A separate DOGE team for Idaho?
Nine-member committee would ‘review government efficiency’ in state
BOISE — The Idaho Legislature may be looking to create its own “DOGE.”
The House State Affairs Committee on Friday unanimously passed House Bill 364, which would create a nine-member legislative task force to “review government efficiency.”
The effort is named for the new federal Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, led by billionaire Elon Musk.
“Government inefficiencies, redundancies and regulatory burdens,” said bill sponsor Jaron Crane, R-Nampa, “contribute to unnecessary costs and operational delays, and they hinder economic growth and effective public service that we are here to do.”
Under the bill, the task force would be made up of three members of the House appointed by the House speaker, three senators appointed by the Senate president pro tempore, and three members of the budget-writing Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee. The committee would be required to meet at least twice a year and compensated for their time spent out-of-session.
The group would be authorized to appoint up to two nonlegislators with technical expertise as nonvoting advisers. The bill also would require the use of technology, including artificial intelligence, “whenever doing so would increase the DOGE task force’s efficiency.”
The bill would authorize the committee to create three subgroups on “regulator accountability,” “budget accountability,” and “government operations and oversight.”
Rep. Mike Pohanka, R-Jerome, noted that nationally, President Donald Trump recently signaled the department would be scaling back from recent broad federal layoffs, which had drawn a number of lawsuits and concern among some Republican lawmakers.
“At first they were using a hatchet, and now we’re at a scalpel,” Pohanka said. “I hope, if this goes through, that they use a scalpel and not a hatchet.”
The task force would be required to “from time to time advise the legislature of its findings and recommendations.”
One person spoke in favor and one in opposition, and a legislative co-sponsor, Rep. Jordan Redman, R-Coeur d’Alene, also testified in favor.
Meridian resident Laura Miller argued the task force created “redundant bureaucracy.”
“This legislation is simply repackaging Idaho’s existing efficiency work and creating a new entity with new buzz words,” Miller said. “This implies a lot of distress in our civil servants and undermines the work that they do.”
Billy Knorpp, also from Meridian, spoke in support.
“I don’t believe Idaho is anywhere near the stuff we’ve been hearing out of the federal government … but I do hope and expect that the Idaho Department of Government Efficiency will find ways to make Idaho more efficient,” Knorpp said.
The bill unanimously passed out of the committee and will go to the House floor.
Guido covers Idaho politics for the Lewiston Tribune, Moscow-Pullman Daily News and Idaho Press of Nampa. She may be contacted at lguido@idahopress.com and can be found on Twitter @EyeOnBoiseGuido.
