Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana
Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana
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HELENA - On the final day of the 66th Montana Legislature, lawmakers completed their only state constitutionally mandated task by passing the bill that sets the budget for state agencies. House Bill 2, which spends about $10 billion of state and federal money over the next two years, passed its final vote in House of Representatives 73-25. The bill had moved through the session relatively quickly, passing the House 54-45 for the first time in late March and then passing the Senate 28-21 in...
HELENA -- The Montana House of Representatives voted 61-37 Saturday to pass a controversial bill to extend Medicaid expansion. The expanded program has enrolled nearly 96,000 Montanans to receive subsidized health insurance. The federal-state partnership was first passed into law in 2015 and includes a 90 percent funding match from the federal government through the Affordable Care Act. Rep. Ed Buttrey, R-Great Falls, is carrying House Bill 658. It includes new requirements for some recipients...
The Montana House Appropriations Committee opened public testimony last week on House Bill 2, the bill that sets the budget for state agencies. Some of the most controversial changes come from the subcommittee that deals with the budget for the Department of Public Health and Human Services, which has proposed cutting more than 100 full-time equivalent positions from the agency. Director of DPHHS Sheila Hogan said the cuts will especially hurt rural areas where it's difficult to find qualified...
The Montana House of Representatives last week advanced legislation that would require a two-third vote majority for the Legislature to transfer funds out the state's fire suppression account. The governor would still hold the authority to pull from the fund, as well. Speaker of the House Greg Hertz, R-Polson, is carrying House Bill 276 and said on the House Floor during the bill's second hearing that it was proposed in response to the historic 2017 fire season that drained government funds....
The Montana House of Representatives has passed a bill that would use money from the coal severance tax trust fund to pay for low- and moderate-income housing projects. House Bill 16, carried by Rep. Dave Fern, D-Whitefish, passed the House on a 71-29 vote and will now move on to the Senate. The bill would allow a loan to be taken from the coal trust fund's investment pool to fund the development of housing originally financed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Unite...
Lawmakers in Helena are beginning discussions on how to build and maintain the state's infrastructure, including roads, bridges, wastewater systems and state buildings. Again, the debate will come down to which projects get funding and whether that funding comes by way of cash or borrowing. In 2017, legislators voted to end the session without funding public works projects. Some legislators thought Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock bill did not allocate enough to rural infrastructure while putting...
