Mike Jopek

Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer joined Republican Lt. Gov. John Bohlinger and 93-year-old former Republican Secretary of State Verner Bertelsen in signing a citizens’ initiative to place on the November ballot a policy that states, “corporations are not entitled to constitutional rights because they are not human beings.”

The ballot initiative seeks Montana policy that charges state and federally elected officials with enactment.

“It’s never been a concern of the people of Montana to stand up to Washington, D.C. We did it on the Patriot Act, we did it on Real ID and we’ll do it on bribery,” said Schweitzer.

The long-term goal of the proposal is to overturn the unpopular 5-4 Citizens United decision by the United States Supreme Court that allows direct corporate spending on national, state and local elections.

This year, the Montana Supreme Court upheld the citizen-approved Montana’s Corrupt Practices Act banning corporate contributions in elections. The act resulted from nefarious acts in the Montana Legislature where big money was essentially buying votes in selecting the next U.S. senator. Montanans themselves adopted the ban.

Earlier, Chief Justice John Roberts penned an opinion explaining why his U.S. Supreme Court overruled a prior decision. The Roberts court opened the way for secret money. It fostered super PACs and allowed a mere handful of super-wealthy Americans to peddle influence in our elections.

Recently Schweitzer was on MSNBC’s “Hardball” with Chris Matthews. Matthews said that, “All this money of running a campaign is down to less than 50 people right now.” Matthews pointed that since January of 2011, 46 people and corporations have contributed $110 million to campaigning.

Schweitzer was frank with Matthews, saying, “In 1977 Congress said the Corrupt Foreign Practices Act made it against the law for American corporations to bribe politicians in other countries. Now they’re saying they can bribe them in the United States.”

Last week, the Washington Post reported that 100 top firms face anti-bribery investigations for practices outside the U.S.

Schweitzer is one of only a handful of recent governors in America not accepting campaign money from political action committees. He won two terms.

Previously, Schweitzer helped pass a successful Montana citizens’ initiative mandating a two-year cooling off period for the revolving door of lawmakers becoming a lobbyist.

In 2007, Schweitzer backed a bill requiring lobbyists to disclose expenditures while the citizen Legislature met in Helena. Republicans – on a straight party line vote – killed the bill that would have required lobbyists to itemize expenses of $5 or more on “wining and dining” legislators with “thick steaks and whiskey.”

Recently, Vice President Joe Biden told the annual conference of the YWCA, “This is not your father’s Republican Party.” Former GOP governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, reinforced the statement in a recent the Los Angeles Times’ op-ed, stating, “It’s time to stop thinking of the Republican Party as an exclusive club where your ideological card is checked at the door…”

The 2011 Montana Legislature was full of fanatics. Lawmakers were too infatuated with a multitude of social bills – like banning federal funding to Planned Parenthood – to cap property taxes for people living in their homes or pass meaningful reform.

Old time Republicans like Bohlinger and Bertelsen remember the reasons to keep corporate and secret money out of our elections. But the new brand of Republican is deeply conflicted.

Democracy works better with one person and one vote, not super-saturated with secret and corporate cash.

Schweitzer sparked a “prairie fire” for reform by signing onto the citizens’ initiative.

The Montanans putting the question of corporate personhood onto the November ballot are signaling a path for Americans to follow. They are saying that corporations are not people.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

For nearly three decades Montana has banned the practice of basing insurance premiums upon a person’s gender. Last year, a new brand of lawmaker nearly repealed Montana’s unisex insurance laws. Unisex laws are gender-blind.

In 2005, Senate Bill 351 by Duane Grimes, R-Clancy, was tabled by a Democratic-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee.

In 2008, when running for state auditor, Grimes referred to SB 351: “I think it’s politically unfair that you were after me for discriminating against women because of bills I’ve carried in the past.”

Grimes lost that race to Democrat Monica Lindeen. Lindeen contended that if a larger pool does not share the cost for things like gynecological care and maternity coverage, then women bear the sole burden.

In 2009, Senate Bill 142 by Gary Perry, R-Manhattan, passed the Republican-controlled Senate but failed in the Democratic-controlled House.

“For 25 years, no Legislature has overturned it and there is good reason why every attempt has failed,’’ said Lindeen at the SB 142 hearings. ‘‘Why would we tolerate women paying more for their health insurance?’’

