How the 2025 Legislature answered Montana’s big policy questions

✅ ANSWER: Yes. A pair of bills implementing Gianforte’s proposal to lower taxes on homeowners and landlords by, in part, raising taxes on second homes and Airbnb-style vacation rentals passed on the final day of the session. The bills overcame opposition from lawmakers and industry groups worried the measures will mean hefty tax increases for large businesses and Montanans who own multiple homes.

Proponents have said the package will offer “significant” tax relief on properties used as owner-occupied homes or long-term rentals. However, full implementation of the second-home tax and its associated tax shifts won’t happen until 2026, though lawmakers also authorized interim tax rates and $400 rebates this year aimed at tiding over homeowners who have been frustrated by rising tax bills.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? Not yet. But he did post on social media Wednesday thanking lawmakers who helped pass the bills. 

✅❌ ANSWER: Some parts yes, some parts no. The state budget authorized by this year’s Legislature, which started life as Gianforte’s November budget proposal, includes raises for state employees, as well as spending on health and human services provider rate increases, two new district court judges in Billings and a retention fund for state employees. It also factors in a major income tax cut that reduces the state’s top-bracket tax rate from 5.9% to 5.4%, a smaller cut than what Gianforte pitched.

The state’s primary budget bill, House Bill 2, passed with $16.6 billion in spending authorized for the two-year period that opens this July, up about 15% from the budget bill passed in 2023. About $5 billion of the current budget bill is spending from the state General Fund, which is largely filled with state income taxes.

Lawmakers also passed a major endowment proposal, creating a “Growth and Opportunity” trust seeded with more than $500 million from the General Fund. The new trust will backstop the state pension system and housing lending programs in addition to eventually spinning off interest for property tax relief, local bridge repairs, water project maintenance, and child care programs. The trust and other reserve accounts will also help buffer the state budget against potential fallout from federal spending cuts. Lawmakers intend to build it up with “volatile” revenues from sources like capital gains taxes that typically fluctuate year to year.

The roughly $60 million the state collects annually from taxes levied on recreational marijuana also inspired tinkering this session. Lawmakers endorsed two bills giving Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks the ability to put habitat restoration dollars toward private land projects. One of them, dubbed the “cops and conservation bill” by its sponsor, specifies that it would take precedence over the other and also reallocates marijuana taxes currently directed into the General Fund to bolster substance use disorder treatment, police department operations, homelessness support and other initiatives.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? While some budget bills have been signed into law, including state employee raises and the income tax cut, key measures like House Bill 2 have not. Some Republicans have criticized budget bills that passed to the governor with support from moderate Republicans and Democrats, urging Gianforte to wield his veto power over standalone spending bills or line items in the main budget bill to leave the state with a comfortable General Fund balance. It’s also possible that Gianforte will veto the “cops and conservation” marijuana bill in order to let the other measure take effect.

❌ ANSWER: No. A pair of bills developed in the lead-up to the session in an effort to tighten rules that currently let the owners of many high-value homes claim tax breaks by securing an agriculture designation for the land beneath their residences both floundered as opponents balked at voting for tax increases. In many cases, those properties will likely see their tax bills shift as a result of the second-home tax, but it’s difficult at this point to tell precisely how that shift will play out — in part because homes on agricultural properties that don’t qualify as primary residences will be shielded from the full second-home tax.

✅ ANSWER: The Legislature greenlit two bills aimed at expanding Montana’s prison infrastructure, but it will be years until new housing units are complete. House Bill 833 is a $250 million investment in the construction of a new prison, and House Bill 5 is a biennial bill allocating funds for long-term infrastructure projects that included $186 million for new prison dorm units and updated facilities. Construction on new low-security housing units at Montana State Prison, the result of $156 million allocated by the 2023 Legislature, began on April 29 this year and is slated to conclude in October 2027.

It remains unclear whether these investments will enable all Montana inmates to be held in prisons inside the state. Just over 600 Montana men are currently imprisoned out of state.

On April 28, the Legislature passed House Bill 643, which would reimburse counties for Department of Public Health and Human Services inmates in county facilities. Lawmakers rejected a bill that would have prevented a parent prisoner with a child under 13 from being sent out of state, but passed House Bill 707, which would require Department of Corrections officers to consider prisoners’ in-state family in the decision to relocate them outside Montana. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? The governor has not yet signed either prison infrastructure bill, but praised the Legislature’s investment in prison infrastructure during a press event at the Montana State Prison on April 29.

The bills requiring DOC to consider prisoners’ families when making transfers and reimburse DPHHS have not yet been signed by the governor. 

