Representative Brad Barker

08/30/2026

Knocking at the College Door: What Montana's high school graduate projections mean for our schools, colleges, and workforce

Last Tuesday I was back at the Capitol for the Modernization and Risk Analysis Committee (MARA), with the Revenue Interim Committee sitting in. The agenda covered a lot of ground: how Montana taxes data centers, what the research says about data center water use, projections of Montana's future high school graduates from the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education (WICHE), a comparison of child care programs in Montana and our peer states, and water use trends across Montana from the Montana Water Center at MSU. Our nonpartisan fiscal staff also updated us on their work on water data, ballot data, a local government fiscal model, a cost of living study, and federal funds flowing into Montana. I will come back to data centers and water in future updates. This week I want to focus on the WICHE presentation.

The Numbers

WICHE has been projecting high school graduating classes for decades, and its latest report, Knocking at the College Door, carries a clear national message that the number of high school graduates peaked with the Class of 2025 at about 3.9 million and will fall to about 3.4 million by 2041. The West is the hardest hit, down 20 percent, with California down 29 percent and Wyoming down 23 percent.

Montana is one of the few states projected to grow, about 5 percent overall, but that number isn't the full story. Our graduating classes rise about 15 percent from now to a peak of nearly 12,000 in 2034, then fall about 12 percent to roughly 10,500 by 2041. That peak is already set. Those students were born in 2015 and 2016, and Montana births have declined since. Migration has been volatile, and all the data we've seen shows that more people moving to Montana does not necessarily mean more children or more working-age adults.

Why It Matters Here

Two findings stood out. First, our colleges have leaned on out-of-state students, and four of the five biggest states sending students to Montana campuses, Washington, Oregon, California, and Colorado, are shrinking. Only Idaho is growing. Meanwhile, in-state first-time enrollment in the Montana University System fell from 4,600 in fall 2012 to about 4,000 in fall 2024, even though our graduating classes were essentially flat at just over 10,000. Out-of-state freshmen grew to nearly 1,400. Second, only 53 percent of Montana's Class of 2024 went straight to college, compared with about 60 percent in North and South Dakota. College enrollment declines started well before the demographic decline arrived.

What I Take From This

Not every Montana kid needs a four-year degree. Apprenticeships, trades, two-year programs, and military service are just as important. The measure that matters is whether our kids can earn a living and afford to raise a family here. But a 53 percent college-going rate, shrinking neighbor states, and a graduate pool that shrinks again after 2034 all point the same direction: we cannot count on growth to carry our colleges or our workforce, so we have to do better for the students we have.

WICHE's evidence-based solutions, wraparound support for students, a simpler path to enrollment, lower costs, and reaching adult learners, line up closely with the at-risk student work the School Funding Interim Commission is recommending to the 2027 Legislature. That is where I will continue to focus: helping our kids reach their full potential, whatever path they choose.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com

08/27/2026

A win for Montana voters today with the ruling against Art Wittich's attempt at authoritarian control of the Montana Republican Party.

08/26/2026

Income Tax Relief by the Numbers

The Legislative Fiscal Division, the legislature's nonpartisan fiscal staff, published analysis showing that income tax cuts passed between 2017 and 2025 could reduce state income tax collections by an estimated $628 million a year as of Fiscal Year 2028. Even with those cuts in effect, income tax revenues are projected to be 85.8% higher in FY 2028 than they were in FY 2017.

The relief came in steps. In 2017, HB 391 created a state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) equal to 3% of the federal credit, a refundable credit for low and moderate income working families. In 2021, SB 159 trimmed the top marginal rate from 6.9% to 6.75%, and SB 399 simplified the code itself, collapsing seven brackets into two, starting Montana's calculation from federal taxable income, and setting a 6.5% top rate. In 2023, SB 121 lowered the top rate to 5.9% and expanded the state EITC to 10% of the federal credit. And in 2025, HB 337 raised the income threshold where the top rate begins, steps that rate down to 5.4% by 2027, and grows the EITC to 20%. Because SB 399 tied our calculation to the federal definition of income, the federal tax changes Congress passed in 2025 flow through to state collections as well.

