The Montana State Capitol in Helena on Wednesday, April 26, 2023. (Photo by Mike Clark for the Daily Montanan)
State Sen. Susan Webber said Montana has paid a lot of attention to missing and murdered indigenous people, but earlier legislation has focused on data collection.
Tuesday, Webber told the Senate Judiciary Committee Senate Bill 107 has a different focus, one that would help all elementary and secondary school children.
“None of them have addressed prevention. Let’s give our children the tools,” said Webber, D-Browning.
If it becomes law, the bill would instruct the Office of Public Instruction to develop curricula and activities to teach students to identify and avoid child sex trafficking and human trafficking, Webber said, and students are the population most vulnerable to it.
At the hearing, Webber shared a handout with committee members that showed the pictures of young people who are currently missing, a problem she and others described as an epidemic.
A Department of Justice database counts 45 Indigenous people missing, and 31 children missing, with overlap.
One concern, Webber said, is Native people make up 6.7% of the population in Montana, but 30.6% of missing and murdered people.
“I want you to see the faces of the children that are missing,” said Webber, of the Blackfeet Nation.
Sen. Sue Vinton, R-Billings, asked about the cost of the bill — Webber said it was just another educational module, easy for OPI to absorb — and Sen. Daniel Emrich, R-Great Falls, said he worried about another shift away from “reading, writing and arithmetic.”
The committee didn’t take action Tuesday, and proponents said it would go a long way in preventing children from being trafficked, possibly sold for drugs or into slavery.
“Human traffickers are targeting youth as young as nine years old and prey on victims based on hardships the child may be facing in their home,” said Patrick Yawakie, representing the Blackfeet Nation, Fort Belknap Indian Community, and Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation.
The bill would protect all Montanans, not just Native American students, and it would help potential victims steer clear of perpetrators and help their peers do the same, Yawakie said.
“Having an educated community in sex and human trafficking for elementary and secondary schools helps all involved with a clear understanding for how to be responsible for each other,” Yawakie said.
In support of the bill, Imani Kindness, with the Montana Budget and Policy Center, said the number of cases of trafficking in Montana went from seven in 2015 to 143 in 2023, an increase of 1,900%, citing the state Department of Justice data.
Sharon Kickingwoman, with the ACLU of Montana, said no community is immune, and “no institution seems more poised to be part of the solution” than OPI.
Often, said Sen. Mary Ann Dunwell, D-Helena, the signs of human trafficking are often right under a person’s nose. Dunwell said she has a similar bill to help awareness for bus drivers and supports this bill too.
Ria Bahadur, who described herself as author of the bill and currently a student at Stanford University, said more than 45% of victims of trafficking are minors attending school every single day, most commonly 12- to 18-year-olds.
Bahadur urged the committee against apathy and said “real lives” depend on educating children. Bahadur also shared a nickname Montana has, one she would like empowered youth to help erase.
“Montana is known as the truck stop state in sex trafficking circles,” Bahadur said.
The Montana Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence also expressed support for the bill.
Although the bill is aimed to protect all students, Keaton Sunchild, with Western Native Voice, said it’s no secret that young people on reservations go missing at a far higher rate than young people off the reservation. Sunchild said a lot of legislators want to protect children, and SB 107 fits.
“This bill is a real, tangible solution that does that,” Sunchild said.