But in 2011, House Bill 283 by Liz Bangerter, R-Helena, passed the Legislature. Republicans banded together as one voting bloc. The new brand of GOP lawmakers included Rep. Derek Skees, R-Whitefish, the candidate now seeking to unseat Lindeen as the next insurance commissioner.

GOP lawmakers sent gender-based insurance legislation to Gov. Brian Schweitzer, only to meet his veto.

With his veto Schweitzer wrote, “Yet, as a society, we understand that it would be socially repugnant to allow different insurance rates or benefits on grounds of an individual’s race or religion. Using a constitutional framework, there is no difference between the prohibition on setting insurance rates and benefits based on race or religion and the same prohibition as applied to gender. These classifications are equally and expressly prohibited.”

Schweitzer referred to the Individual Dignity provision of the Montana Constitution, which states, “The dignity of the human being is inviolable. No person shall be denied the equal protection of the laws. Neither the state nor any person, firm, corporation, or institution shall discriminate against any person in the exercise of his civil or political rights on account of race, color, sex, culture, social origin or condition, or political or religious ideas.”

Recently, the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors hosted a Republican debate for the gubernatorial primary in early June.

The attending GOP candidates pledged to sign into law the practice of letting insurance companies use gender when evaluating insurance risk. These Republican men, including presumptive frontrunner Rick Hill, said they would all support the insurance industry at next year’s Legislature.

“It is a crazy law,” declared candidate Corey Stapleton, who in 2001 sponsored a bill to repeal the gender exclusion.

In a report, which examined other states that allow gender bias, the National Women’s Law Center said that companies charge women more than men for similar coverage. Gender-based premiums cost women $1 billion more annually.

The Center pointed that even with maternity coverage excluded, nearly one-third of plans charge 25- to 40-year-old women roughly one-third more than men for the same coverage. Gender-based insurance in South Dakota charges a 40-year-old woman over $1,200 more than a man of the same age.

Lt. governor candidate Sen. Jon Sonju, R-Kalispell, has a track record of voting for gender-based insurance. The Hill and Sonju gubernatorial team is mistaken in assuming that women – most of the electorate – will tolerate more gender-based political shenanigans.

With Hill and the new brand of Republicans supporting gender profiling, women voters may well opt for a Democrat in the governor’s office to veto any “socially repugnant” bills that pass the Legislature.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

The conservative Tax Foundation is a Washington, D.C. based think tank with a long history of publishing research studies and comparing state tax policy. The foundation receives funding from big corporations and far-right political groups.

Tax Freedom Day is the foundation’s point of the year when Americans have earned enough money to pay for taxes. The date is crudely calculated by taking taxes paid in the current year, divided by the nation’s income for the year.

This year, that day nationally was April 17. The latest the date has fallen was May 1, 2000.

The foundation rates Montana’s business tax climate as very favorable, ranking it No. 8 out of the 50 states. The foundation rates Montana’s state and local tax burden well below the national average.
On state and local property taxes per capita, Montana ranks in the middle of the pack at 23 out of 50. On individual income taxes, Montana rates lower than average at No. 17.

Montana still has no statewide sales tax. And plenty of us like it that way.

Montana is one of a handful of states that reasonably weathered the economic meltdown spurred by gamblers on Wall Street. Montana has a growing $400 million budget surplus, thanks to the frugal financial management of Gov. Brian Schweitzer.

Personal income increased over 5 percent from last year, which will boost Montana’s budget forecast. But since these forecasts are politically amended by legislators, they are often wrong. Schweitzer simply refers to the more than $341 million of cold hard cash in the bank.

During his tenure as governor, Schweitzer made a practice of cutting taxes. From lowering taxes on energy production, to multiple tax cuts on business equipment, to new property tax credits, to a historic $100 million property tax rebate distributed equally to homeowners.

But instead of finding a permanent property tax fix for homeowners living in high-growth regions, Republicans controlling the 2011 Montana Legislature had another idea. The GOP put onto the primary ballot a referendum that would result in an automatic tax credit when budget revenue reaches 25 percent more than what was politically projected by legislators.

On Legislative Referendum 123, former Republican Montana secretary of state and state Senate president Bob Brown recently wrote that he had participated in five unplanned special sessions of the Legislature.