Over the decade, rate reductions were paired with expansions of the credit that rewards work at the lower end of the income scale, and the code got simpler along the way.

We will continue to watch, but strong income growth means the state is projected to collect substantially more in FY 2028 than it did in FY 2017, even after $628 million in annual relief. But these estimates are static, meaning they don’t assume the tax changes modify behavior. That is why we should keep matching relief to what revenue actually does, not what we hope it will do. Tax cuts that outrun collections eventually land somewhere, usually on property taxpayers or essential services. Delivering relief while meeting our obligations to schools, public safety, and infrastructure is the balance, and to date Montana has delivered meaningful income tax relief while maintaining a balanced budget.

The full analysis is available in LFD's 2029 Biennium Outlook and its history of income and property tax changes, both posted at lfd.mt.gov. I encourage you to look at the chart yourself, and I will send it out in my email update. And as always, if you have questions about how these changes affect your family, contact me directly.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com

08/01/2026

AI, Cheating, Diplomas and Future Work

At my last Modernization and Risk Analysis (MARA) meeting, we were briefed by Andrew Smalley of the National Conference of State Legislatures on how artificial intelligence is reshaping higher education. Gallup and Lumina found that 57% of college students now use AI for their coursework at least weekly. At the same time, 53% say their institution discourages or prohibits it, and 29% say they are not given enough training to use it well. At 47%, nearly half considered changing their major because of AI, and 16% already have.

Most students are using a tool their school tells them not to use and may not teach them to use ethically. That is a missed opportunity to better prepare our kids for what is happening in the workforce.

Gallup’s data shows a decades long decline in confidence in higher education, from 57% in 2015 to 38% in its June survey this year. When parents and employers start to wonder whether a diploma certifies anything, that is a problem for our kids entering the workforce and for the taxpayers who help pay for the university system.

We are not going to ban our way out of this. Detection software is unreliable, and any policing outside the classroom is mostly unenforceable.

The better answer is structural. Put more of the grade on what a student can demonstrate in the classroom with in-class writing, proctored exams, problems worked at the board, and oral defense of one’s own work to balance with study and work produced outside it. Let students use AI on homework, research, and drafting. Then ask them to show, in the room, what they know.

Whether in the workforce or on the global stage, fighting technological change only rewards your competitors.

My alma mater, the United States Military Academy, has always put the weight where I believe it belongs. Under the Thayer Method, cadets prepare the material on their own, then come to small class sections and are graded on in-person discussions, writing, board work and presentations. Written Partial Reviews during the term and Term End Examinations are proctored, and there is a reason for that.

We learned it again the hard way in 2020. When COVID pushed a calculus exam off site, West Point caught the cheating, investigated it, and held cadets accountable under the Honor Code. Colleges across the country moved exams into students’ homes that year. Most never found out what happened in those homes. The lesson is not about cadets. It is about what unsupervised testing asks of anyone, and about why the Academy built its assessment the way it did.

Examples from other institutions

The University of Sydney in Australia has adopted what it calls a two-lane approach: one lane of secured, in-person assessment that certifies learning, and a second, open lane where AI use is permitted, taught and structured. Its policy changed in January 2025.

Closer to home, the blue book is making a comeback. For those who have not sat in a college classroom lately, a blue book is the thin, lined booklet with the blue cover that a professor hands out at the start of an exam, so students write their answers out by hand, in the room, in the time allowed. No laptop, no phone, no help. The Wall Street Journal reported in May 2025 that blue book sales had climbed more than 30% at Texas A&M, roughly 50% at the University of Florida, and 80% at UC Berkeley.

There are challenges. Timed handwritten exams can disadvantage students with disabilities and those writing in a second language. More than half of students now take at least one online course, and employers increasingly expect graduates who can work alongside these tools. Sydney’s own guidance warns against stripping the weight off open assessment altogether, because grades drive behavior. What I am describing is a rebalancing to embrace the modern world and work environment, not a retreat from it.

