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HB 499 updates several provisions in Utah's watercraft laws, including clarifying that air mattresses and inner tubes are not legally considered "vessels," and explicitly limiting wakeless speed to five miles per hour. Most significantly, the bill restricts the Division of Outdoor Recreation from requiring life jackets (personal flotation devices) on flatwater, in marked swimming areas, or within 50 feet of shore on non-whitewater bodies — and if wearing a life jacket isn't required on a human-powered vessel, the division also cannot require one to simply be on board. The bill also limits how the division can classify rivers, requiring that rivers default to "flatwater" designation and prohibiting the designation of an entire river system as whitewater, allowing only specific stretches to carry that higher-risk classification.