By SANJAY TALWANI Independent Record helenair.com
Thursday, February 17, 2011

A long procession of state university officials, trade association leaders and business people told the House Appropriations Committee Wednesday that a measure to issue $89.9 million in tax-exempt bonds for a variety of projects across the state, including the proposed heritage center at the Montana Historical Society in Helena, would create jobs and pay off in future development of the state’s economy and work force.

“I believe that the projects that are encompassed in this bill will not only bring immediate jobs to the state of Montana, but also it will create an environment that is very conducive to creating jobs in the state well into the future, and we can do it in a fiscally responsible way,” said Rep. Galen Hollenbaugh, D-Helena, the sponsor of House Bill 439 along with Sen. Carol Williams, D-Missoula.

To pass, measures that create debt for the state need a two-thirds majority vote in both the House and Senate. For it to take effect, the state would have to show a budget surplus of $2 million. Hollenbaugh said the bill has 70 co-sponsors.

The bonding would include $23 million for the heritage center planned for construction across Sixth Avenue from the main Montana Historical Society building. With that money, the society would still have to raise another $7 million or more.

Helena Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Cathy Burwell said the project would benefit not just the local economy, but the entire state.

Former Montana First Lady Betty Babcock, Helena Mayor Jim Smith, former Mayor Russ Ritter and Shirley Herrin, past president of the Society of Sons and Daughters of Montana Pioneers, all pointed to the value of the Historical Society to the state and its future generations.

“I’ve seen the look of awe and wonder in their faces,” Smith said of the vast numbers of schoolchildren who visit the state museum.

“One of the greatest gifts you can give to future generations is to inspire them with the knowledge of their own history and heritage,” said Babcock.

In addition to the heritage center, the bond sales would provide $29 million in improvements to the University of Montana-Missoula College of Technology; $14.25 million for the science and technology building at MSU-Billings; nearly $12 million for improvements to state university facilities in Great Falls, Bozeman and Dillon; $6.7 million for consolidation of state laboratories at MSU-Bozeman; and $5 million for a new Southwestern Montana Veterans Home in Butte.

An amendment will come later to add MSU-Northern in Havre to the bill, Hollenbaugh said.

He said that current low interest rates make this is a good time for issuing bonds and embarking on capital improvements.

University professors, administrators and students — and business managers who seek skilled employees for their businesses — described a university system with aging, outdated facilities.

At MSU-Billings, the money would add to and renovate a building constructed in the 1940s, with the campus’s largest backlog of deferred maintenance, plagued by inadequate laboratories.

At MSU-Great Falls College of Technology, it would build a new agriculture and trades building, a twin to the construction trades building built in 2008.

The $29 million project at the UM-Missoula College of Technology would create a new 104,000-square-foot building.

Proponents of the measure said the technology training, especially for nontraditional students, is especially important for workers laid off from traditional Montana industries.

“It is probably the most direct connection to the work force that higher education has,” University of Montana President Royce Engstrom said on the colleges of technology.

“This is not just a jobs bill. This is a careers bill,” said Sheila Stearns, the state Commissioner of Higher Education.

The only person to speak against the bill was Cindy Swank of Poplar, who identified herself as “a taxpayer,” who called the bill an end-around against the state’s balanced budget requirement, and was skeptical of how the bill’s trigger — the $2 million budget surplus — was determined. And she cautioned against the state taking on more debt.

“Sooner or later you have to pay the fiddler,” she said.

The panel took no action Wednesday.

Reporter Sanjay Talwani: 447-4086 or sanjay.talwani@helenair.com