Gianforte in Havre

Republican Greg Gianforte came to Havre Friday for the first time since officially declaring his candidacy for governor Jan. 20.

The stop was the latest on Gianforte's "Regulation Roundup," a statewide tour that began Monday. The electrical engineer turned software company founder and billionaire is embarking on the tour to hear how regulations are affecting Montanans.

"There is no silver bullet, but if we round up the regulations that are getting in the way, when I am elected governor, we can take the excessive ones and put them out to pasture," he said during his appearance at the Best Western Plus Great Northern Inn.

Earlier in the day he held an event at the Chinook Motor Inn, before speaking at the Great Northern Inn and a fundraiser at the Duck Inn's Vineyard Room in Havre. He made stops for similar events in Fort Benton and Chester later in the day.

Gianforte, made his fortune as the founder of RightNow Technologies, a hi-tech firm he started in a spare room of his house. The company eventually blossomed into a company of 1,100 employees, with positions that typically averaged $100,000 a year.

In 2012, he sold the company to Oracle for $1.8 billion.

Now, Gianforte is hoping to bring his business expertise to state government.

Should Gianforte get his party's nomination, he will have to defeat Gov. Steve Bullock, a Democrat.

Bullock's name recognition and fundraising numbers that come with his incumbency, coupled with low statewide unemployment of 4.0 percent will not be easy to beat.

Gianforte said the prosperity being touted comes from those who reside in what he calls "the Bullock bubble" in Helena.

"They think everything is great," Gianforte said. "Everybody's perfect, everybody is thriving. We have low unemployment, we are doing great."

But, Gianforte said, he has met with between 700 and 800 business owners in the past year and has heard otherwise.

"Over and over again, I hear people saying they are dying a death of a thousand cuts," Gianforte said.

He said he has been told about regulation of natural resources, the cumbersome process to gain approval for permits, the tanking of commodity prices and that Montana is 49th in the nation in wages.

He said because of the state's dearth of high wage jobs, young employees are leaving Montana. This, combined with an aging population, is leaving small towns across Montana and shrinking the tax base needed to fund schools. infrastructure and other local needs.

"If we don't find ways for people to stay home and actually make a productive living and thrive here, some of our small towns are going to dry up and blow away," Gianforte said.

He said the state's young former-residents need to return and bring a job with them.

Since June, his campaign has sent out invitations to nearly 20,000 people who have moved out of Montana asking them to come back.

Telecommuting, where individuals based in Montana use technology to do jobs and outside of a traditional office, could be a part of the solution.

"Montana has unequal work ethic," Gianforte said. "We have rich natural resources. The element that is missing in Montana is effective business management."

The jobs of the future, however, will require changes in education.

"As I meet with manufacturers, they've got jobs but can't find people with skills."

Gianforte said he wants computer education in every middle and high school classroom in Montana.

He said too many students are being pushed into expensive four-year degree programs, but are often not able to find jobs once they leave.

Gianforte said he is a big advocate of trade schools, where Montanas can earn certificates in welding and machining.

He said that the state has a hard-working state government workforce, but one that has had the wrong kind of leadership. Too often, he said, people who have no experience in dealing with businesses and property owners have been appointed to oversee the rules governing those very people.

If elected, Gianforte said, he would bring what he calls "a culture of customer service" to state government, where agencies would be more responsive to the people they serve, rather than blindly abide by a rule book of regulation.

Gianforte said that after he took his company public, he and his CFO had to sign a letter to the SEC, saying the financial statements they gave were accurate and if they we're accurate they would face criminal charges.

By contrast, he said there is no such mechanism in state government, where there were 125 accounting errors and nobody was held accountable.

Gianforte said Montanas are over-taxed, saying he would have signed three tax bills passed by the Republican-led state legislature during last year's legislative session that were later vetoed by Bullock.

He said cuts in state income and capital gains taxes could have been signed, legislation funding infrastructure improvements passed and the budget balanced, while still maintaining the state's rainy-day fund.

Gianforte said actions taken by both the federal and state government have stymied economic growth in the state.

He blames the failure of the federal government to manage forests for the state's weakening timber industry. He also lauded Attorney General Tim Fox for taking part in a 27 state suit against President Obama's Clean Power Plan, that would force states to slash emissions from coal plants.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court issued a stay prohibiting the government from enacting the plan until the court has issued a ruling on the program.

"The federal overreach we are seeing is essentially a taking of property rights," Gianforte said. "And we need to stand up for our sovereign rights under our tenth amendment."

Gianforte said that too often the Bullock administration has either followed Washington or failed to assert itself in protecting the jobs and other interests of Montanans.

If elected, Gianforte said, he would be a part of that push back. He said lawsuits are one appropriate avenue, as is joining with governors in states such as Wyoming and Idaho, who are also adversely affected by such actions.

Though he is said states can manage them better, Gianforte said that transferring deeds of federal land in Montana to the state is not something he would support. He thinks the state should take a larger role in managing those public lands while collaborating with the federal government.