Last fall I attended a Council of State Governments West workshop on AI and state policy, where Stanford’s Bharat Chandar presented payroll data covering millions of workers. Employment for software developers aged 22 to 25 has fallen about 20% since late 2022, while workers 35 to 50 in the same field held steady or grew, which begs the question of how we will maintain the pipeline for some professions. The jobs losing the most ground are the ones AI automates outright: software development, accounting, auditing. The ones holding or growing are the ones it can only assist: management, nursing, maintenance. The degree most exposed to AI is the desk job. A young welder, lineman, or diesel mechanic is standing on firmer ground, and our kids deserve to know that before they take out loans.

What Montana is doing

In March 2026, the Montana University System AI Task Force, convened under the Office of the Commissioner of Higher Education (OCHE), issued system-wide recommendations. They state that AI “must be used in ways that reinforce learning, not undermine it,” urge campuses toward assessment built on process, reflection, application and synthesis alongside “contextualized or in-person demonstration of learning where appropriate,” and caution against leaning on AI detection tools as the enforcement mechanism. Faculty retain authority over course design and assessment, as they should.

The Legislature’s role is limited by design. Article X, Section 9 of our state Constitution vests in the Board of Regents “full power, responsibility, and authority to supervise, coordinate, manage and control the Montana university system.” We do not set campus policy but maintain influence through the budget and workforce development policies.

I look forward to continuing the work with OCHE, the Office of Public Instruction, and the Department of Labor and Industry to help create the best outcomes and opportunities for our kids. I also welcome feedback from our students in the trades and college on what they are experiencing and their concerns about the future workforce.

A degree is a promise made to a student, to an employer, and to the parents and taxpayers who support it. Technology continuously changes how the work gets done. It does not change what the promise is supposed to be worth.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com

07/26/2026

Getting Special Education Funding Right

The School Funding Interim Commission met in Helena last Monday and Tuesday for one of our most consequential meetings of the interim. The agenda was packed with the Successful School District study, possible student-based adjustments to the funding formula, school facilities, and how the formula handles inflation. I will dig into several of those topics in the coming weeks, including a closer look at the overall staffing and funding model under study. This week, I want to focus on a discussion that matters greatly to rural districts like ours: how Montana funds special education.

The Problem

Federal law requires school districts to provide the services in a student's individualized education program, or IEP, regardless of cost. For most students, that means something modest, like an hour or two of speech therapy each week. But for a small number of students with significant needs, the required services can exceed $100,000 a year. Districts don't get to choose whether to provide them. These are our kids, and educating every child is both a legal obligation and the right thing to do.

The challenge is how we pay for it. The state's special education payment has not kept pace with inflation, and it is tied to total statewide enrollment, which has been declining even as the number of students identified as needing special education services has grown by roughly 30% since 2015. The result is a payment that covers a shrinking share of actual costs, pushing more of the burden onto district general funds and local property tax levies.

The existing backstops fall short, especially for small schools. The state's disproportionate cost reimbursement pays 40 cents on the dollar for costs above an ever-rising threshold. It also pays it two years after the district spends the money. A larger district may be able to absorb costs and wait. A small district cannot. The permissive tuition levy is the other relief valve, but it raises property taxes without any state equalization support, and in a small town, neighbors can often figure out exactly which student a levy is being run for. No family should face that.

Two Fixes Under Consideration

The Commission reviewed two provisional bill drafts this week. The first would increase the special education allowable cost payment to a level that better reflects inflation and the growth in students requiring services, and it opens the door to tying the payment to the number of special education students rather than total enrollment which is a common-sense change that matches funding to actual need.

The second would create an extraordinary cost program to establish a state fund that covers 100% of a student's allowable costs above a threshold of roughly three times statewide per-pupil spending, about $42,000. Think of it as catastrophic insurance for school budgets. A district facing extraordinary costs would apply and receive funds in the same year it incurs them, with an early-application option for districts in severe financial hardship. Nearly half the states have a program like this, and it is especially valuable for small districts, where a single high-need student can strain the entire budget.

