HELENA -- The chairman of the House Appropriations Committee told tobacco prevention activists Tuesday that he'll try to grant their wish for $9.3 million for prevention programs.

But he warned them to be careful what they wish for.

Chairman Dave Lewis, R-Helena, told them that their millions of dollars for anti-smoking programs they've requested are going to come straight out of the beleaguered human services budget.

"I'm tired of getting beat over the head," Lewis said in the House Appropriations Committee Tuesday. "I'll vote for this, but we got to come up with the money somewhere else."

Rep. Christine Kaufmann, D-Helena, is sponsoring House Bill 756, which would implement the initiative that 65 percent of Montana voters approved at the polls in November.

Initiative 146 allocates 40 percent of the annual, $30 million tobacco settlement payment into a health care trust fund, 32 percent into tobacco-use prevention programs, 17 percent for insurance plans for low-income and uninsurable residents and 11 percent of the money is returned to the state's general fund.

Kaufmann's bill would ensure that the voter-approved funding formula remains intact.

Legislators have talked about using some, or all, of the $9.3 million slated for tobacco prevention programs to help balance the human services budget in fiscal 2004 and 2005.

"I give the voters credit," said former attorney general Joe Mazurek, representing Protectmontanakids.org. "I think they knew what they were doing."

Prevention advocates said Tuesday that the state has never funded the prevention program to the $9.3 million level that voters want, which is the funding level that the Center For Disease Control recommends.

The 2001 Legislature slashed the prevention funding to $500,000 each year of the biennium. Advocates are calling on lawmakers to do better this time around.

Tobacco companies have already given Montana $124 million of the $920 million settlement, yet Montana still doesn't have a an adequate prevention program, Mazurek said.

Carla Williams, a Helena obstetrician and gynecologist, said she sees first hand the effects smoking has on children. People need help kicking the habit, she said.

"They know it is detrimental to their kids," she said. "This is something shameful for them that they can't quit."

Steve Yeakel, who represents several human service organizations, spoke against the bill, saying the state needs to use that money for human services programs that are slated for reduction next biennium.

Yeakel did say that he supports a proposed 18-cent per pack cigarette tax that could be used to fund tobacco prevention programs in Montana.

The committee took no action on Kaufmann's bill Tuesday.