Heather O’Loughlin: Voters beware — proposed CI-134 would decimate local public services
- Jun 9
- 2 min read
Wealthy out-of-staters have put forward a ballot initiative that would immediately cut millions of dollars in local police, fire and essential services while upending Montana’s property tax system. Voters should be wary of this initiative and of out-of-state signature gatherers trying to qualify it.
CI-134 is a complicated initiative, and signature gatherers are not telling the full story on what this will mean for Montana communities. If passed, CI-134 would wipe out an estimated 15% of local property tax revenue statewide, cutting nearly $200 million in funding for critical public services for cities, towns, counties, and rural fire districts.
In some areas of the state, CI-134 would decimate 20-30% of local property tax revenue, with no ability to raise it elsewhere, forcing local governments to cut fire, police, parks, and other essential services.
CI-134 is aimed at cutting property taxes for extremely high-value property. If passed, the initiative would reset property taxes to the lower of 2024, 2025, or 2026, and this change would largely benefit the highest value properties.
Most Montana homeowners saw their local property taxes go down from 2024 to 2025, and many will see a further reduction in their property tax rate in 2026. Resetting to 2024 does nothing for the average Montana homeowner, but it would give a massive windfall for homes valued over $2.2 million and vacation homes.
In fact, for multi-million-dollar mansions built in 2025 or 2026, it appears that CI-134 would even reset property tax levels on the lower value of the vacant lot in 2024. Meanwhile, Montana residents will feel the impact of cuts to fire and police departments, local parks, and rural health and fire districts.
If passed, CI-134 would also cap future local government property taxes, and this cap applies to every type of real property, including some industrial property, data centers, and large centrally-assessed property, regardless of the valuation growth of that property. Right now, when one type of property increases in value, local property tax mills can adjust down and tax burden shifts to increasing high-value property.
But CI-134 would disconnect our property tax structure from the actual value of property, leaving residential property with an almost guaranteed increase in taxes, even if other types of property has valuation growth.
The full implications of CI-134 are hard to imagine, but the impacts at the local level are all too real.
Take the Seeley-Swan area as an example. Health officials recently announced a budget shortfall at the Seeley Swan Medical Center, a critical health care facility in the area.
If CI-134 were to pass, it would immediately cut an estimated 26% of property tax revenue for the Seeley Swan Hospital District. And CI-134’s rewrite of how voted levies can pass would make it almost impossible for the community to levy new revenue to keep the doors open.
Montanans should say no to this attempt to cut essential local services for the benefit of wealthy out-of-staters.
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