"Free HB 13!" say state employees

3-8-13

 

State Superintendent Denise Juneau and MEA-MFT member Jill Cohenour: "5 & 5"

Next Free HB 13 event: Wed., March 13, noon to 1:00, outside Room 102 at the capitol. Let Rich Aarstad know you're coming: rkaarstad@msn.com

 

What you can do: Email House Appropriations Committee. Ask them to pass HB 13 out of committee with no amendments.

 

More than 30 Montana state employees lined the halls outside the House Appropriations Committee March 8 during their lunch break, holding signs saying, “Free HB 13” and "Get Out of Jail Free Card needed." 

 

The signs showed House Bill 13 behind bars. This event comes on top of a musical "flash mob" appearance and two Days of Action.  

 

House Bill 13 is the state employee pay plan. The House Appropriations Committee held its hearing on the bill way back in January and has still not taken action on the bill. It’s a scenario eerily similar to the 2011 session, when the legislature delayed action on the pay plan bill until the very end of the session, then killed it.

 

Rich Aarstad, an archivist at the Montana Historical Society, said, “We’re here today as state employees asking that the House Appropriations  Committee move on House Bill 13 and get it out of committee to the House Floor.”

 

State employees politely greeted committee members as they left the committee room. The employees then took their signs upstairs and lined the hall outside the House of Representatives chambers, greeting legislators as they entered the chambers.

 

Brady Minow Smith, a public defender, said “State employees including myself need this bill out of committee so we can actually get it moving through the legislature.”

 

Dave Feldman, a water quality specialist at the Dept. of Environmental Quality who protects Montana’s streams, held a sign saying, “Move HB 13.”  “We’re here supporting House Bill 13, hopefully to get it moved out of committee,” he said.

 

House Bill 13 contains a 5% base pay increase for state employees, whose base pay has been frozen going on five years. The pay freeze has hurt state employees and their families, but it has equally hurt the state’s economy. State employees live, work, and shop for goods and services in communities all across the state. The 5% increase would have a positive ripple effect throughout Montana’s economy.

 

State employees say they’ll be back in the halls next week. Stay posted.

 

The House Appropriations Committee has not yet scheduled executive action on HB 13. Rumor has it, it might happen March 13, but many people are betting not.