Nothing is final yet. These are provisional drafts, and the Commission will refine its recommendations at our August meeting before sending them to the 2027 Legislature. But the direction is right: meet our obligation to every student, protect small rural schools from costs they cannot absorb alone, and reduce the pressure on local property taxpayers.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com

07/20/2026

An Update on Montana's Water Infrastructure Data Project

We all know that if you don’t take care of your equipment, it will quit on you at the worst possible time. The same rule applies to the water systems that serve our communities. Montana has hundreds of them. Wells, storage tanks, treatment plants, and thousands of miles of buried pipes quietly work every day beneath our cities, towns, and water districts. Most of us never think about them until something breaks, and repair is usually much more expensive than routine maintenance.

At the May meeting of the legislature's Modernization and Risk Analysis (MARA) Committee, the Legislative Fiscal Division briefed us on its water data project. This work doesn’t make headlines, but has important implications for Montanans, especially our rural communities with fewer taxpayers to share the costs.

Here is what the first phase of the work found. Montana has 2,309 public water systems. Of the 786 that serve communities year-round, 231 are owned by local governments serving our cities, towns, and districts. There are another 324 public wastewater systems on the books. Yet until this effort began, no consolidated statewide inventory of these assets existed. Individual communities may know the condition of their own pipes and plants, but the state has had no way to see the whole picture of what we collectively own, what shape it is in, or what it will cost to keep it working.

More than half of Montana's community water systems serve towns of 500 people or fewer. Engineers estimated full replacement values for a sample of systems, and the results are sobering. Dodson, population 120, would need roughly $5.6 million to replace its water system which translates to an annual replacement cost of $3,700 per person. Havre's system carries a replacement value over $151 million or a $988 annual replacement cost per person. And the most expensive part of every system, the buried pipe under our streets, is the part we know the least about. Demand for drinking water project loans through the State Revolving Fund already stood at roughly $136 million as of last fall.

Deferred maintenance is a debt like any other, and, if not addressed, passes the burden on to our kids and future generations. With that in mind, we paid off the state's bonded debt in 2023. Last session, we established the Growth and Opportunity Trust (House Bill 924), which requires Montana to save volatile, one-time revenue with the earnings dedicated to fixing infrastructure like bridges and water storage, shoring up pension liabilities, and lowering property taxes. This study will help us better understand where the needs are greatest and what honest stewardship costs, so decisions are driven by facts instead of politics.

The Fiscal Division is building a water dashboard with Legislative Services to replace the lengthy reports with visual tools. It is producing fact sheets on the State Revolving Fund and water storage. It is beginning a forecast of Montana's growth over the next ten years, working with DNRC to determine whether our water rights and water availability can support that development and where the conflict points will be before they arrive. And it is working to connect data across state agencies to enable more informed planning and decision making.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com

07/12/2026

Results, Not Just Costs: What Montana's corrections numbers are telling us and what we can do about it.

Photo credit: Thanks Chad Mills!

I hope everyone had a great Fourth of July weekend. I want to thank Operation Second Chance, https://operationsecondchance.org/, for inviting Carla and me to ride on their float. It was a privilege to celebrate alongside an organization that shows up for our veterans every day. I appreciate all that they do for those who have worn the uniform. Please consider supporting such a great cause.

Now, back to work. The interim is in full swing, and my committees continue digging into the issues that will shape the 2027 session. At my last Modernization and Risk Analysis (MARA) Committee meeting, we heard testimony from Marc Levin, Chief Policy Counsel at the Council on Criminal Justice, a nonpartisan think tank that works with all fifty states, on Montana's corrections trends and what they mean for our budget and our communities.

You can find access to the full report at this link: https://info.bradbarker.com/results-not-just-costs

Here is what the numbers tell us. Montana's prison population has grown more than 65 percent since 2000, while our state population grew 26 percent. As of mid-May, 3,413 Montanans were in prison, with projections climbing toward 3,650 when jail holds are counted. Overcrowding has forced us to house hundreds of inmates in private prisons in Arizona and Mississippi, far from the families and communities that support successful reentry. Last session, the Legislature approved $400 million for two new housing units in Deer Lodge and a new women's prison. Those were necessary decisions, but if the trend lines don't change, we will be back at the appropriations table again and again.

