The Associated Press Lawmakers have introduced 1,441 bills in the first half of the 2007 Legislature, an average of nine measures per legislator. About 35 percent, or 502, are dead. The status of some key bills:
What’s alive
Six Republican budget bills created as an alternative to the governor’s budget bill
A $400 per-homeowner property tax rebate
A refundable $120 income-tax credit for renters
A $200 million GOP property-tax relief proposal
Abolishing the death penalty
Banning picketing at funerals
A Republican proposal to scrap Montana’s utility deregulation laws
The governor’s $138 million school funding proposal
Requiring teenage girls to notify their parents before undergoing abortions
Limiting state spending
Redoing the business equipment tax and increasing the exemption level
A GOP proposal to give schools $166 million in new money over the next two years
Funding for all-day kindergarten statewide
Revamping environmental laws for power plants
Increasing Indian Education for All funding
Expanding the state Children’s Health Insurance Program
A $50 million proposal to freeze college tuition for two years
Regulating so-called “constituency accounts”
Toughening action against the state’s worst sex offenders
A 3 percent raise for state employees
Changing Montana’s eminent domain laws
Collecting tax money from out-ofstate and corporate tax cheats
Amending the state constitution to establish a parents’ bill of rights
Changing the state’s stream access law
Helping young workers in highdemand fields pay off student loans
Two bills rejecting federally approved national identification cards
Allowing police to stop drivers for not wearing their seat belts
Banning human cloning research
Designating a state lullaby
Eliminating the water adjudication fee passed in 2005
Establishing a board to compensate ranchers who lose livestock to wolves
Increasing tax incentives for moviemakers who film in Montana
Creating Liberty Day in Montana
Making child seat violations a primary traffic offense
Extending a state moratorium on specialty hospitals
Setting up wolf and grizzly bear hunts once the animals’ federal protection ends What’s dead
The governor’s budget bill
Tuition cuts for state university students
Mandating employee break times
$200 in annual tax credits per person and credits for small businesses that provide health insurance
Banning discrimination against gays and lesbians
Including all school employees in the state health insurance program
Three bills allowing local governments to institute sales taxes
Banning or restricting cell phone use while driving
Two Democratic bills to “reregulate” the state’s utilities
Allowing children who aren’t vaccinated for religious reasons to attend state-funded preschools or day care centers
A $96 million increase in state funding for schools
Increasing the amount of marijuana allowed for medical use
Reimbursing the state poet laureate for travel expenses
Requiring daytime use of headlights
Imposing new state regulations on home schooling
Requiring lawmakers to meet every year
Cutting income taxes by 3 percent
Abolishing compulsory school attendance
Requiring English proficiency to obtain a driver’s license
Allowing school districts not just the state to certify teachers
Requiring the use of wooden baseball bats in baseball games
Deleting Columbus Day as a state holiday and replacing it with Sept. 11
Requiring paper towels in public restrooms
Expanding Class III gambling on American Indian reservations
Requiring the transferability of university system credits
Encouraging intellectual diversity in the state university system
Requiring the use of motorcycle helmets
Using oil and gas revenue to expand U. S. 2 to four lanes
Banning the United Nations flag on state property.
