Spending decided behind closed doors unacceptable
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The 64th legislative session is over. It was an honor and a pleasure serving the people of Montana. The last five days of the session primarily revolved around SB 416 or as portrayed in the media, “the infrastructure bill.” This bill was first introduced on March 24 and started its journey through the legislature with a close relationship with HB 2, the primary budget bill. The final version of SB 416 was negotiated by a handful of legislators and Governor Steve Bullock’s office. These negotiations were done in private meetings with no notice, no public input nor input from other legislators. Unfortunately this is the process that has been used for decades in establishing major spending bills. I believe this process needs to be open to the public and other legislators. By shedding light on the process, I believe we would end up with better bills that benefit the entire state and not certain areas of the state or certain elected officials.
The legislature passed several bills that did fund $93 million of statewide infrastructure projects. However, in the process the legislature left $50 million of unfunded water, sewer, and school projects. These projects had already gone through the application process with the state and were rated in order of spending priority.
SB 416 pushed these projects aside and came up with a new process for applications that identified $80 million of new construction projects. The unfunded projects could resubmit their applications under SB 416 and would not have to start from the beginning, however, would not be guaranteed they would be funded.
SB 416 had potential spending of $150 million. It was made up of $50 million in cash and $100 million in bonding. Since the bill had the requirement of issuing bonds it required 2/3 of each the House and the Senate to approve the bill, which meant the bill needed 67 votes in the House. This bill had two problems. The first was the spending priority. The bill included $80 million of spending on new buildings and up to $70 million on repairs and maintenance of existing infrastructure. Many legislators including myself believe that our priority should be repairing and maintaining existing infrastructure. The second issue was bonding. The Montana Constitution requires that two-thirds of the Montana legislature vote to approve bonding. This requirement limits the growth of government and discourages irresponsible and unsustainable borrowing practices.
After the House voted SB 416 down on three different votes, a group of legislators tried to convince Governor Bullock to re-negotiate the spending priorities and bonding amounts in the bill. The governor refused to negotiate. Legislators attempted to have the bill be reconsidered two more times, but the votes weren’t there. I could not vote for this bill knowing that $50 million of good water, sewer and school projects all across state would go unfunded, including projects right here in Lake County, because the governor wanted to build a new $30 million dollar museum in Helena and remodel Romney gym at MSU for $23 million dollars.
