HB 647 Montana House · 2025 Regular Session

Prohibit state land leases to nonprofits

House Bill 647 proposes to prohibit nonprofit organizations from leasing state lands or timber. The bill directly affects nonprofit organizations and the state entities responsible for managing state trust lands. It amends several existing state statutes to make it unlawful for any official or employee of a nonprofit organization to lease state lands or timber on behalf of their organization. This change would restrict the state board's authority to lease state trust lands for commercial or other purposes to nonprofits.

Issues: ✗ Housing

Bill status died 1 of 4 stages cleared

Introduction

Feb 2025

Committee Review

Floor Vote

Governor

Introduced Feb 21, 2025 Last action May 20, 2025

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What changed between versions

LC1709.pdf → HB0647_1.pdf · 3 edits

MINOR

The bill number was updated from LC 1709 to HB 647.1, and the sponsor names were added. The list of amended statutes was reorganized and slightly modified. A new requirement was added requiring the department to determine if state lands will produce greater or equal annual returns over a 20-year accounting period before leasing Class 1, 3, and 4 lands.

Scope change

The bill's scope remains focused on prohibiting leases of state lands to nonprofit organizations, but the amendment to the leasing requirements now includes a specific 20-year return analysis for certain land classes.

REQUIREMENT

Added a requirement for the department to determine if leasing state lands will produce greater or equal annual returns over a 20-year accounting period for Class 1, 3, and 4 lands.

TECHNICAL

Updated bill number from LC 1709 to HB 647.1 and added sponsor names.

Reorganized the list of amended statutes in the bill title.

Floor votes

How they voted

No floor votes recorded yet.

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Amendments

Mar 3, 2025

Amended

(H) Tabled in Committee - (H) Natural Resources

lower

Feb 22, 2025

Committee

(H) Referred to Committee - (H) Natural Resources

lower

Feb 21, 2025

Introduced

(H) Introduced

lower

1 primary · 0 co-sponsors