Northern auto-diesel facility stalled

A $180 million state plan to build educational and other buildings, including an $8 million facility at Montana State University-Northern, in order to spur jobs is hitting a roadblock.

But Lt. Gov. John Walsh said in Havre Wednesday he is confident it can be revived as a bonding bill.

The Senate Finance and Claims Committee agreed Wednesday in a bipartisan vote to table the plan.

Chairman Rick Ripley of Wolf Creek says the bill was just too expensive. He says lawmakers need to start trimming priorities with just 15 days left to balance a budget.

State Sen. Jonathan Windy Boy, D-Box Elder, said this morning that he expects the construction money will come back — whether as cash or bonding he would not predict — but legislators are starting to look at what proposed spending has to be cut back.

"If everything passed today of what's left on the table, we would probably blow out the 400 million (dollar) surplus and then some," Windy Boy said in a telephone interview from Helena.

In other action, the House Education Committee chaired by Rep. Kris Hansen, R-Havre, also cut spending proposed in a bill sponsored by Sen. Llew Jones, R-Conrad, to fund education.

The Havre Daily had not received responses to requests for comments sent this morning to Hansen and Reps. Clarena Brockie, D-Harlem, and Wendy Warburton, R-Chinook, and Sen. Greg Jergeson, D-Chinook, by the printing deadline.

Jones sponsored the bill after working closely with state agencies and education groups, and it has received strong support from the education community, including Havre Public Schools Superintendent Andy Carlson and other local school officials.

The Associated Press reports the Education Committee cut proposed spending in the bill from $120 million to $40 million, and also took out proposals to reduce local property taxes.

The Associated Press reports Hansen said the committee axed the bill's property tax relief because Republicans prefer other tax relief measures.

Windy Boy said some of the cuts made in Jones' bill, Senate Bill 175, might be restored.

He added that some Senate education bills, including a bill sponsored by Jergeson, adjusting education transportation funding, were voted down when senators argued those funds were included in SB 175. Now that bill's funding has been cut, he noted.

Much of the building construction originally was proposed for a state bonding bill, called the JOBS bill — Jobs and Opportunity by Building Schools — by Gov. Steve Bullock, but legislators, citing desire to avoid state debt, shifted the construction to a bill to pay cash using the much-larger-than-expended ending fund balance left from the last Legislature's budget.

The idea to sell bonds to fund construction is stalled in the House, unable to hit the two-thirds threshold needed to borrow money.

Ripley says he thinks there is still time to possibly revive it.

Walsh said in an interview in Havre Wednesday that he and the governor will not support using cash.

"We believe that its the right time, … with the record low interest rates, we believe that the best way to do that would be to bond it because then it would also improve our credit rating," he said.

Walsh also said he believes the Legislature will agree to put the projects back into a bonding bill.

"I think so, because … when they finally see what the budget looks like, (they will put it back)," he said.

The building for Northern — which would replace facilities including a building that did not meet code when it was constructed in the 1950s — has repeatedly hit stumbling blocks.

The latest was when it was included in the bonding bill in the 2011 Legislature debated, which was voted down, at that time with legislators saying the state should not increase its debt because of predictions of low revenues.

The revenues ended exceeding even the predictions of Gov. Brian Schweitzer's administration, leaving the state with some $400 million as an ending fund balance.

Walsh said he and Bullock are disappointed with the Legislature's actions so far, but there is still more than two weeks in the session.

"Gov. Bullock put together a proposal that created jobs in the state of Montana, provided additional funding for education, it balanced our budget and kept a $300-million-plus budget surplus," Walsh said. "And so, if they would've listened to Gov. Bullock's proposal, I think we would be in pretty good shape right now."

Windy Boy said seeing bills sent from one chamber to the other stall or be heavily amended is not unusual.

"Now is the time where a lot of bills get hijacked on the way … they make deals on others," he said. "It gets frustrating at times.

"But," he added, "you have 150 opinions down here and 150 opinions don't exactly point in the same way."