{"id":16755,"date":"2017-03-22T16:28:31","date_gmt":"2017-03-22T22:28:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=16755"},"modified":"2017-03-22T16:28:31","modified_gmt":"2017-03-22T22:28:31","slug":"legislative-update-wednesday-march-22","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2017\/03\/legislative-update-wednesday-march-22\/","title":{"rendered":"Legislative Update: Wednesday, March 22"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"SF\"<\/a>

Steve Fitzpatrick<\/p><\/div>\n

Mail-in-ballot bill up for hearing in House<\/h4>\n

By Freddy Monares<\/h6>\n

A contentious bill that would allow counties to opt for mail-in ballots for the upcoming special election to fill now-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke\u2019s vacated congressional seat is advancing in the Legislature.<\/p>\n

Senate Bill 305<\/a> passed the Senate in February and gets its first hearing in the House on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The bill\u2019s sponsor, Sen. Steve Fitzpatrick, R-Great Falls, said mail-in ballots could save counties up to $500,000. \u00a0During debate on the bill last month, recorded by the Legislature, he also said the percentage of people voting by mail ballot has skyrocketed.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost people vote by mail,” he said, “and we don\u2019t have problems with fraud or any of these other things that people think they\u2019re going to get from mail-in ballots.”<\/p>\n

Republican House Speaker Austin Knudsen has been a vocal opponent of the bill. A spokesperson for Knudsen said in an email statement that the speaker has concerns about the process eliminating choice for some voters and that he questions the security of the ballots.<\/p>\n

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 Foundation.<\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Brewers back plan to raise production limits<\/h4>\n
By Cole Grant<\/h6>\n

Nearly a dozen brewers testified at the Montana Legislature Wednesday on a bill that would raise a small brewery\u2019s production cap six-fold.<\/p>\n

Matt Leow with the Montana Brewers Association said raising the 10,000-barrel limit for small operations to 60,000 barrels would unleash potential for Montana brewers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWouldn\u2019t that be great if instead of just seeing beer from California, Oregon, Washington, Colorado on our shelves, that we were seeing Montana beer when we go visit places like Seattle?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

John Iverson with the Montana Tavern Association saids he\u2019d support House Bill 541<\/a> with a caveat: that the Legislature pass another bill that would allow certain beverage license holders to add a brewery or distillery operation\u00a0to their business.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re saying here\u2019s something that you guys like, and here\u2019s something that we like, let\u2019s put them together and let this industry go for it,\u201d Iverson said.<\/p>\n

The bill passed the House 85-14 in February. It\u2019s sponsored by two Republicans and a Democrat.<\/p>\n

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>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mail-in-ballot bill up for hearing in House By Freddy Monares A contentious bill that would allow counties to opt for mail-in ballots for the upcoming special election to fill now-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke\u2019s vacated congressional seat is advancing in the Legislature. Senate Bill 305 passed the Senate in February and gets its first hearing in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":16756,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[2043,5665,1122],"class_list":["post-16755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-breweries","tag-mail-in-balloting","tag-montana-legislature","prominence-category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16755","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=16755"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16758,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16755\/revisions\/16758"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}