In a recent column Brown said, “Let’s not adopt government by a politically contrived autopilot. Decisions of public policy should be made thoughtfully, and only by those we elect to make them.”

Tea Party Republicans rode into office wanting to cut taxes, but soon lost their way. They became more attracted to social issues like cutting funding to Planned Parenthood than fixing homeowner property tax policy.

Issues like spear hunting, reviewing birth certificates, private militias, guns in public schools, higher taxes for renewable energy, nuclear power plants in the Flathead, mandated marriage counseling, climate change as tourism promotion, and nullification of all things federal took center stage in Montana. Embarrassingly, Montana made national news repeatedly.

Enough culture war already.

Citizens need for the next Legislature to exhibit more reason and less firebrand rhetoric. Voters deserve elected representatives who are willing to compromise for the betterment of local communities.

Montanans will not have Schweitzer and his red-hot branding iron in the next Legislature when a veto is needed to stop policy that will make Montana look “bat-crap crazy.”

Given the slim odds of Democrats controlling the 2013 Montana Legislature, independents may opt for another Democratic governor like Schweitzer to backstop the kooky policy bills coming from Helena.

Tax Freedom Day has come and gone for the year. Gratefully the libraries, public schools and local fire departments remain fully open to serve the people of our great state.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

In the next couple of years, middle-class Montanans are eligible for a sizable tax credit from the Affordable Care Act. It is refundable so taxpayers who have little income tax liability can still fully benefit. The credit can be paid in advance to a taxpayer’s insurance company to help cover the cost of premiums.

All presidents talk about reforming health care. President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law. Obama said, “I was not going to allow another decade to pass by where we kick the can down the road because it was politically convenient.”

“They call it Obamacare?” Obama said. “I do care! You should care, too.”

In a statement from Montana Democratic Sen. Max Baucus, he said the average American family with health insurance pays $1,000 in extra premiums to cover the $43 billion in uninsured health care.

Every GOP presidential candidate made repealing Obamacare their platform. Ironically Mitt Romney previously collaborated with former Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy to mandate insurance in Massachusetts.

Romney joked on Fox News that having “Ted Kennedy supporting a bill which I authored could actually be a cure to global warming, because hell has frozen over.”

Romneycare mandated near universal health insurance in Massachusetts. On Obamacare, Romney says he would “kill it dead.”

Obamacare has plenty of noteworthy provisions like cheaper medicine for seniors, free access for preventive care, or gender neutral premiums.

“Obamacare means never having to worry about getting sick and running up against a lifetime cap on insurance coverage,” Obama strategist David Axelrod wrote. “It gives parents the comfort of knowing their kids can stay on their insurance until they’re 26, and that a ‘pre-existing condition’ like an ear infection will never compromise their child’s coverage.”

The mandate to purchase health insurance is the political problem.

Early in his political career, Gov. Brian Schweitzer made national headlines by traveling with busloads of seniors into Canada for much cheaper medicine.

Schweitzer’s plan for a low-cost health clinic for state employees will open later this year. It could be expanded to serve university employees or Medicaid patients.

But Schweitzer signed a bill into law prohibiting public employers from mandating insurance upon employees. “They ought not to have a mandate unless we have a public option,” Schweitzer said. “I don’t like the mandate … They’ve come in and said you have to buy a policy from one of these private insurance companies. I think (insurance) is overpriced and I don’t think it’s the right thing to do.”

Rep. Derek Skees, R-Whitefish, sponsored multiple Tea Party bills in the 2011 Montana Legislature. Skees proposed a state commission to nullify any federal law it reasoned unconstitutional and a mandate that the reform outlined in Obamacare is “null and void” to Montanans.

Skees receives $733 per month – for 2 years – in taxpayer subsidized health insurance. Skees is now the GOP candidate seeking to become the next insurance commissioner in the Montana auditor’s office.

It is hard for people to believe that the Supreme Court justices reviewing Obamacare will not allow their personal views to affect their decision.

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said that “if the decision is 5-4, basically Republican versus Democratic appointees on the court, I think a lot of people will look at that as they did at the Supreme Court decision to put President Bush in power.”