✅ ANSWER: In a word, yes. The 2025 Legislature has already emerged as arguably the most significant in recent memory when it comes to public education funding, and much of the credit for that status goes to one banner proposal: House Bill 252, more commonly known as the STARS Act.

The topline takeaway from that bill is a $100 million investment in raising starting teacher pay. Recent years have seen steady recognition by lawmakers of the low wages Montana’s newest educators receive, and how those wages contribute to a statewide teacher shortage. Building on efforts to increase those salaries in recent sessions, Gianforte included the appropriation in his proposed budget, and a bipartisan majority of lawmakers coalesced around the STARS Act.

But STARS does more than target teacher pay. The bill also increases funding for local schools tied to other licensed staff positions, and pours even more money in the pot for districts with high rates of students pursuing dual credit and professional certification opportunities ahead of graduation. It even enables districts in high-cost-of-living areas to raise money locally for teacher housing.

With those additions, it’s easy to wonder how increasing money for education might impact property tax payers, given the close relationship between the state’s education funding formula and local levies. To that end, lawmakers also passed two high-profile measures designed to drive down or redistribute school-related taxpayer pressures. The first, House Bill 156, would swap out Montana’s current district-specific school levy system for a countywide one, a move its sponsor argued will spread out the burden of local levies. The second, House Bill 483, aims to redirect excess funds collected from the state’s mandatory 95 mills — which equalizes funding between taxbase-poor and taxbase-rich districts — to drive down the local cost of nonvoted levies for basic educational needs such as transportation and teacher retirement.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? Lawmakers sent the STARS Act to the governor’s desk in late April, where it awaits his signature. Both HB 483 and HB 156 are also pending.

✅ ANSWER: Heading into the session, the Legislature’s more education-focused contingent had already identified Montana’s declining math scores as a top priority for school policy work. House Bill 338 aims to shore up those numbers by adding numeracy to the state-funded early childhood intervention programs established last session around literacy, enhancing access to math instruction for children in their earliest years of elementary school.

Lawmakers also continued to prioritize career and technical education, passing a measure to provide state dollars for trade-based instruction at the middle school level as a complement to current federal funding with House Bill 357. The Legislature has also sent bills to Gianforte that add human trafficking to its list of instructional goals for Montana’s public schools, provide funding to the Office of Public Instruction to purchase high-quality instructional materials for local districts to use, and establish a $1-million-per-year mentorship and training program for early career teachers.

For at least the third session in a row, the Legislature engaged in a series of intense debates about classroom lessons on human sexuality. One such bill now on the governor’s desk is House Bill 471 that would create new parental notification and curriculum review requirements for instruction involving gender identity. Democrats and a smattering of Republicans opposed the measure, but it gained enough traction with GOP lawmakers to pass both chambers by early April. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? By mid-April, lawmakers passed HB 338 to the governor, where it is pending his signature. HB 357 was signed into law April 16. Gianforte has not yet acted on the human trafficking, instructional materials or mentorship and training program bills. He has also yet to sign HB 471.

✅ ANSWER: Yes. Among other measures, lawmakers passed House Bill 505, which puts an extra $50 million into a revolving loan fund that helps finance streets, sewer lines and other infrastructure for new residential developments.

Other housing bills include several measures that limit local government zoning powers in an effort to boost housing construction, following on a wave of such legislation passed in 2023. This year’s zoning measures include bills that would restrict city parking requirements and require county zoning to allow accessory dwelling units.

The Legislature also passed a Democrat-sponsored measure that requires property managers to return rental application fees to unsuccessful applicants, except for fees that are used for things like background checks.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED THE BILLS? Not yet. However, the infrastructure funding is a scaled-down version of a measure included in Gianforte’s budget proposal and some of the zoning reform measures reflect recommendations from his housing task force.

✅❌ ANSWER: Child care got significant attention this session in the context of economic and workforce development, with lawmakers widely acknowledging the barriers that affordability and accessibility raise for working Montana families. And the strategies they gravitated toward tended to fall into two distinct categories: income tax support for child care workers and state investments in early childhood infrastructure.

With regard to the former, the Legislature managed to resurrect and pass one proposal in late April: House Bill 456, which would make all child care workers with children of their own eligible for state assistance through the Best Beginnings scholarship program. Child care advocates lined up strongly behind the bill, arguing that it would help address recruitment and retention issues in an industry plagued by low wages. 

Lawmakers debated two competing measures that would have established sizable trust funds at the state level to provide financial support for local businesses, programs and initiatives. They ultimately opted to pass a bill to create several trust-based revenue streams including for bridges, water projects and pensions. Child care was included in the list, with an initial trust fund appropriation of $10 million for efforts supporting early childhood education.

