Committee hears bill to eliminate nine state agency reports; agencies back change as efficiency move

A Montana House committee heard testimony on House Bill 562 on behalf of several state agencies, a bill that would eliminate nine agency reporting requirements to the Legislature and amend related sections of law.

Representative Julie Darling, the bill sponsor, told the House State Administration Committee that the reports are often outdated or redundant and that agencies and legislators spend time producing and reviewing material that rarely prompts questions. "If you read through the bill, there are 9 agency reports that they would like to eliminate from required reporting to various committees just because a lot of it's redundant," Darling said.

Agency witnesses largely supported the bill. Chris Dorrington, director of the Montana Department of Transportation, said many reporting mandates were helpful when first created but no longer serve the Legislature or the public and consume staff time. "Over the course of time, most of those reports ... really aren't either relevant or they're not relevant for the time," Dorrington said, noting examples such as biodiesel and special fuels inspection reports.

Rebecca Decamara, Medicaid and Health Services director for Montana Medicaid, told the committee the agency does not operate under a managed care organization and described the designated report in the bill as unnecessary. "The report is unnecessary and the department requests a do pass," Decamara said.

Lieutenant Governor Kristin Juras described the measure as part of a broader "red tape relief" effort and said many agency reports are duplicative or already available online. "This does not mean, because some of these reports may be eliminated, that if you have an interest in these areas, they won't respond and provide you the information you need," Juras said.

Mandy Rambo, deputy director at the Department of Commerce, said two items in the bill affect her agency: a socioeconomic report on the impacts of federal land management proposals that has repeatedly stated no local government requests were received since 2011, and a requirement for agencies to report grants during the biennium that Commerce and other agencies already publish electronically.

Erin Weisgerber, deputy director at the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, described two DNRC reports in the bill: an annual state water plan update under the Montana Code Annotated citation mentioned in testimony (MCA 85-1-203) and an annual survey of power generation capacity that includes hydroelectric potential. Weisgerber said updating the state water plan is a multi-year, multi-agency process and that the next revision "is due in 02/1935" as stated in testimony; she said the annual reporting requirement to committees is duplicative because the department makes the plan and related materials available online.

Sponsor Darling and agency witnesses told the committee the information remains available on request and via agency websites, and several witnesses asked the committee for a do-pass recommendation. The transcript recorded no committee vote on the bill during the hearing.

The hearing closed after questions from committee members and the sponsor's final request for a do pass.

The committee packet included a note that an amendment was expected that would add additional reports to the list.