Partisanship aside, it is about time that someone in Congress put real people at the head of the tax-cut line. Refundable tax credits help people.

The Supreme Court may eliminate the mandate for health insurance. The justices may abandon the tax cuts in the Affordable Care Act. But the justices cannot eliminate the reality that real people must secure essential health care from a very expensive marketplace.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Out of  Touch

Title X is the federal grant program that provides comprehensive family planning and other health-related services to people. Two-thirds of the patients live in poverty and have no health insurance.

In 1969, President Richard Nixon said, “It is my view that no American woman should be denied access to family planning assistance because of her economic condition.”

The sponsor of Title X was former President George H.W. Bush, then a member of the U.S. House. Bush said, “We need to make population and family planning household words. We need to take sensationalism out of this topic so that it can no longer be used by militants who have no real knowledge of the voluntary nature of the program but rather are using it as a political stepping stone. If family planning is anything, it is a public health matter.”

Title X and family planning passed the U.S. House 298 to 32 and the Senate unanimously.

Almost two generations later, rightwing ideologues are waging a new culture war upon women.

Last election cycle, Tea Party Republicans rode a national wave into office. Promising lower taxes, they lost their way. Their rightwing ideology flared into anti-women rhetoric and policy.

The modern day U.S. House defunded Planned Parenthood. A moderate Senate rejected the idea.

Title X reaches far past Planned Parenthood. Family planning is annually delivered to 5 million people in nearly 5,000 clinics and other health centers across America. Planned Parenthood of Montana serves close to 27,000 patients annually, including many college students.

The last GOP-controlled Montana Legislature sent Gov. Brian Schweitzer a budget that eliminated the family planning services entirely. The GOP removed state funding to family planning clinics like Planned Parenthood and county health departments. The legislative intent was to prevent Montana from accepting the millions of dollars in federal funds for family health services.

A tax-cutting and budget-frugal Schweitzer simply restored funding by amendatory veto. And the Montana Legislature relented, having politically underestimated the bipartisan support for women’s services from the voters back home. But if not for the Democratic governor, family planning in Montana would have ceased in many areas throughout the state.

The militants – as Bush referred to the fanatical political fringe – are today focusing their wrath upon women’s contraception.

The rhetoric became so surreal that GOP commentator Rush Limbaugh labeled a young Georgetown University law student a “slut” and a “prostitute” for publicly advocating that employers cover contraception in health plans.

A young Sandra Fluke answered an old Limbaugh with a nationwide letter stating, “Restricting access to such a basic health care service, which 99% of sexually experienced American women have used and 62% of American women are using right now, is out of touch with public sentiment.”

Embarrassingly few, if any, Montana Republican candidates condemned the insulting rightwing radio chatter. The GOP is apparently run by fanatics who promote their own ideology upon a more moderate and mature nation. Unfortunately for Limbaugh, more than 140 national companies in the free market have pulled advertising dollars from rightwing radio.

Fringe candidates ignore the simple notion that women account for most of the voting population. Demagoguing women is one dumb strategy to win elections. No candidate can win an election without support from young, middle-aged or mature women.

Women remember, and are passionately active in politics. And women voters will determine multiple top races in Montana.

Montana has plenty of Democratic women in higher office. Their courage to make all our lives better is remarkable.

Elections matter and set the political tone for the future. And 2012 will be a banner year for women in Montana elections, no matter how loudly the middle-aged and old men of the Tea Party rage.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Serving Montana

President Franklin Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps for millions of youth to serve and restore America’s parks and stabilize the economy.

The Going-to-the Sun Road could not have been built without the CCC. CCC served in Glacier National Park and Yellowstone National Park. From reforestation to campground development to trail building to fire hazard reduction, the volunteerism of the Corps was at the forefront of service.

Volunteers in Service to America is a war-on-poverty program created under President Lyndon Johnson. VISTA became the domestic version of Sargent Shriver’s Peace Corps as originally envisioned by President John Kennedy.

President George H.W. Bush created the Office of National Service and the Points of Light Foundation to foster volunteering. Bush approved grants to schools to support service-learning through Serve America.

President Bill Clinton enhanced AmeriCorps with bipartisan support. Clinton said, “Service is a spark to rekindle the spirit of democracy in an age of uncertainty.”

