A vote on House Bill 808 was delayed Friday in part because its sponsor, Rep. Edith Clark, R-Sweetgrass, was too ill to attend the floor session, said House Speaker Scott Sales, R-Bozeman.
“We’re working on that bill,” Sales said. “That’s a tough one.”
On Thursday, the politically polarized House rejected some amendments to add money to the $3 billion budget, and then defeated the bill, 54-46. All 49 Democrats, joined by four Republicans and one Constitution Party member, voted against it, while 46 Republicans voted for it.
Afterward, Republican House leaders said they were prepared to offer an amendment Friday to cut the Department of Public Health and Human Services’ budget to only $300 for two years from the proposed $3 billion. This agency’s budget pays for the states’ mental health hospital in Warm Springs, the Children’s Health Insurance Plan, Medicaid, which is the federal-state health insurance plan for poor people, and hundreds of other programs.
The GOP goal was to lower the health and human services budget enough to attract enough votes to pass the bill to the Senate, which is expected to restore most of the money.
On Thursday, Rep. Bill Glaser, R-Huntley, had proposed the $300 budget option for public health and human services, only to yank the amendment when he thought there was enough support to pass the bill without it.
Asked Friday if he would offer the amendment again, Glaser said, “If that’s what it takes.”
Sales said Glaser’s amendment remains a possibility, “but we’re keeping our options open.”
“It would be nice if we got a little Democratic help,” Sales said. “It’s amazing that you can put out a 20 percent increase in human services, and they’ll thumb their noses at it.”
House Democrats have united against the four House budget bills. They are angry that Republicans changed how the Legislature handles the state budget and switched to eight spending bills instead of the single budget bill the Legislature used for 30 years.
“The Republicans just will not accept that 49 Democrats, seeking to balance the budget and help Montanans, have committed themselves to opposing these bills and this process, not as gamesmanship, but because we are legitimately worried about the content, the political way they were put together and the constitutional legal problems they raise,” said House Minority Floor Leader Art Noonan, D-Butte.
Republicans argue that the multiple budget bill approach provides more accountability, offers more scrutiny and allows lawmakers to vote for some budget bills and against others instead of having to vote on a single state spending bill.
Meanwhile, the House Appropriations Committee on Friday morning heard and quickly endorsed, on identical party-line 11-8 votes, the final three Republican budget bills, without any amendments.
Republicans split HB804 into three bills, HB818-820, covering the judicial, legislative and certain elected officials’ offices and other agencies respectively. They feared HB804’s title was too broad and could have allowed Senate Democrats to fold all budget bills into it to return to a single appropriations bill.
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