To what extent do the Mormons control Salt Lake City and Utah?

To the extent that the majority there are mormon - 89.87%

Because of the Latter-day Saint influence in Utah, the state has the lowest child poverty rate, lowest teen pregnancy rate, highest high school graduation rate, and the lowest military recruitment rate among all U.S. states.

EDIT: I grew up there as a non-mormon kid from a non-mormon family. It never bothered me at all. and taxes etc are the same no matter your religion, although non-memebers pay more tuition than members at BYU a church owned school- like a non-state thing for state owned schools - or at least they used to.

The Mormons founded Salt Lake City, Ut and many other places in the west. But it all started in Salt Lake City, UT. They formed the state that later became Utah and set up church headquarters there. Salt Lake City, UT is not the only area with a high percentage of Mormons, in fact, the city itself has a lower percentage of Mormons in it compared to the rest of the state which is probably around 60%. Mesa, AZ and the surrounding area also has a high percentage of Mormons, as well as California. The reason for these is that many of these cities and areas were originally founded by the Mormons. Other settlers came later. Trivia: Did you know that Las Vegas was founded by Mormons? Looks like that city got out of hand! :)

Considering that the Mayor of Salt Lake, Rocky Anderson, isn't Mormon ... not as much as you obviously think. Mormons are people first - and have a wide range of opinions [just look at Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader and Democrat - and card carrying member of the Mormon church]. Liquor isn't hard to get here - it's just not on the shelves of the supermarket [except beer - it's in the cold drinks aisle]. It's at the liquor store. And I seem to recall recent demographics of Salt Lake put Mormons well under 50% - a lot closer to 30%... but that's just Salt Lake. Many other cities and town in Utah still have an LDS majority. The leadership of the Mormon church don't call up the governor and tell him how to run the state [nor do they tell the senators or representatives how to vote].

And, btw - there's no higher rental or tax rate for non-mormons [but thanks for the laugh] even in St George [or we'd raise the rents for the illegals who've overrun the place]. But a landlord is allowed to say no to smokers, pets, and evict persons who cause disturbances where the police become involved.

To a certain extent the mormon church controls the state by influening their members to vote a certain way. One example was when the vote came up to ammend the state constitution to make marriage between a man and woman. The mormon church issued a statement to its members to vote for the ammendment.

But really, Utah is no different from any other red-republican state controled by narrow-minded conservatives.

The church owns a considerable chunk of downtown Salt Lake City and so it exerts a lot of control that way. Another thing to consider is that the property the church owns does not get taxed to support government even though the church properties are protected by city fire & police departments.

non-mormon kids are made outcast, it's really sad to watch. There is a church on every corner (that's not much of an exaggeration), no smoking sections in restaurants, CTR rings on half the people you run into, strip clubs have no table dances and must wear pasties (an obvious sore point with me!).

to the guy above me...what address did you see all that supposes filth? it must have been a different salt lake city than the one I live in!

So are you trying to tell us that every single state and city government official is Mormon.?

I wonder about that.

gw

When I lived in St. George, I personally witnessed the City Council control where and IF other denominations were allowed to build their churches. And if you are non-Mormon you pay more in home mortgages and rent.

I've never encountered any forcing of religion on any one, unless it's the anti-Mormons trying to force their POV on anyone.

If they have more than 50% of the votes, then that would be control.