President George W. Bush urged Americans to devote 4,000 hours to volunteer service in our lifetimes. Bush created the USA Freedom Corps and expanded AmeriCorps.

Montana campuses placed more than a thousand AmeriCorps and VISTA members in communities across the state. These young service members will engage another 5,000 volunteers to assure cost-effective local projects.

AmeriCorps tutors children and cares for elderly. AmeriCorps volunteers clean streets, winterize breezy homes, teach literacy and computers, work on watershed conservation and river restoration and build trails and bridges.

Food Corps works on nutrition, education and food. Members help on farm-to-cafeteria programs for schools. Food Corps members at Flathead Valley Community College work with Kalispell schools to get Montana beef patties, Flathead cherries and local carrots back on the menu.

Food Corps helped put local apples and fresh vegetables into Polson schools. Members tilled school gardens in Somers.

Energy Corps weatherizes homes across Montana, generates wind power at rural schools, and presses biodiesel in Havre.

The Montana Conservation Corps carries the spirit of the original CCC. Roosevelt’s CCC transformed the Lewis and Clark Caverns but closer to home MCC serves just as hard.

Flathead MCC members built raised garden beds at the Columbia Falls Veterans Home and are farmhands at Kalispell’s two community gardens. MCC has been active at Lone Pine State Park, Lawrence Park and Whitefish State Park.

MCC worked with locals to build the Whitefish Trails on the state public lands surrounding the town. Service members worked hours to open the public trails for Whitefish bikers and hikers.

There are more 5,000 Senior Corps members volunteering across Montana helping people.

The Retired Service Volunteer Program serves here in the Flathead. RSVP helps Meals on Wheels get food to elders. RSVP volunteers serve as foster grandparents and work in local food banks.

Colin Powell chaired the committee for Presidents Clinton, George H.W. Bush, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and First Lady Nancy Reagan to encourage increased service and volunteerism for America’s youth.

Today’s sputtering economy demands a stronger AmeriCorps of service. AmeriCorps provides an excellent return on investment.

President Barack Obama’s budget proposed a 1 percent increase in youth service funding. The U.S. House called for the outright elimination of AmeriCorps service.

Sens. Jon Tester and Max Baucus support service. Tester said, “From building homes to educating our kids to strengthening Montana’s infrastructure, these volunteers are essential to communities across our state.”

The Veterans Green Corps provides career development for returned military veterans interested in pursuing employment opportunities with public lands management.

Only in the past couple years has service and volunteerism become wedged in the hyper-partisan politics of Washington, D.C. Firebrand politicians should serve out the portion of the AmeriCorps pledge that states, “Faced with apathy, I will take action. Faced with conflict, I will seek common ground.”

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Farm Bill for Eaters

Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow from Michigan announced that the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry will begin public policy hearings on the next Farm Bill. Luckily for Montana, Sen. Max Baucus sits on this committee that encourages farms to produce good food.

Montana ranks fifth in the nation for producing wheat. Counties like Chouteau and Hill are the heart of the “Golden Triangle,” an area encompassed by Shelby, Havre and Great Falls. Seven counties produce nearly half of Montana’s wheat crop. It is one bumper crop still free of genetic engineering.

Montana wheat will hopefully retain its GE-free status. The bulk of the crop is shipped to places like Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines and South Korea.  But Montana’s whole wheat and pasta is also served locally, like at Whitefish schools. Whitefish also serves milk free of synthetic hormones like rBST.

The Farm Bill helps growers decide what crops to plant. It articulates policy and priorities for American agriculture. It is the policy behind what type of snacks and meals 30 million American students eat. It decides what foods will be cheap. But a good Farm Bill also articulates a plethora of policies for farming, food access and health.

Past Farm Bills allowed the top 10 percent of corporate farms to rake in three-quarters of all crop subsidies. Mega-farms, commodities traders, meat packers and processed food manufacturers send their powerhouse lobbyists to Congress.

Small growers do not qualify for crop insurance. With the changing climate, many small farmers are suddenly faced with devastating hail storms during the short growing season. The new growing reality of planting weather is changing frost zones and wild freeze-to-thaw cycles that can easily kill the crop.

The bulk of past Farm Bills was food stamps for 45 million low income families that must trust the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. SNAP attracts many lawmakers who live outside food producing regions to support the Bill.  These lawmakers may further embrace better food infrastructure.

