BOISE, Idaho — Taxpayer dollars could be used to help renovate the Idaho State Capitol building.
On Wednesday, the House voted 60 to 9 to move forward legislation, known as House Bill 289, that would allow $10.6 million to be used for remodeling the Statehouse.
Some House members feel the remodel is necessary, while nine representatives opposed to it believe it is a waste of money.
Currently, House offices are located on the ground floor of the Capitol.
Rep. Mat Erpelding (D - Boise) said it's currently cubicle space, which makes for tight quarters.
“House Bill 289 is essential to us reaching the right amount of space in order for legislators to get their jobs done, and to be able to accurately and appropriately staff legislators during the session," he said. "The way it is right now, most every House member is downstairs, and we don’t even have enough room to have staff in the same room as the legislators. That’s the real problem.”
Rep. Caroline Troy (R - Genesee) said there's not a lot of privacy in the space House members have now, and sometimes that lack of privacy is an issue.
“You can hear every single conversation that’s going on in that room and there’s a lot of times that you want to have a private conversation, you want to make a phone call to a constituent that’s maybe a sensitive subject, and it’s not really something that you want everyone to be able to hear,” she said.
But not all representatives agree that the current office space is an issue.
Rep. Brent Crane (R - Nampa) said he's always campaigned as a fiscally responsible legislator and he would not be able to justify legislation like this to his constituents.
“We’re only there three months out of the year and so I did not feel it was a justifiable expense and a good use of taxpayer dollars,” he said.
According to Crane, that money could be better spent elsewhere.
“We’re a growing state – the fastest growing state in the nation right now," he added. "We have a lot of needs. We have needs in education, we have needs in corrections, we have needs in health and welfare, we have needs in roads. I don’t need a new office.”
Rep. Priscilla Giddings (R - White Bird) also voted no. She agrees that it's not a responsible use of taxpayer dollars.
“You’re looking at more than $150,000 per office just so that a few House members can have a private office with a door attached to it and it just seems not very fiscally responsible from my perspective to use taxpayer money to give myself a bigger and better office,” she said.
Rep. Tammy Nichols (R - Middleton) is another representative who voted no.
“While I understand the issues at hand and agree that there is certainly a problem with privacy, office space and room in general; after listening to those in my district and looking into the matter, I couldn’t justify the cost involved, especially with unknown budgeting issues at hand that we are still needing to address,” Nichols told KTVB in a statement.
Crane said as for the matter of privacy, he uses those same offices and it's not an issue.
“We have conference rooms and if I need to have a private conversation with a constituent, I simply take them to the conference room,” he said.
Giddings agreed, adding that most conversations in the legislature should not be have to be private anyway.
“We are a governing body. We’re supposed to be about transparency," she said. "There’s no real private conversation, in my opinion, that needs to happen at the legislative level.”
Crane tells KTVB another issue he had with the funding is that it doesn't actually add more space to allow for growth.
“There was not a plan for expansion as far as, if you’re going to do this, then let’s make sure we’ve got plenty of office space so that as the state grows, we can also plan for the future and not have to go back and spend additional money,” he said.
According to Troy, this is a continuation of the remodel the Capitol underwent about a decade ago, finishing work that couldn't be done at the time.
“This will finalize that renovation that was started 10 years ago and get the office space we were hoping to get in that first renovation,” she said.
Troy also added the Senate side has their own offices, and constituents should be allowed the same experience on both sides of the aisle.
“I think it’s important when citizens come to visit us that they have the same experience on the House side as they do on the Senate side," she explained. "So on the Senate side, if one of my constituents goes to see a senator, they can be invited into an office, they can close a door and have a private conversation. On my side, I have to get out my folding chair and shuffle things around and boot out my intern. I think it’s important to be respectful of those constituents when they come to see their Representatives too.”
Another part of HB289 would take $3.5 million of the proposed $10.6 to be used to relocate the State Treasurer's Office out of the Capitol, keeping only the ceremonial office there.
Relocating that office has been a long-debated issue and the current treasurer, Julie Ellsworth, has publicly spoken out against relocating.
Ellsworth's office sent this statement to KTVB about the proposed bill:
"The Treasurer has opposed this move from the beginning and does not support spending $10.6 million taxpayer dollars for private legislative offices, that will be used three months out of the year.”
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According to Erpelding, the relocation is not personal - it goes back to the issue of not having enough space.
“The treasurer’s ceremonial office certainly has a place in this building but the truth is, those people that work down in the offices where the House members are, everybody agrees that they’re too cramped and there’s no way to effectively staff legislators,” Erpelding said.
When looking at how to get more space, he said, it would make more sense for an office like the treasurer to have office space elsewhere, rather than the legislators.
"Our dollar system has moved largely to an electronic system that can be used anywhere on the Capitol Mall," he said. "The legislators during session, it’s really difficult for us to be anywhere on the Capitol Mall. So there’s no press to take away the traditional safe or the ceremonial office but there is some concern that there is not enough space for everybody to do their jobs in this building.”
Crane believes the treasurer should stay in the Statehouse because there are a lot of offices that interact with it. He also said visitors to the Capitol come to see both the legislative branch as well as the executive branch, so the treasurer should stay.
Giddings also took issue with the part of the bill that would relocate the office, saying she was "disturbed by the whole process."
“The House leadership wasn’t getting their way, so they just kind of used their bully pulpit to change the law that will essentially force the treasurer out of the building and I’ve just been really frustrated with that," Giddings said. "I don’t think it’s fair and I think there probably could have been a better solution.”
According to Erpelding, there are already several offices like the treasurer that are not housed in the Capitol.
“I will remind you that the controller, an executive position; superintendent of public instruction, an executive position; secretary of state, an executive position – all have a majority of their offices outside of the Capitol and so the treasurer would be no different than them,” he said.
Crane said overall, he felt HB289 was not something voters would support so he didn't.
“This was not a bill that was brought forward by the citizens of the State of Idaho – not one," he said. "This was simply a bill that was brought forward by individuals inside the process saying this is what we want. And I think you have to be very careful when you do that because ultimately, you answer to your constituents.”
Crane and Giddings were among nine Republicans that voted 'no' on the bill.
The bill will now move to the Senate for a vote. If it passes the Senate, it would then go to Gov. Brad Little to either sign or veto.