Lieser talks taxes, public land

As I canvass the Whitefish voting district of House District 5, two issues seem to surface repeatedly; taxes and public land management. As your Representative to the Montana House, I would like to share my perspective on both of those issues.

In the 2013 session of the Montana Legislature, the 63rd session, I served on the House tax committee. I requested this assignment because tax fairness is an important value to me and it affects my constituents in many ways.

One of the most significant ways it affects them is in their property taxes. As a relatively small resort community, Whitefish has been able to institute a resort tax that gives every resident of the city a bit of property tax relief.

In addition, there is another program called the Extended Property Tax Assistance Program in the Montana Code that allows low income individuals to phase-in a property tax increase over time.

Neither program sufficiently addresses the problem of hardworking homeowners that live in homes that have appreciated in value to point where they cannot afford to pay their property taxes.

In some cases these are homes that have been in the family for decades or even generations. Certainly one could “cash in” on the appreciated value, but I believe it is unfair to expect a family to sell off an asset that has more sentimental value than money can buy. In some cases, the existing tax system is taxing people out of their home, and not just in Whitefish.

In the 63rd session a bill was written by Sen. Dick Barrett, a retired economics professor from Missoula, that proposed a fix for the situation. He developed a formula that related a homeowners income to their property tax bill, generally referred to as a circuit-breaker tax. This is a progressive form of taxation that gives property tax relief to homeowners with modest working class incomes or fixed incomes if their proper tax increases significantly due to market conditions.

I believed this was a reasonable solution to a problem that affected not only my constituents but many around the state. I testified before the senate finance committee in support of the bill, spoke with the director of the department of revenue, encouraged my colleagues to understand and support the bill.

Ultimately, it failed to pass out of the senate finance committee on a purely partisan vote. Not one Republican supported it.

If reelected I will try again.

Another issue that is on many constituents mind is the proposal to pursue transferring federal lands to the state. I have written about this in the past and the problems it would create for Montana taxpayers.

As a member of the Environmental Quality Council and the subcommittee on Federal Lands, I have been studying this issue for over a year and debated it with colleagues in the legislature.

In a recent opinion article in the Whitefish Pilot, Republican candidate for House District 5 Doug Adams accused Democrats of lying about the intent of those proposing to pursue such a course of action.

I believe that transferring federal lands to the state will result in some of those lands being sold or leased. While it may not be the intent of those proposing the transfer, the consequences of such a course of action are more than a “theoretical possibility.”

Evidence of the likelihood for the sale or lease of state lands is right here in our back yard.

In 2003 there was an effort to develop a subdivision on Montana Trust Lands in the vicinity of Spencer Mountain on the west side of town. Residents did not want to lose the recreational access that would have resulted from development.

A direct consequence to the development proposal was a Neighborhood Planning process that resulted in the establishment of Whitefish Legacy Partners and conservation easements around Beaver Lake. Montana DNRC Trust Lands division has a Real Estate Management Bureau and there are parcels of land for sale right now. It is possible for the state to use the proceeds to purchase other lands through land banking but it is not required.

It is essential that voters understand the potential consequences of taking on the management of federal lands.

I will continue to advocate for working with federal land managers in an effort to reach land management decisions that protect and maintain healthy ecosystems while providing the resources that sustain communities rather than risk losing those public lands to private interests.

— Rep. Ed Lieser is the Democratic candidate for HD5