Foods the USDA recommends occupy most of our plate – nuts, fruits and vegetables – but get the least notice in past Farm Bills. Fortunately for eaters, Sen. Jon Tester is still an active farmer. Both Tester and Baucus are old farmhands when it comes to real food.

The number of farmers’ markets has ballooned to more than 7,000 nationwide. Millions of Americans are again buying food directly from farmers – in places like downtown Whitefish on Tuesdays, downtown Kalispell onSaturdays, or downtown Columbia Falls on Thursdays.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack called for efforts to recruit 100,000 new farmers and ranchers. Farm Service Agency’s Bruce Nelson announced better programs to help young farmers acquire loans to start growing.

Hardheads and corporate lobbyists want the Farm Bill to appropriate billions in taxpayer subsidies to cheapen GE foods. Eaters simply want Congress to label these laboratory foods.

Young farmers like Courtney and Jacob, owners of Prairie Heritage Farm in Conrad, represent a generation of growers who produce organic lentils and heritage wheat directly for local eaters. Congress could boost national security by cultivating farm policy that grows more local food.

What kids eat builds a framework for health. The correlation between skyrocketing health care costs and food policy is blatantly apparent to policy makers.

Congress should listen to eaters and support more nutrient-dense choices for food programs. Congress can encourage family farmers to grow more kale, plant hearty grains for local consumption, or produce beef that is readily available to local eaters.

The 2012 Farm Bill deserves a long term vision toward health. Eaters cannot stomach more national food policy that caters solely to paid corporate lobbyists. Montanans hunger for farm policy that feeds local appetites and embraces real food.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Whitefish’s Economic Engine

During the past decade, the tri-cities of Flathead County were the fastest growing places in Montana. Propelled by record growth, property valuations skyrocketed. The 2009 worldwide credit-fiasco depressed the valley leaving middle class prospects dismal.

Three years later, Whitefish is trudging back. Median home values again hover around late 2009 levels, which ballparks the pre-bubble values of the growth years. Today, Whitefish is the sole city in the Flathead posting recovery gains. Proper community planning protected property values.

For the coming years, Flathead taxing jurisdictions will see their budgets increase thanks to the formula used in the 2009 property tax reappraisals. Homeowners are stung by the Legislature’s failure to cap taxes. Due to the six-year phasing of reappraisal, taxes will be based upon 2006 benchmark values – increasing one-sixth annually.

The same cast of characters who served in the 2011 Montana Legislature seeks homeowner trust for the next session. They promise to fix the appraisal mess. Recall in 2009, Gov. Brian Schweitzer unsuccessfully asked the Legislature to freeze tax values. Schweitzer said the state should let the market stabilize. But the 2011 Legislature was laser-focused on nullifying all things federal, rather than offering a homeowner fix.

But petty partisanship aside, places like Whitefish continue to progress thanks to a positive attitude from locals.

Whitefish recently garnered state recognition – from the conservative Montana Contractors’ Association, for the downtown street work projects. The plan was initially snared in a web of created-controversy, as naysayers used downtown revitalization to wage a 2009 election year campaign against sitting Councilor Frank Sweeney.

Sweeney lost that election by slim margins, but came roaring back, posting an impressive win last November. Locals appreciate his no-nonsense leadership and advocacy of Whitefish.

The merchants association, called the Heart of Whitefish, works tirelessly to promote a stronger and more vibrant economy. Not only does downtown look great, it is thriving.

The Heart of Whitefish sponsors one of the best farmers’ markets in Montana. The market has become such an economic boost that downtown businesses acknowledge Tuesday nights are competitive with weekends.

Retail sales were up double digits over the previous summer. Tourist taxes are posting significant annual gains. As locals enjoy the Whitefish Winter Carnival, lodging claims good numbers of “heads in the beds.”

The carnival was rated a top-10 event in the world by National Geographic’s Traveler magazine. The magazine touted the Penguin Plunge as a “frigid dip into Whitefish Lake.”

Whitefish was paraded in Vogue magazine as a top destination town in the nation. Vogue pegged Whitefish enviably as “VIBE: Aspen the way it was.”

