First week of legislature completed

We finished the first week of the 66th Legislature. The Opening Ceremony was great. Judy was in attendance this session having missed the first day of the 2017 session because of a storm. Our friends and campaign treasurer, Junior Scheuerman and his wife, Karen, were also in attendance for the ceremony. It was great to share the experience.

As you may have guessed, over the last week, time was spent getting introduced to folks on our respective committees. It is called “organizing,” though sometimes it almost resembles chaos. I am on the same committees as last time: Education/Cultural Resources, Energy/Telecommunications, and the big one, Tax.

Not everyone is new on all committees, which helps a lot in understanding how people feel about issues. In each committee, state department personnel come in to introduce themselves, as they will be the ones testifying on bills. Some examples would be: the Department of Revenue coming to our Tax Committee to explain liquor laws or Office of Public Instruction coming in to talk about K-12 school funding. The bills will start pouring in this coming week. Very few were heard in committee this past week as everyone was getting reacclimated to session.

As you may have already read, Medicaid expansion is being worked on by both the Democratic and Republican parties. There are a lot of competing views and ideas about how this will look, so it will be a lot to sort out.

Addressing school safety concerns and youth exploitation issues are another priority. I attended a meeting where they spoke about missing adults and children. They are proposing to put together a database of school-age student photos that would be available for law enforcement 24/7. The idea is that it would be an opt-in program for parents only if they choose to participate. There are over 3,000 potential bills at this time. Most will be sorted out in committees.

I read Thursday morning in the paper, which you probably did also, that Sen. Scott Sales talked about sending $8 million to build the Wall. I have no clue where this idea came from or why. If there is state money to spend, I will vote to put that toward issues at home in Montana.

On a side note, I have shut down my Facebook campaign page and campaign website as they are no longer needed. I appreciate all the inquiries, information, opinions and requests that are coming in, and in order to streamline this communication, please continue to email my Senate email, below, and phone, 406-444-4800.

Additionally, if you list your city in the subject line, it will help me to identify and prioritize constituent emails.

If you come to Helena, please make a point to look me up and say hello, and, as always, I plan on greeting and speaking with the students of Senate District 14 when they visit the Capitol. Have a great week!

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State Sen. Russ Tempel, R-Chester, can be emailed at [email protected].