Working for our electorate every day

Things are finally in full swing in the Legislature. The appropriations subcommittees are starting to wrap up their work. After they finish, the full Appropriations committee will come back together and start putting the budget together. Revenue is hard to estimate here with the pandemic and the policies coming out of government and leaving a lot of unknowns out there. But on the budget side we have a pretty good idea of where we are heading. We think that we will be able to reach our target of providing budget that covers our essential services without any tax increases. In fact, we are planning on delivering targeted tax relief. We have already made room for this in the budget.

This week SB 65 will make its way to the House Floor. SB 65 is our liability shield bill for businesses in Montana. It will effectively render businesses safe from frivolous lawsuits arising from businesses dealing with mask mandates and occupancy requirements. The passage of this bill will not only protect Montana small businesses but will signal the beginning of the end for the mask mandates across Montana. We are going to get Montana's economy back on track. While we are doing so, considering government made this economic mess to begin with, I don't think it is too much to ask for that same government to provide protections for businesses as they start back up.

We are also going to be examining the laundry list of regulations that Former Governor Bullock temporarily removed in order to better deal with the pandemic. Seems to me that if we didn't need the regulations during this last year, we should be asking ourselves if we really need those regulations at all.

The infrastructure bills are moving according to schedule. My subcommittee will finish its work this week and vote on all the bills next week.

Governor Gianforte's budget calls for direct-targeted property tax relief for Montana seniors living on a fixed income. I am currently working with the administration to deliver it. You should be seeing more about that here in the next couple weeks.

I have seen a few news stories from Democrats talking about their "jobs" plan and the order of bills appearing in front of the legislature. First, the Democrats' job plan is literally just Republican bills from the 19 session that they revived and put their names on. Those bills, from last session, are already being carried this session by the Republicans that wrote them.

Second, the first bills to appear in the session are the ones that are easiest to write or were already written during the previous session. Complicated legislation takes longer for staff to proof and send through our legal division. Democratic leaders know this. They just feel like pretending they don't benefits them politically.

The Republican majority isn't focused on the next campaign. The people of Montana elected us to come here and get things done. We came to Helena to do exactly that.