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Committee trims House Bill 1168 to 10‑mill property tax buydown and advances measure
Summary
The House Finance and Taxation Committee amended House Bill 1168 to reduce a proposed mill‑levy buydown to 10 mills, approved the change by roll call and recommended the bill for passage with that change. Sponsors and tax officials discussed fiscal notes and how the measure would interact with existing school mill limits.
House Finance and Taxation Committee Chairman Hedlund on Thursday advanced House Bill 1168 after the committee adopted an amendment that cuts the bill's mill‑levy buydown to 10 mills.
Representative Lausser, the bill's sponsor, told the committee the amendment before members would change his earlier 30‑mill proposal to a smaller buy‑down and that he planned to return in a later session for additional relief. "The amendment that I'm bringing before your committee would be a 30 mil buy down for all property types," Representative Lausser said when presenting his initial change; later amendments reduced that to 10 mills.
The committee discussed fiscal estimates and statutory interaction: committee members and staff referenced earlier fiscal notes, school district mill caps and where the bill's language fits in the code. Representative Lausser described earlier estimates that a 60‑mill buyout would have produced a fiscal note around $787,000,000 and said a 30‑mill, all‑property approach seemed likely to cost about $360–365,000,000 based on informal tallies and comparison to a senate bill he cited.
Members asked how the change would affect levy limitations and whether school district mills were included. Representative Lausser said the bill does not alter the separate statutory limits that apply to school districts; "So everywhere where it said 60, we're changing it to 30," he said while explaining the drafting that originally reduced a 60‑mill cap to 30 in the text then later to 10 after amendment.
Representative Porter moved a further amendment to reduce the buy‑down from 30 mills to 10 mills, saying a 10‑mill option—estimated by him at about $120,000,000 using a $12,000,000 per‑mill rough figure—was more likely to be considered alongside other property tax relief measures. The committee adopted the 10‑mill amendment on a roll call vote recorded in the transcript as 13 yes, 1 no, 0 absent. The committee then recommended a "do pass" on House Bill 1168 with the 10‑mill buy‑down; that committee recommendation was recorded later in the transcript as 12 yes, 1 no, 1 abstain.
Tax department and education staff answered drafting questions. Charles Dendy, general counsel for the tax department, told members he could not resolve all school‑funding interactions and recommended policymakers consult Department of Public Instruction staff for precise effects on school funding language and mill‑count references. Amy Kopas of the North Dakota Council of Educational Leaders (NDCEL) reviewed where earlier buy‑downs changed the statutory mill totals and confirmed wording adjustments were required in section references when altering the mill counts.
The committee debated whether the bill could prompt renewed ballot measures and whether a smaller buydown would blunt that risk; Representative Steiner asked whether sponsors in Minot would consider the smaller buy‑down sufficient to avoid returning to voters, and Representative Lausser replied he was not overly concerned at this stage and preferred to see the final legislative package before predicting voter responses.
The committee recorded votes on the amendments and the final committee recommendation and carried the bill forward with the 10‑mill change for further consideration in the legislative process.
Votes at the committee level do not itself enact law; subsequent floor action and any conference with the senate will determine final text and fiscal notes.
