[5] The Utah State Correctional Facility is the only prison in Utah authorized to carry out capital punishment, with executions carried out by lethal injection or firing squad (for death row inmates sentenced to death before May 2004 or if the state is unable to obtain the necessary lethal injection drugs within 30 days of a scheduled execution).

Since the former prison's erection, business parks and residential neighborhoods have developed the once rural area into a suburban one.

Seeking the ability to offer better treatment options, the state legislature initiated a process to build a new prison, deciding it was best to relocate elsewhere.

A study was completed in 2005 by Wikstrom Economic & Planning Consultants to determine if moving the prison would be feasible.

[8] However, on August 19, 2015, a special session of the state legislature voted to move the prison to the northwest side of Salt Lake City.