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Montana politics, elections and legislative news

Montana Legislature Considers Pay Increase For Lawmakers

Montana House of Representatives.
Montana Public Radio
Montana House of Representatives.

Montana state lawmakers will get a slight uptick in their pay during the next legislative session. The roughly 20 cent per hour raise was part of a 1 percent increase to all state employees’ pay approved  last year. Lawmakers are also looking at ways to update their budgets for communicating with constituents.

Lawmakers cannot vote to change their own pay, but can change compensation rates and rules for future legislatures, and they did that in 2017. They’ll be getting paid just under $12 dollars per hour each legislative day starting in 2019.

The Subcommittee on Legislator Compensation met in Helena, today. It reports to the Legislative Council, which is considering changing a law that went into effect last summer that gives each lawmaker a stipend of $3,000 for expenses related to communicating with and representing constituents.

"Because it’s done that way, there are not a lot of reporting requirements," says Great Falls Republican Senator Ed Buttrey, who sits on both the Legislator Compensation subcommittee, and the Legislative Council.

The council is a bipartisan group of lawmakers who will make the call on whether to draft any bills that could change lawmaker pay following the 2019 session. The subcommittee voted today to send the council proposals that could change how their stipends can be taxed and recorded and meet enforceable ethical standards. The council will also consider a proposal to raise lawmaker pay based on the average pay of legislators in five neighboring states.

Base pay for lawmakers in Montana is currently less than the regional five-state average, according to state legislative staff analysis.

Lawmakers’ challenge is to balance public perception that they're writing themselves bigger paychecks, with providing enough pay to make a position in the citizen legislature accessible to people who have to work other jobs for a living. All at a time when state agencies are cutting programs and laying off staff due to a state budget shortfall. 

During the next session, Montana lawmakers will make  $92.46 per legislative day. 

Corin Cates-Carney manages MTPR’s daily and long-term news projects. After spending more than five years living and reporting across Western and Central Montana, he became news director in early 2020.
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