HB 265 Montana House · 2025 Regular Session

Provide Over-BASE levy authority consistent with inflation adopted by the legislature

HB 265 proposed changes to how Montana school districts manage their general fund budgets, primarily affecting school boards and local taxpayers. The bill would have allowed school boards to increase a previously voter-approved local property tax levy (an "over-BASE levy") by the same inflationary adjustment provided by the legislature for state school funding. This adjustment would not require a new vote from district electors, provided the increase was solely due to the legislative inflation adjustment and stayed within overall budget limits. The bill aimed to improve the alignment of school funding with the defined "basic system" and ensure annual inflationary adjustments are included in the funding formula.
Bill status died 1 of 4 stages cleared
Introduction
Jan 2025
Committee Review
Floor Vote
Governor
Introduced Jan 21, 2025 Last action May 20, 2025
Maddy AI version diff · 1 comparison

What changed between versions

LC2918.pdf HB0265_1.pdf · 2 edits
MINOR
The bill's identifier was officially updated from LC2918 to HB 265, and the list of sponsoring legislators was added to the header. These are administrative updates that clarify the bill's official name and its sponsors, but they do not alter the substantive policy, funding, or legal requirements within the text.
TECHNICAL

The bill number was changed from LC2918 to HB 265 throughout the document.

The names of the bill's sponsors (L. Muszkiewicz, J. Isaly, P. Strand, P. Elverum, M. Romano, M. Thane) were added to the introduction line.

Floor votes

How they voted

No floor votes recorded yet.
Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions
25
Key actions
0
Committee
1
Amendments
1
Feb 7, 2025
Amended
(H) Tabled in Committee - (H) Education
lower
Jan 21, 2025
Committee
(H) Referred to Committee - (H) Education
lower
Jan 21, 2025
Introduced
(H) Introduced
lower
1 primary · 0 co-sponsors

Sponsors

Role
Legislator
Party
State
District
P
Photo of Luke Muszkiewicz
Luke Muszkiewicz
DDemocratic
MT
79