This is exactly the kind of problem MARA was built to examine. Fiscal notes in Montana cover the current fiscal year and the following three years, but a sentencing change may not show its full cost for ten to twenty years – long after the budget window closes. One of the Council's core recommendations is that Montana require long-range prison population impact statements for sentencing bills and build the capacity to model policies over realistic time horizons. That isn't soft or tough on crime, it's honest accounting to understand how policy impacts spending.

The testimony also pointed to where we can get better public safety for less money. A significant share of Montana's prison population, roughly 14 percent revoked from probation and 27 percent from parole, is there for supervision revocations rather than new convictions. Ten states have cut violation admissions by half or more with no increase in violent crime, using graduated sanctions that match the response to the violation and earned-time credits that reward completing treatment, education, and job training. Accountability should change behavior, not just fill beds. Montana took a good first step in 2025 with Senate Bill 70, which lets probation and parole officers remove supervision conditions that no longer serve a purpose if there are no objections.

Two more points hit close to home. First, veterans: Montana ranks third in the nation for veterans per capita, and nationally veterans are significantly overrepresented behind bars, often because service-connected conditions like PTSD or traumatic brain injury went unaddressed. Nationally, veterans account for roughly 8 percent of state prison populations or about six times their share of the civilian population. Montana has veterans’ treatment courts in Great Falls, Missoula, Billings, Butte, and Bozeman, and the Cascade County court was just named one of only five national mentor courts by the Department of Justice. But a veteran in rural Montana often has no such option. Nebraska recently became the first state to adopt the Veterans Justice Act, which puts diversion in statute statewide: veterans whose offenses are linked to service-related conditions enter supervised treatment with real accountability, complete the program or face the original charges. That is a model worth studying here in Montana.

Second, rural Montana: 23 counties and eight judicial districts lack access to a drug court or other problem-solving court, and much of our state is a designated mental health shortage area. When treatment isn't available locally, incarceration becomes the default, and that is the most expensive, least effective option on the menu.

Our communities deserve protection from crime. People who cause harm should be held responsible in ways that actually change behavior. And every taxpayer deserves a system that delivers results, not just costs. I will keep you updated on this discussion.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com
406-426-1034

07/04/2026

A republic, if we can keep it.

On July 4, 1776, fifty-six men and their families risked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor for the radical idea that governments derive their power from the consent of the people. We mark the day with parades, family gatherings, and fireworks, and we should. But the fireworks aren’t the point. The point is that the structure the founders built to make self-government last is more important than any politician, any party, or any passing fight.

Benjamin Franklin reportedly said the founders had given us, “A republic, if you can keep it.” The founders divided power among three branches that check one another, and again between the nation and the states. We have a compound republic: united for what a great nation must do together, and free, as states, communities, and families, to govern the rest closer to home. This diffusion of power fosters the sometimes heated competition of ideas that has made us great while guaranteeing our freedom. As Madison put it:

"Hence a double security arises to the rights of the people.… The society itself will be broken into so many parts, interests, and classes of citizens, that the rights of individuals, or of the minority, will be in little danger from interested combinations of the majority." – James Madison, Federalist No. 51

That friction, and the frustration that can come with it, is not a flaw in the system. It is the system. It is how free people keep any one faction from running the table. Washington saw the threat clearly when he warned that political parties could become: "potent engines by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people, and to usurp for themselves the reins of government." – George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796

He wasn’t warning against disagreement. He was warning against factions using their grip on power to replace voter judgment with top-down dictates to eliminate debate and dissent. Parties are tools for serving the country. They were never meant to be masters.

Unity has never meant uniformity. The Constitution itself was a bundle of hard-won compromises, and lasting law still works that way. It takes compromise to reach consensus, and that is the heart of a representative republic. We argue, we negotiate, we find the ground we can hold together, and we don’t burn down government institutions when we don’t get our way.

I’ve taken one oath again and again, to support and defend the Constitution, first at seventeen at West Point, and most recently administering it to my son. That oath is to the Constitution, not to a party, an organization, or any individual. It is why the rule of law and our institutions must be protected, not bent toward whoever holds power.

Structure matters more than politics. Representative government means putting the Constitution and constituents ahead of any party. The founders handed us a republic, and each generation must defend it.

