Legislators already at work on bills for the next legislative session

This past week, I attended the last interim Education Committee meeting for this part of the session. It was time to lock in what bills the committee wanted to endorse or sponsor and who was to carry the bills. I am not able to sign on to carry any bills at this time as District 14 elections have not yet been completed.

Current bills are as follows: HJ 1 is the funding bill. The draft bill the committee put together is LCFIXZ. It generally revises school funding laws, clarifies laws related to special education cooperatives and joint boards, and corrects errors in language. A bill that was discussed at some length was a draft bill LCFAID. This bill is to revise undergraduate financial aid laws; revising the Montana resident student financial aid program. In the past, there have been scholarships that were offered and not funded. One was the STEM Scholarship — Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. We hope this bill fixes that problem, not only for the students, but also for the school counselors and parents. Bill draft LCQELA is a bill to help quality educators pay off their student loans by teaching in qualifying schools.

We also heard testimony on the advantages of dual enrollment, CTE Career and Technical Education and work-based learning. I have always supported these types of programs. Now, if we can find ways to finance all the great ideas.

As a legislator, in the Tax Committee, we worked on a bill that closely resembles what is now I-185. The bill did pass the Senate Tax Committee. I felt it was well-thought-out, but somehow got an adverse committee report in the House. There are issues with I-185 as written and I hope to see it not pass, so it can be cleaned up and worked on in the Legislature. If you would like to discuss this or anything else, be it politics, weather, or motorcycles, I am listed in the phonebook. I hope back-to-school and back-to-sports season is going well.

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State Sen. Russ Tempel, who is facing a re-election challenge from Havre Democrat Paul Tuss, can be emailed at [email protected]