option for people considering ending a marriage.

Fowlke is being challenged in her re-election bid this year by Russ Zimmerman, a Libertarian candidate.

Lockhart talked mostly about transportation and the significant needs facing Utah.

The Legislature dedicated about $400 million to transportation this year, aided by significant surplus funds that had built up in state coffers, she said. But it's only a beginning: "We have to have eight or nine years just like that in order to meet all our needs," Lockhart said.

One audience member expressed concern about increases in the sales tax. Both Utah and Salt Lake counties have proposals on the November ballot that would add a quarter-cent to the sales tax for transportation funding.

Sales taxes are considered regressive because low-income people spend a greater proportion of their income on a sales tax than the wealthy -- particularly in a state like Utah, which has a sales tax on food.

There's a balancing act involved in appropriate tax policy, said Lockhart.

"When you talk about property tax, I would venture that it's the most hated tax," and one that's hard to increase, she said. "Then you're looking at income tax and sales tax" -- and by law all income tax revenue must be used for education costs.

Still, the sales tax won't withstand indefinite increases.

"No one is going to want to live here if we have a 10 percent sales tax," Lockhart said.

When asked about high gasoline prices, Lockhart noted that Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. has ordered an investigation into why Utah's prices haven't dropped as precipitously as those in other states. Since gasoline is a market commodity, she also wondered if a heavily Republican state would be interested in regulating that market.

"Are we willing to have a discussion that oil and gas and refining are a utilityfi I'm not sure," she said. "Then you would see more regulation."

Lockhart is being opposed in November's election by Kenneth Peay, a Democrat from Spanish Fork, and Shaun Knapp, a Constitution Party member from Provo.

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D1.