One notable defeat was Senate Bill 321, which aimed to establish a three-pronged tax credit system: a per-child tax credit for Montana families, a tax credit for child care workers and a tax credit for businesses offering direct child care assistance for their employees. A move to blast the bill out of the House Appropriations Committee failed in late April, rendering SB 321 dead.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? Both HB 456 and the trust bill are en route to Gianforte’s desk.

✅ ANSWER: A bill to continue Montana’s Medicaid expansion program, which provides health coverage to low-income adults between 18 and 65, passed the Legislature with bipartisan support in mid-March, capping much of the debate on a significant policy issue fairly early in the session. 

The bill, House Bill 245, was supported by the Montana Chamber of Commerce, the Montana Hospital Association, the Montana Medical Association, other industry associations, tribal governments, and advocates for health care access. Opponents included Republican lawmakers who consistently forecasted state budget woes if federal funding for the program dwindles. Others said the program was a form of socialized medicine that creates dependency on government support. 

Several other bills sponsored by Republicans and Democrats alike used other parts of the Medicaid umbrella as a tool for improving health care access. House Bill 881 allows families to buy into Medicaid to access benefits for children with disabilities. Another bill, Senate Bill 72, allows people seeking home and community-based services to be considered presumptively eligible for Medicaid. Senate Bill 319 creates a pathway for doula care to be reimbursable through Medicaid, while House Bill 585 increases reimbursement rates for physical therapists and occupational therapists who see Medicaid patients. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? Gianforte signed HB 245, the Medicaid expansion bill, in late March. As of May 1, the governor has not approved any of the other Medicaid-related policies listed here.

✅❌ ANSWER: After voters approved Constitutional Initiative 128 in November, lawmakers in the 69th Legislature struggled to advance restrictive abortion measures typical of prior sessions. A bill to create a felony for abortion “trafficking” inside or outside Montana’s borders, House Bill 609, was tabled in committee in February. Two bills that would have created regulations for medication abortions failed to pass a House committee and a Senate floor vote, respectively. Another bill to advance a constitutional amendment defining personhood from the time of conception, House Bill 316, passed both chambers but failed to meet the two-thirds majority requirement to clear the Legislature. 

Two bills rooted for by anti-abortion advocates did pass both chambers. One, House Bill 388, would create legal protections for crisis pregnancy centers that counsel women against having abortions. Another, House Bill 723, would require medical facilities to file annual reports detailing abortion procedures and outcomes in Montana, including situations “in which an infant is born alive subsequent to an abortion or attempted abortion.”

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? The Legislature’s bill tracking website shows that Gianforte has not signed HB 723. A press release from his office May 2 said he has signed HB 388.

✅❌ ANSWER: Lawmakers spent portions of the 2025 session digging into proposed changes to Montana’s behavioral health system, prior-authorization laws for insurance companies and vaccine legislation. 

Among the most high-impact proposals that advanced to the governor’s desk, lawmakers approved funding in the long-term infrastructure bill, House Bill 5, for a new mental health facility to decrease pressure on the state hospital. Bills to protect insurance coverage for people with chronic conditions and cancer, Senate Bill 447, House Bill 398 and Senate Bill 422, also cleared both chambers. On vaccine policies, lawmakers ultimately voted down a bill to create an “informed consent” exemption for vaccination requirements in child care and day care centers, Senate Bill 474. Lawmakers also blocked a bill to once again allow the state to collect vaccination data from local school districts, House Bill 364. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? The governor announced on Friday that he had signed House Bill 398. None of the other bills that made it to Gianforte’s desk have received his stamp of approval.

❎ ANSWER: Members of Montana’s American Indian Caucus say the 2025 legislative session may have been the group’s most successful yet. Caucus members made history this year, successfully advancing a bill that would establish Indigenous Peoples Day as a state-recognized holiday through both the House and Senate. The caucus also passed priority legislation that extends the Montana Indian Child Welfare Act, combats the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People crisis and strengthens the state’s Indian Language Preservation program. House Bill 2, which determines the state’s budget, also includes several new investments for Indian Country — a historic increase in funding for tribal colleges and funds to support repatriation efforts at the University of Montana. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? As of May 2, Gianforte signed House Bill 83, establishing a revenue account for the state’s Missing Indigenous Persons Task Force. It was the first of American Indian Caucus priority bills to be signed into law. While the other bills have been transmitted to Gianforte’s desk, he has not yet signed them.

