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Uncommon Ground

Tricky Coyotes

Lawmakers are making old-time homeowners pay way more state property taxes so maybe some newcomers might move to Montana

By Mike Jopek

The Legislature is in Helena for another three months and your wallet is unsafe. Keep your freedoms secured, fairness is defined by Montana lawmakers.

I was once sequestered in Helena gladhanding fellow lawmakers, isolated away for my hometown locals, and stuck debating with hundreds of lobbyists, day in and night out. I get the twisted sentiment people feel toward politics, especially now that I’m on the home side of the Capitol, back on the farm for so many years.

Lawmakers discuss ad nauseam the best way to confuse homeowners on why state property taxes increased so dramatically over the last four years for home and business owners. It’s pretty simple stuff but nefariously clouded by smoke. The state revalued homes, small businesses and farms by over a hundred billion dollars while lawmakers say state property taxes increased by magic.

Budget analysts, using state revenue department numbers, predict that home and business owners should expect their state property taxes to increase by $465 million over the upcoming four years as a result of state reappraisals. That’s on top of the $200 million state property tax increase homeowners already paid from the 2023 state revaluation.

The combined effect is a whopping $665 million state property tax increase due simply to the process lawmakers enacted to revalue existing homes, farms, and small businesses every couple of years. This state tax increase is compounding, baked into the property tax cake, growing permanently every couple of years, likely until home and business owners revolt and say enough already to the Legislature.

The local impacts are much starker as only homes and businesses tax values were allowed to spike with legislative actions, causing massive tax breaks for industry that are paid for by, you guessed it, homes and business.

There are two bills in the Legislature that stop the madness and let people just keep their dollars. Home and small businesses should pay no extra state property taxes after a state reappraisal. It’s lawmakers’ choice whether to let you keep your money upfront or require paperwork to get a portion back someday later.

HB 213 by Rep. Ed Byrne, R-Bigfork, and SB 189 by Sen. Mary Ann Dunwell, D-Helena, say that you should keep your money, don’t even send it to the state. This maverick pair are cosponsoring the proven method to stop the taxing effect of state property reappraisals. Proven, I say because every governor since our Constitution was enacted, more than 50 years ago, cut the tax rate multiplier when the state increased home tax values.

Yet, leadership on all sides of the aisle is busy compromising amongst themselves, the second floor of the Capitol, and the hundreds of lobbyists who run the show. Their task to design the best, most complicated way to someday later, return to you, a small portion of the money they previously forced you to send to the state, versus just letting homeowners keep it in the first place.

And to add insult, they’re jokingly insisting you gotta be at least 5 feet 9 inches tall to qualify for any property tax relief in their oddball compromise, riddled with paperwork and assorted verification. And get this, they’re gonna give a bunch of your home tax increase dollars to someone else whom lawmakers insist are more deserving.

Lawmakers want grandma to fill out all sorts of nonsensical paperwork to see if she can get a portion of her state property tax increase back for a home she’s lived in for last 40 years. You know the paperwork I’m talking about; the tax people always make their paperwork so damn simple, easy to figure out and file timely.

Home and business owners will soon receive the next revaluation notices, complete with the next outrageous state increase. You got one two years ago after lawmakers left Helena. Recall the fury. And again, instead of letting you keep your cash, lawmakers want you to send the state the tax increase, and then apply to get a portion back, but only if you’re tall enough or poor enough to understand the paperwork.

Schools across the state are firing teachers, seeking local levies to fill their budget gaps as Montana won’t help. Levy the locals, lawmakers say, you can’t use the state property tax increases because we’re giving those dollars to someone else.

The simplest reason your state property taxes will keep increasing so dramatically is because lawmakers want to cut state income taxes permanently for others. Income taxes are one big state funder of public schools.

Lawmakers seek less top-end state income taxes in Montana and more middle-class state property taxes to fund public education. The Constitution says they gotta balance the budget after all. Might as well make home and business owners pay more, lawmakers muse.

Lawmakers are making old-time homeowners pay way more state property taxes so maybe some newcomers might move to Montana and get a big, top-end state income tax cut. Luckily for the rest of us, there’s still a few mavericks left in Helena. Byrne and Dunwell are siding with farmers, home and business owners. Other lawmakers should follow their lead.