Hill campaign focuses on his work experience

Editor’s Note: This candidate feature is part of the Bigfork Eagle’s ongoing coverage of the 2012 election

Montana Governor candidate Rick Hill and his running mate, Jon Sonju from Kalispell, are calling on their experience as businessmen and politicians in Montana during their campaign this fall.

Hill worked in surety bonding for 30 years and was elected to Congress in 1996 where he worked on welfare reform, cutting taxes, and balancing the state’s budget.

Sonju is known for his work at Sonju Industries and was elected to the Montana Legislature in 2004. He served in the State House and State Senate.

Hill describes their platform as having three components, bringing more and better jobs to Montana, changing how government functions by implementing performance based budgeting and bringing education reform.

“One key area that’s important to the Bigfork community is property tax relief,” Sonju said. “We have the opportunity to take oil and tax revenue the state receives, the state’s share, and provide permanent property tax relief for the entire state of Montana.”

Hill and Sonju want to see Montana become a leader in energy production. Hill said the difference between them and Bullock is that they have experience running a business in Montana and that their opponents in fostering coal production in the state are Bullock’s supporters.

“The truth is there isn’t much demand right now for wind energy in the markets and Montana’s portfolio is satisfied,” Hill said. “There are limited opportunities to invest in wind, but if people want to do wind energy products in Montana, we support it.”

Hill also said Bullock wants to raise taxes on oil and gas that would shut down that industry in the state. They said their goal, should they be elected, is to increase business owners’ confidence that Montana is a good place to do business.

Sonju added that part of this means bringing predictability to how the state operates. Hill’s example of this was a coal producer in Montana and Wyoming applied for an increased footprint in both states. In Wyoming the application took 22 months and in Montana it took 60 months according to Hill.

Hill said Bullock doesn’t see these problems because his background is as a government lawyer.

“We’re not advocating relaxing environmental standards,” Hill said. “We are advocating a change in attitude in the agencies to work with people who solve challenges and problems, we want to make it a more productive process.”

Part of improving that process also includes their goal to improve the relationship between landowners, sportsmen, and Fish, Wildlife and Parks. Hill said the current commission damaged relationships with landowners and they would like to decrease predacious species numbers by increasing the amount of hunting licenses for wolves with a longer season and trapping options.

The third part of their platform, education reform, spurs from the state not authorizing charter schools. They said they support tax credits for scholarships that could be used at private schools as a way for parents to make choices on which schools their children attend.

Hill said 20 percent of Montana’s students do not graduate and 30 percent of graduates require remedial math and reading classes when they go to universities.

“We need to focus on higher academic standards,” Hill said.

Other changes they would like to bring to Montana’s education system include evaluating teachers based on success in the classroom and how they obtain tenure. They also want to have standard methods of measuring each student’s performance and growth.

One of the ways they said they plan to bring about these changes is by working with Republicans and Democrats on a regular basis. Sonju credited lack of leadership from the executive branch as why there is tension in legislative sessions.

“One of the big things we need to change is to get the branches in government more respectful,” Hill said. “That will start with the executive and legislative branches.”