Happy Independence Day! It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com
406-426-1034

07/02/2026

Thanks to the Montana State University Extension Office for hosting the Rural Summit in Townsend last month. I was honored to have the opportunity to discuss local issues with local leaders from across Montana.

https://www.mtpr.org/montana-news/2026-06-19/summit-highlights-shared-challenges-facing-montanas-rural-communities

All but 10 of Montana’s counties are considered “non-metropolitan.” This comes with challenges like aging infrastructure and dwindling services. At a recent summit, rural stakeholders highlighted the need for equitable funding access to help alleviate strains on the Treasure State’s small to...

06/28/2026

Budget Balancing and School Funding

Legislative Update: Budget Balancing and School Funding

I spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Helena for two of the four committees I serve on: the Education Interim Budget Committee and the Legislative Finance Committee. Here's what we covered and why it matters to you heading into the 2027 session.

We’ve Cut Taxes over the past several sessions and balanced the budget.
The headline from this week's 2029 Biennium Outlook: Montana is projected to be structurally balanced heading into the next budget cycle – the money coming in covers the money going out for what we're already committed to fund. Ongoing revenues are projected at about $7.1 billion over the biennium.

Business equipment tax. This directly impacts farmers, ranchers, and main street businesses. The business equipment tax is an annual tax on the tractors, combines, equipment, and tools people need just to run their operation. We raised the exemption from $300,000 to $1 million in 2023. In many cases, these changes have taken small businesses, farms, and ranches off of the business equipment tax rolls entirely.

The income tax reductions, combined with federal changes, flatten state revenue growth projections from now through around 2028. So, we are balanced, but with less cushion than we've had in recent years. That means next session we'll have to make real choices about what we can and can't afford.

School Funding

This is where some of the next session's hardest choices will land. The decennial study of the school funding formula wraps up by September 1, and it's driving the biggest numbers in the budget outlook.

By law, Montana adjusts school funding for inflation, but that adjustment is capped at 3% a year, a cap that's been on the books since 2013. In normal times that's fine. But over the past several years, actual costs ran well above 3%, so the cap left schools falling behind.

A few reference points:

• The cap vs. actual inflation. The formula held funding to 3% or less in years when the real inflation figure went over that and peaked at over 7% in 2022.
• Wages, which are the biggest cost schools face, grew faster still. Montana wages have grown strongly since 2020, running around 5% a year in recent years according to state economic data, and are projected to keep outrunning the 3% cap (about 5.33% and 4.75% over the upcoming two years, per the state's forecasting firm). In fact, Montana is one of only two states where wage growth has outpaced inflation since 2020. That's great news for our economy, but it means schools, capped at 3%, can't keep up with what the labor market is paying.

Our economy and wages are strong, which is a good-news story but the 3% cap means school funding hasn't kept pace with that same growth, and the federal backfill that papered over it is gone. Some of our rural districts have seen qualified-teacher vacancy rates above 30%.

Property Taxes and the 95 Mills

Because of recent property tax changes, the Department of Revenue's certified values won't be available until August, so a lot of the school equalization math is still preliminary. Rising revenue into the state's equalization account is projected to fund a new mechanism this biennium that could increase support to school budgets without adding to local property taxes.

Other Items We Took Up

On the Education committee side, we heard quarterly financial reports from higher ed, the Historical Society, the School for the Deaf and Blind, the State Library, and others, plus an OPI update on the countywide BASE levy rollout.

On the Finance committee side, beyond the outlook we covered the FY 2026 financial report, an update from the Governor's budget director, statewide IT policy, and recommendations to the 2027 budget subcommittees.

What I'm Watching

Further out, the report flags another roughly $83 million a year off our income tax collections if federal H.R. 1 tax provisions are extended. This is an estimate, but the kind of exposure we plan around when we budget responsibly.

We have delivered income tax relief and kept the state structurally sound. Next session the margin is tighter, and the school funding decision will be one of the defining choices. I'll keep you posted as the commission's final report lands.

It is an honor to serve you.

Brad Barker
Representative
House District 55 (Carbon County)
[email protected]
bradbarker.com
406-426-1034