Rep. Dan Ruby said at a legislative forum in Minot Saturday that he usually supports more money for roads but voted against the bill because the proposed method of distribution creates new funds, similar to the Prairie Dog funds, rather than using the current gas tax distribution formula for political subdivisions.

“I’m kind of hoping the Senate either amends that out or does something with that, but maybe they will just kill it because they don’t want the increase, he said.

House Bill 1382 passed the House 53-32 and was sent to the Appropriations Committee.

Opposition to raising taxes so far has helped kill House Bill 1570, which would have increased the state’s tax on tobacco and vapes, legislators said. The bill would have placed some of the money in a new fund for behavioral health services and some into the state general fund.

Jill Schramm/MDN Sen. Randy Burckhard speaks at Saturday’s legislative forum. At left is Minot Mayor Tom Ross.

“We have a lot of money in the general fund. We don’t need more money,” Ruby said.

“Then the other thing was ‘Well we need to do it as a deterrent to young people because they wouldn’t be able to afford vape products.’ My comment was ‘You’ve got to be kidding.’ These kids, what they spend on their phones and gaming and all the other things, they have the money to do this. This isn’t going to be a deterrent,” he said. “When you think about raising people’s taxes on gas and then on tobacco, if there are lower income, middle income people that are already struggling, they don’t need to pay more taxes.”

Legislators at the Minot Area Chamber EDC forum also provided updates on other bills that failed in either the House or Senate and are no longer in consideration. Among them are bills installing chaplains in public schools, capping increases in the state general fund budget at 3% a biennium and attempting to protect private property owners in the path of carbon dioxide pipelines, including prohibiting companies from using eminent domain.

A bill proposing to base property taxes on square footage rather than assessments has been turned into an interim study, while the House bill containing the governor’s proposal to increase the property tax rebate on a primary residence to $1,500, using Legacy Fund dollars, remains alive but has not yet been voted on.

Despite a committee’s “do not pass” recommendation, the House voted 61-32 to pass House Bill 1255 and eliminate about $1.5 million in state funding for Prairie Public Broadcasting. Ruby said the funds are a small percentage of the broadcaster’s overall funding and would not affect its ability to operate.

The House sent HB 1255 to the Appropriations Committee, which is sending it out with a 17-2 “do not pass” recommendation. Ruby said his view is the bill will have a hard chance of passing when it returns to the House for a second vote.

The House is moving forward a bill to spend $140 million on free school lunches for all students.

Sen. Jose Castaneda said he has opposed free school lunch bills because those who can afford school lunches should pay. Federal programs already provide free or reduced price meals for lower income families, and Castaneda said there definitely should be programs to help lower income families.

Sen. Randy Burckhard said the Legislature is giving more scrutiny to appropriations bills as the session goes along. The government operations section of Senate Appropriations recently trimmed a $50 million request for rural community endowment funds to $5 million, he said.

“The reason we did that is we’re approaching this point of the session where we have to look at how far off or how wacko we are on our finances. And right now, approaching the crossover point, we’re, like, $3 billion in the red,” he said.

The next legislative forum will be Saturday, March 15, at 9 a.m. at the State Fair Center.