Montana University System mill levy is crucial

To long-time Montanans, the once-every-decade vote for a six-mill levy for the state’s university system seems to zoom by about as often as those “local on the 8’s” on the Weather Channel.

But to younger voters and newcomers to Montana, the referendum held every year that ends in an eight is a new and probably somewhat alarming wrinkle. Now what?

That’s why, once again, u-system officials and friends of all forms of higher education from vocational training to graduate degrees rallied this week to kick off a campaign encouraging Montanans to continue the levy for another decade.

After all, said Commissioner of Higher Education Sheila Stearns, although the levy raises only about 7 percent of the system’s $200 million annual student-supported budget, it is “the brick upon which the rest of the foundation is built.”

Montanans have a solid history of support for the property-tax levy, having approved such a tax every time since 1920. And since 1948, when the amount was increased to six mills, voters have approved it by a better-than-20 percent average margin.

That makes a lot of sense, because most of us understand that a quality university system is critical to a lot more than the ambitious students who go off to study. The system is vital to Montana’s whole economy and its ability to compete in the worldwide market.

So it is important to remind voters that approving Referendum 118 won’t raise anybody’s taxes. We’ve been paying the six-mill university system levy every year for nearly six decades now. And it will remain every bit as crucial for every year of the next decade as well.

http://helenair.com/articles/2008/02/27/opinions/top/irview_080227.txt