Lawmakers will be polled soon on whether to override eight vetoes issued by Governor Greg Gianforte after they adjourned the legislative session last month. The Secretary of State is required to poll legislators on whether to override post-session vetoes of bills that received a combined 100 votes from the 150 lawmakers in the House and Senate...
Custer Gallatin National Forest Rescinds Fire Restrictions
The group Upper Missouri Waterkeeper petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency Monday, arguing Senate Bill 358 signed into law by Governor Greg Gianforte runs counter to the agency’s authority to approve or disprove changes under the Clean Water Act and is a risk to the state’s waterways. It repeals numeric standards for nutrients, namely...
Electric Car Tax Halted By Governor Gianforte
Governor Greg Gianforte vetoed House Bill 188 Thursday that would have imposed fees on top of annual registration costs on all types of electric vehicles including cars trucks and motorhomes. The goal of the bill according to supporters was to tap electric vehicles for funding state highways as other vehicles do via gas taxes. The governor ind...
Governor Greg Gianforte signed House Bill 701 into law Tuesday. It implements Montana’s adult-use recreational marijuana program and authorizes the Healing and Ending Addiction through Recovery and Treatment Fund. Using marijuana tax revenue a portion of the tobacco tax settlement and a federal Medicaid match the HEART Fund will invest $25 mil...
Attorney General Knudsen Leads Call To Re-Visit Keystone XL Pipeline
Four Native American tribes in Montana and a pair of indigenous rights organizations are challenging new restrictions on ballot collection signed into law by Governor Greg Gianforte. Ballot collection is a practice commonly used by get-out-the-vote groups in which organizations submit completed mail-in ballots collected from voters. Violators ...
Campus Gun Law May Lead To Lawsuit By Board Of Regents
In response to a new law allowing firearms on public college campuses, the Montana Board of Regents will consider whether to file a lawsuit against House Bill 102 which was signed by Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte in February. The law removes the Board of Regents’ ability to enforce restrictions for guns carried on campuses. After hearing Mont...
Gianforte Signs Multiple Infrastructure Bills
Governor Greg Gianforte has signed into law a package of nine bills containing more than $500 million to fund infrastructure projects across the state. The funds are mostly in addition to hundreds of millions of dollars that will be flowing into Montana from the federal American Rescue Plan Act. Most of that money was appropriated in separate ...
Department Of Agriculture Director To Oversee ARPA Funds
A shakeup today with the Montana Department of Agriculture, Governor Greg Gianforte announced that he will be appointing the department’s director Mike Foster to lead the state’s program in distributing federal funds from the American Rescue Plan Act. Foster will work with ARPA commissions and state agencies to recommend how the governor...
Listening Session Held For Gun Policy On School Campuses
At a public meeting Wednesday, about 600 people attended a Board of Regents Academic Research and Student Affairs committee listening session and they received overwhelming feedback to maintain its current policy or pursue litigation regarding House Bill 102. For every comment that offered support for the draft policy to allow guns on campus t...
Gianforte Signs Broadband Infrastructure Bill Into Law
Montana is the 46th ranked state for broadband access according to Federal Communications Commission data published in January. One in three residents in Montana doesn’t have broadband access which is three times the national average and it’s even worse in rural Montana where three in five lack broadband access. Only 12 of the state’s 5...