Utah officials: don't they have anything better to do?
It's a matter of control. If they let this person get away with worshiping in a manner that makes them uncomfortable, pretty soon other people might want to exercise their rights in an unapproved manner. Then there would be anarchy, people exercising their rights willy-nilly without the blessing of government. Can't have that, what if after all that rights exercising people stopped and realized that they didn't need their local government stooge quite as much? Unemployment for bureaucrats is what! Pudgy former civil servants, not properly weaned from the government teat, unsuited to any productive work, wandering the streets like an army of zombies, jonesing for the sweet elixir of power.
Better that some fringe wacko religious wierdo give up his rights than disenfranchisement of public sector employees.