Tempel talks about his experience in the Legislature

State Sen. Russ Tempel, R-Chester, spoke to the North Central Pachyderm Club Friday where he defended his stance on two issues that put him at odds with some conservatives in the last legislative session - support for a bill to allow counties to conduct last year's special U.S. House election entirely by mail, and voting to authorize bonding for state infrastructure projects.

Tempel and Brad Lotton, owner of Lotton Construction in Havre and the Hill County Republican Central Committee financial director, are currently in a Republican primary to represent Senate District 14. The District extends from the Canadian border in Liberty County down to just above Great Falls, and most of Hill County including Havre.

The winner of the primary will take on Democrat and Bear Paw Development Corp. Executive Director Paul Tuss in November.

Tempel was appointed to the seat in Dec 2016 by the county commissioners within the district after state Sen. Kris Hansen, R-Havre, resigned from the senate to move to Helena and take the job of chief legal counsel to Montana Auditor Matthew Rosendale.

Lotton and Darrold Hutchinson, a farmer from north of Hingham who is a candidate in the Republican primary for House District 27, were also names submitted by the Cascade, Chouteau and Hill County Republican Central Committees as well as a Interim Republican Central Committee in Liberty County.

In the 2017 legislative session, Tempel co-sponsored Senate Bill 305, which would have allowed counties to conduct the 2017 special election to fill Montana's lone seat in the U.S. House entirely by mail ballot. The bill would not have changed how subsequent elections in Montana would be conducted and was championed by county commissioners and clerks and recorders.

Some Republicans, such as state Rep. Jeff Essmann, R-Billings, opposed the bill saying it would unfairly boost turnout among Democrats and make the election more susceptible to voter fraud.

The bill passed the Senate 37 to 1 but died in the House. When the governor issued an amendatory veto of another bill related to voting issues to allow the mail balloting, it was not brought up.

Tempel, a former three-term county commissioner, said that the bill not being passed in the House was "kind of disappointing." He said the bill would only have impacted the 2017 special election, and altogether would have saved Montana counties $7 million.

"It was obvious to me that if you could save $7 million statewide for all these counties, it just made sense," he said.

Pam Harada, who was at the meeting, said she disagreed with Tempel.

She said people should have the option to vote at the polls.

Harada said some people who vote by mail ballot could face pressure at home to vote for a candidate or that someone could secretly cast a ballot for a candidate and then mail it out.

She said people having the option of going to the polls allows people to keep who they voted for a secret.

Hill County Republican Central Committee Andrew Brekke said an all-mail ballot election would save money and that Havre's city elections are conducted by mail for that reason.

He said that opposition to an all-mail ballot election was based on principle.

"It's a major principle thing for us, save your $7 million somewhere else," Brekke said.

Tempel said he also "got heck" last legislative session for supporting bills that authorized bonding for infrastructure projects across Montana. None of the bills passed the Legislature.

He said he supports bonding in some cases because when he was on the Liberty County Commission, the county spent 10 years trying to save enough money to build the Liberty County Senior and Community Center. After five years of saving for the project, he was approached by an 85-year-old woman who asked if it would be completed in her lifetime. The project was completed and the woman did live to see it, but Tempel said he thinks many people died in that period who could have used the facility, and that is something that he always felt bad about.

Tempel added the project would have cost less if the county had bonded.

Tempel said he is not a big fan of tax abatements, which he said takes money away from counties. He said that when he was county commissioner, two grain elevator companies came to the county and wanted a 50 percent abatement.

"If you abate taxes for one person, the other people pick up the difference in the tax," he said.

Everyone needs to pay their fair share of taxes, he said.

Tempel also discussed some of his work during the legislative session. Tempel is a member of the Senate Education and Cultural Resources, Taxation, and Energy and Telecommunication committees.

Tempel said that in the last session, he was the primary sponsor of Senate Bill 324, a bill signed into law to revise property tax exemptions.

He said the law requires the Montana Department of Revenue contact a county treasurer when the department learns a previously taxable property qualifies for tax exempt status when purchased by a non-profit.

Tempel said that nonprofits could often purchase a property and the property would then be taken off county tax roles without the county knowing.

The bill was meant to make counties aware of the loss of any tax revenue that resulted from the purchase, he said.

Tempel said a second bill for which he was the primary sponsor, Senate Bill 134, that would have revised laws related to motorcycle operation, did not pass out of the Senate Highway and Transportation Committee.

The bill says that the law would have allowed a person operating a motorcycle between adjacent lanes of traffic traveling in the same direction on a highway under some specific conditions.

Tempel said that if elected to a full term, he is interested in working to address the shortage of qualified teachers and health care professionals in Montana.

"Those types of educated people are leaving the state of Montana, obviously for better paying jobs," he said.

As a member of the Education Interim Committee, Tempel said, he has been looking at issues of school safety and mental health.

He said he has visited different school districts and said their security measures vary. In some of the older buildings there are multiple entrances some of which are locked and people can't get out of.

Tempel said he thinks there should be consistent state guidelines in place for school security systems.

He also said views differ on allowing school employees to carry guns. Tempel said at one school he visited the principal did not want employees to carry guns, while at another the principal said he allows them to, but no employee has volunteered to do so.