Nestled near Beaver Lake, the cross country skiing at Stillwater Mountain Lodge was rated top three in Montana by Yahoo sports news.

Allegiant Air announced a twice-weekly direct flight from California to Glacier Park International Airport. This is welcome news to San Francisco Bay skiers looking for Whitefish powder. But locals will appreciate the business, work and recreation aspects of air service.

Big-money investors are again taking notice of the Whitefish success by pumping millions of dollars in commercial revitalization back into downtown. This is good news for the local economy and middle-class construction workers. The hub of the community is clearly downtown. And locals know it.

Luckily for Whitefish, someone, sometime and somehow figured that the real economic engine of the city lay in protecting the most valuable assets of the community. The clean drinking water, the open public lands, the friendly business atmosphere and the great recreational outdoors preserve community and attract investment.

The local can-do attitude is all around Whitefish, easily seen in the sheer number of public and civic projects.

Economists say the power of positive attitude jolts economic depressions. Welcome back Whitefish, may your optimistic spirit again raise employment and resonate across Montana.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

Copyright 2012 www.mikejopek.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Montana’s Political Courage

In one of the first initiatives Montana voters passed, the 100-year-old Corrupt Practices Act prohibits direct corporate campaign contributions. Montana’s state and local elections are still transparent by mandated disclosure laws.

The U.S. Constitution never gave person-rights to corporations. The activist U.S. Supreme Court reopened those floodgates with Citizens United. Justice John Paul Stevens said in his dissent that the ruling “threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions across the nation. The path it has taken to reach its outcome will, I fear, do damage to this institution.”

President Barack Obama, in a rare State of the Union repudiation, said the court, “reversed a century of law” and allowed “foreign corporations to spend without limits in our elections.” Observers noted that an attending Justice Samuel Alito mouthed the words “not true.”

Montana’s Corrupt Practices Act was a reaction to nefarious acts in the state Legislature where big money was essentially buying votes to select the next U.S. senator. Quickly, Montana citizens adopted the ban on direct corporate spending.

In an email to constituents, Montana Sen. Jon Tester wrote, “We all know what happens when Wall Street banks and other powerful special interests get their way: partisanship trumps citizenship and special interests get a free pass to pollute our elections. And when it comes time to balance the budget, Medicare and Social Security end up on the chopping block.”

Montana still allows corporate spending on local elections, but through a transparent vehicle called Political Action Committees. PACs disclose where the money came from and how it is spent.

Flexing their muscles, the National Association of Realtors spent nearly $2 million in PAC money to successfully pass a Montana constitutional initiative that bars real estate transfer taxes.

Montana has a long history of transparent government. The concept that corporation are people makes little sense to Middle America. Montanans want to keep that right to see who is funding politics.

The GOP attempted to nullify anything federal that moved in the 2011 Montana Legislature. It is a bit ironic that Republican candidates have not asserted a states’ rights defense on the Montana Supreme Court ruling. Apparently for political elections, the Montana GOP leadership prefers that corporations remain people. Or that is the impression imprinted in voters’ minds.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, unless unlimited super PAC spending has an effect. Ironically it was Romney who famously stated, “Corporations are people, my friend.” And the primary voters of South Carolina were inundated by a tidal wave of negative media purchased with a single $5 million super PAC check.

Last November the citizens of Missoula pushed through an initiative calling for an end to corporate personhood. It passed by a whopping 3-to-1 margin. More Montana towns may be forced to take action, as real people find their political courage and say, “enough is enough.”

It’s hard to believe that Congress would not fix this supreme mess. Only the worst Congress ever would do nothing.

Thanks to Attorney General Steve Bullock, Montana is notably the only state in the nation fighting to protect the rights of people to participate in fair and transparent elections. Middle class people appreciate the political courage to act and speak out. Bullock deserves credit. Whether the U.S. Supreme Court is ticked at the gall of Montana to challenge their decree remains to be seen.

For Montana, and its local towns and school boards, it is publicly irresponsible to allow mega corporations and big money to dump unlimited and secret cash into our hometown elections. Democracy is not about money. It is not about secret donations. Democracy is about public trust, real people, vibrant communities and actual lives.

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-Mike Jopek is a retired State Legislator who again helps run the family farm in Whitefish. He welcomes feedback at mike@mikejopek.com.

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