HELENA - We are coming up on our last week here in the Legislative session. During the 2018 election, I said that if you elected me to represent you in Helena that I would chair the states infrastructure committee and work to shepherd a complete infrastructure package through the legislature. With one week left to go, the legislature has passed HB5 (Long Range Building Program), HB6 (Renewable Resource Grant Program) HB7 (Reclamation and Development Grant Program) and HB11 (Treasure State Endowment Grant Program). Now with the recent passage of HB652 (The State and Local Infrastructure Act) and HB8 (Regional Water Program), the state has passed its largest investment in infrastructure in 11 years.
HB652 was finally passed out of the Senate on a vote of 40-10 and together with HB553 (The IDEA Act), is one of the most important pieces of fiscal policy that we have passed in my time interacting with the Legislature. HB652 covers projects throughout the entire state, including our district, over 120 projects total. It will also create the “Delivering Local Assistance Grant Program” which will provide funding for K-12 infrastructure and grants for water/wastewater in rural areas throughout Montana.
HB8 deals with large rural water projects, the fundamental water infrastructure that makes or breaks rural areas in Montana.
In the waning days of the 66th Legislative Session, the big topic yet to be finalized is the State Budget. We have now received what will be the final update on our revenue estimate before we leave town, and things are looking better than we thought. We seem to be right on target and might end up coming in slightly topside of our estimate. This means that we should be able to agree to the Senate’s amendments to the budget and avoid a free conference committee, which is important because weird and surprising things happen in free conference committees and when you are budgeting, surprises are not helpful to say the least.
In addition to finishing the budget (HB2), we still have to make sure to account for all the individual legislators’ bills still making their way through the process, at least the ones that require money. We do this mostly through “Companion Bills”, or bills that have a title implementing the provisions of HB2. We will have to make sure that if those bills pass the House and the Senate and are signed by the Governor, that we have accounted for the money necessary to implement those bills so they can actually take effect.
Things usually get pretty hectic in the last couple weeks of the Legislative session, I don’t think this last week will be any different. That being said, overall this has been an incredibly productive session and I have been pleasantly surprised with the sheer amount of problems we have been able to address.
Thank you for allowing me to represent you in Helena!
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