✅ ANSWER: Republican lawmakers introduced — and passed — major overhauls to the Montana Environmental Policy Act, the 54-year-old law directing state agencies to study and disclose large projects’ environmental impacts. Some proposals, such as Senate Bill 221, were drafted directly in response to the Held v. Montana decision the Montana Supreme Court issued last year directing the state to disclose the climate impacts of large fossil fuel projects. SB 221 specifies what types of greenhouse gas emissions state agencies must inventory — but explicitly directs them not to regulate them.

Lawmakers also changed MEPA, which was modeled on the National Environmental Policy Act, in more general ways. As a result of House Bill 285, environmental nonprofits and impacted citizens and businesses will have a narrower path to challenging large projects in court. The bill garnered widespread support from Republican lawmakers and industry groups.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? Gianforte conducted ceremonial bill signings for SB 221 and HB 285 on May 1.  

✅❌ ANSWER: Despite the best efforts of a stakeholder group that met over the interim, an attempt to overhaul how the state administers wells exempted from the usual water-right permitting process failed to garner sufficient support at the Capitol. Senate Bill 358, which was drafted partially in response to a ruling rejecting the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation’s treatment of a phased 42-unit development reliant on exempt wells, encountered early and sustained headwinds in the 69th Legislature. In Montana code — if not in courts’ interpretations of the Montana Water Use Act — exempt wells remain untouched.

Another water policy debate that resurfaced this session relates to numeric water quality standards for nitrogen and phosphorus. House Bill 664, an effort to strike numbers-based standards and replace them with more subjective narrative standards (undesirable aquatic life or smell, for example), garnered support from the Montana Department of Environmental Quality and two-thirds of the Legislature. Its reception with federal regulators, which rejected a similar measure from 2021, remains to be seen. 

Another deja vu bill lawmakers debated this session revises what constitutes “material damage” of waterways impacted by coal mining. A bill from last session seeking to loosen those regulations failed to pass federal muster, so lawmakers took another run at it with House Bill 587. Industry groups such as Westmoreland Mining supported it, and agricultural operators frustrated with a lack of recourse for compromised water supplies opposed it.

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? HB 664 has been signed by the governor.  HB 587 is awaiting his pen.

✅ ANSWER: Lawmakers set new limits on how late people could register to vote. Senate Bill 490 changes the deadline for registering to vote or changing voter information. Previously, voters could register on Election Day as long as they were in line to do so by 8 p.m. The new law limits same-day registration to noon on Election Day. Early registration ends at 5 p.m. Saturday before Election Day. There is no longer registration the Monday before the general election. Opponents of the bill argued that limiting voter registration is unconstitutional.

Student identification can now be used as proof for voting in Montana elections under Senate Bill 276.

The Legislature on April 28 passed Senate Bill 226, which requires that petition signatures for ballot initiatives be submitted in increments, rather than on a single deadline. County-level election officials argued that the multiple deadlines would make the flow of signatures easier to manage, but grassroots petition groups trying to get on the ballot without using paid signature gatherers told lawmakers that meeting multiple deadlines would make qualifying for the ballot more difficult. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? SB 490 is on its way to the governor, as is SB 276. Gianforte has already signed the bills related to removing some provisional registered voters from the rolls, prevent a voter’s registration from being canceled without their signature and accept obituaries as proof of a voter’s death. SB 226 is also on its way to the governor.

❌✅ ANSWER: There were 27 bills crafted by a select Senate committee to “reign in the courts” but only seven were passed by the Legislature. 

Bills to require judicial candidates to declare a political party died, despite being an explicit priority for Republican legislative leadership and Gianforte.

Bills becoming law include House Bill 39, which repeals a state law banning political parties from contributing to judicial campaigns.

Senate Bill 30 concerns the “rule of necessity” which governs when a judge can still rule on a case despite a personal interest. Senate Bill 38 is specific to court orders calling for lawmakers to be polled on whether to override a veto. Under the law, if the vote isn’t overridden, the person who sought the court order cannot receive attorney’s fees. Senate Bill 39 sets terms for what attorney’s fees can be charged in civil cases and requires the charges to be reasonable. Senate  Bill 41 requires that substitute judges be assigned to cases randomly. Senate Bill 45 will create a judicial performance evaluation system the public can access to learn about how judges are reviewed. Senate Bill 48 removes a ban on citizens discussing complaints against judges before matter is settled by the Judicial Standards Commission. 

🖊️ HAS THE GOVERNOR SIGNED IT? Gianforte has signed HB 39. Gianforte amended SB 45 and sent it back to lawmakers, who OK’d his changes. The rest of the bills are en route to his desk.