{"id":16097,"date":"2017-02-06T20:19:51","date_gmt":"2017-02-07T03:19:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=16097"},"modified":"2017-02-06T20:19:51","modified_gmt":"2017-02-07T03:19:51","slug":"legislative-update-monday-feb-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2017\/02\/legislative-update-monday-feb-6\/","title":{"rendered":"Legislative Update: Monday, Feb. 6"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_16098\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 140px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"addboard wp-image-16098 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/Hertz.png\" alt=\"Adam Hertz\" width=\"140\" height=\"197\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Adam Hertz<\/p><\/div>\n<h4>Bill would end Montana&#8217;s death penalty<\/h4>\n<h6>By Cole Grant<\/h6>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/leg.mt.gov\/bills\/2017\/billhtml\/HB0366.htm\">House Bill 366<\/a> would get rid of the death penalty in Montana and replace it with life in prison without the possibility of parole.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe death penalty system, like so many government programs, is wasteful, ineffective, and unjust,&#8221; said bill sponsor\u00a0Rep. Adam Hertz, R-Missoula.<\/p>\n<p>Many of the bill\u2019s proponents, including lawmakers, faith leaders and a former death row inmate, argued the death penalty costs too much money, is morally wrong and takes up too much time in the court system.<\/p>\n<p>But Rep. Seth Berglee, R-Joliet, says he generally supports the death penalty.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think in the justice system, it\u2019s not just about cost,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It\u2019s also about justice and application of justice, so I think that\u2019s an overriding factor.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>No one testified in opposition to the bill at the House Judiciary hearing Monday morning. <a href=\"http:\/\/laws.leg.mt.gov\/legprd\/LAW0203W$BSRV.ActionQuery?P_SESS=20151&amp;P_BLTP_BILL_TYP_CD=&amp;P_BILL_NO=&amp;P_BILL_DFT_NO=LC0279&amp;P_CHPT_NO=&amp;Z_ACTION=Find&amp;P_SBJT_SBJ_CD=&amp;P_ENTY_ID_SEQ=#ba_table\">Last session<\/a>, a similar bill passed committee by one vote but died in the House on a 50-50 vote.<\/p>\n<p><i>Cole Grant is a reporter with the UM Legislative News Service, a partnership of the University of Montana School of Journalism, the Montana Broadcasters Association and the Greater Montana Foundation.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h4>New infrastructure bill considered<\/h4>\n<h6>By Freddy Monares<\/h6>\n<p>Lawmakers in Helena will be considering a bill that would offer grants to local communities to fund infrastructure projects.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/leg.mt.gov\/bills\/2017\/billhtml\/SB0162.htm\">Senate Bill 162<\/a> would divide the state into four quarters, based on population, to distribute up to $40 million for projects. The bill specifically lays out what can be defined as an infrastructure project, which the sponsor, Sen. Keith Regier, R-Kalispell, said is a key provision.<\/p>\n<p>He took issue with a museum being included in an infrastructure bill last session.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhy are we putting money into a museum when we\u2019ve got roads, bridges, school roofs and other things that have a lot of needs?\u201d Regier said.<\/p>\n<p>Under his bill, grant winners would have to come up with matching funds.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey could use money already invested in a project,&#8221; Regier Said. &#8220;Say that a county has been working on a road and they already have several hundred thousand invested in that road, they can use that in their matching portion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Senate Finance and Claims Committee will hear the bill Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p><i>Freddy Monares is a reporter with the UM Legislative News Service, a partnership of the University of Montana School of Journalism, the Montana Broadcasters Association and the Greater Montana Found<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bill would end Montana&#8217;s death penalty By Cole Grant House Bill 366 would get rid of the death penalty in Montana and replace it with life in prison without the possibility of parole. \u201cThe death penalty system, like so many government programs, is wasteful, ineffective, and unjust,&#8221; said bill sponsor\u00a0Rep. Adam Hertz, R-Missoula. Many of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":16098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[5484,1122],"class_list":["post-16097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-death-penalty","tag-montana-legislature","prominence-category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}