5-11-210. Clearinghouse for reports to legislature. - Montana Statutes

     5-11-210. Clearinghouse for reports to legislature. (1) For the purposes of this section, "report" means a report required by law to be given to or filed with the legislature.
     (2) On or before September 1 of each year preceding the convening of a regular session of the legislature, an entity required to report to the legislature shall provide, in writing, to the appropriate interim or statutory committee:
     (a) the final title of the report;
     (b) an abstract or description of the contents of the report, not to exceed 100 words;
     (c) a recommendation on how many copies of the report should be provided to the legislature;
     (d) the reasons why the number of copies recommended is, in the opinion of the reporting entity, the appropriate number of copies; and
     (e) an estimated cost for each copy of the report.
     (3) After considering all of the information available about the report, including the number of legislators requesting copies of the report pursuant to subsection (7), the appropriate interim or statutory committee shall, in writing, direct the reporting entity to provide a specific number of copies. The number of copies required is at the sole discretion of the appropriate interim or statutory committee. The appropriate interim or statutory committee may require the reporting entity to mail the copies of the report.
     (4) The appropriate interim or statutory committee may require that the report be submitted in an electronic format usable on the legislature's current computer hardware, in a microform, such as microfilm or microfiche, or in a CD-ROM format, meaning compact disc read-only memory.
     (5) Costs of preparing and distributing a report to the legislature, including writing, printing, postage, distribution, and all other costs, accrue to the reporting agency. Costs incurred in meeting the requirements of this section may not accrue to the legislative services division.
     (6) The executive director of the legislative services division shall cause to be prepared a list of all reports required to be presented to the legislature from the list of titles received under subsection (2).
     (7) The executive director shall, as soon as possible following a general election, mail to each holdover senator, senator-elect, and representative-elect a list of the titles of the reports, along with the abstracts prepared pursuant to subsection (2)(b). The list must include a form on which each member or member-elect receiving the list may indicate the report or reports that the member or member-elect would like to receive.
     (8) The executive director of the legislative services division shall make copies of reports requested pursuant to subsection (7) available to those members or members-elect by either requiring that copies be mailed pursuant to subsection (3) or by delivering copies of the reports during the first week of the legislative session.
     (9) The executive director of the legislative services division may keep as many copies of a report as are necessary and discard the rest.
     (10) The procedure outlined in this section may also be used for a report required to be made to the legislature under the Multistate Tax Compact contained in 15-1-601, the Vehicle Equipment Safety Compact contained in 61-2-201, the Multistate Highway Transportation Agreement contained in 61-10-1101, or the Western Interstate Nuclear Compact contained in 90-5-201.
     (11) Each report to the legislature required under 17-6-230, 19-2-405, 19-2-407, and 19-20-201 must be provided to the legislative services division as soon as the report is published. The legislative services division shall ensure that legislators are notified pursuant to this section of the report's availability. During the interim, the legislative services division shall ensure that members of the state administration and veterans' affairs interim committee and the legislative finance committee receive copies of the reports.

     History: En. Sec. 1, Ch. 112, L. 1991; amd. Sec. 5, Ch. 7, L. 1993; amd. Sec. 1, Ch. 40, L. 1993; amd. Sec. 1, Ch. 274, L. 1993; amd. Sec. 1, Ch. 349, L. 1993; amd. Sec. 23, Ch. 42, L. 1997; amd. Sec. 18, Ch. 210, L. 2001; amd. Sec. 4, Ch. 285, L. 2007.