News

No vote on Butte economic efforts

Butte voters will not decide whether tax dollars will continue going toward economic development. As allowed by state law, commissioners will
make that decision as part of the budgeting process.

By Roberta Forsell Stauffer of The Montana Standard

After a lively, 90-minute discussion at Wednesday night’s council meeting, only three commissioners — Mike Sheehy, Joe Quilici and Charlie
O’Leary — voted in favor of putting the economic development mill levy on the November ballot.
Voters haven’t been asked since 1994 whether they want to continue levying one mill — roughly $63,000 — to economic development. Since
creation of the tax in 1990, the money has gone to the Butte Local Development Corp.’s efforts.
O’Leary said he just wanted to gauge the level of public support for the mill levy, and Sheehy said it was only appropriate that the voter gets a
choice.
“ People are wild about the issue and are wondering, `Where are the jobs?”’ Sheehy said. “ They’re not the type who will go to these meetings, but
they’ll stop you in the street and chew your ear off."
Quilici reminded the group that last week they approved putting the YMCA/county pool question on the ballot with little discussion and questioned
why this should be any different.
“ We’re changing horses in the middle of the stream,” Quilici said. “ I respect the people. Voters will take a look at the BLDC track record. If they
think BLDC does a good job, they’ll vote yes.”
Paul Babb said that if placed on the ballot, the issue would turn into a vote about BLDC, rather than a question of whether to spend tax dollars on
economic development.
He said he talked to quite a few people about this and all were “ 100 percent” in favor of economic development. Their concern is whether the
money is being spent wisely.
The real issue is finding ways to bring accountability for how the money is spent, Babb said.
Ristene Hall agreed. “ I don’t see a whole room full of voters saying they want to change this,” she said.
In fact, only a handful of people attended the meeting and the two who spoke praised the efforts of BLDC Director Evan Barrett.
Montana Tech professor Richard Donovan said he’s been involved in a major economic development effort and credited his success to date in part
to Barrett’s work.
Donovan spent time in Helena with Barrett lobbying for his projects and said he witnessed first-hand the grunt work involved in trying to bring jobs to
town. He spoke of Barrett’s putting in “ long hours on lots of hard wooden chairs, burning shoe leather and putting miles on his mini-van.
“ It’s down and dirty, ugly work and somebody’s got to do it and I’m glad Evan’s doing it,” Donovan said.
Bob Rodgers, senior executive officer of St. James Healthcare and chair of the BLDC board, said Barrett has helped with the hospital expansion. He
also said he believes in Butte and has a good feeling about the future.
“ I think things are ready to take off if we can just get the right spark,” Rodgers said.
Babb said that in tough economic times like Butte is facing, it’s natural to look for a scapegoat. “ Right now, the blame is focused on BLDC,” he
said. “ It’s easy to lay blame when we don’t have jobs.”
To bring more accountability to how the money is spent, Rocko Mulcahy suggested that two more members of the public be added to the BLDC
board and that quarterly reports be given to the council. Bill Melvin suggested issuing a request for proposals on how the $63,000 should be spent.
Discussion of those ideas and others will continue at future commission meetings.
Barrett said he’s willing to meet with commissioners individually every month if they’d like. He also expressed openness to expanding the BLDC
board and increasing the reporting he must do. “ We’re not afraid to discuss and deal with what we do,” he said. “ We are very happy to be as
accountable as you want us to be.”
If BLDC is guilty of anything, Barrett said, it’s of not taking the time to do a lot of public outreach because staff members are too busy doing their
jobs.
— Reporter Roberta Stauffer can be reached via email at roberta.stauffer(at)mtstandard.com.

http://www.mtstandard.com/newslocal/lnews2.html

Sorry, we couldn't find any posts. Please try a different search.

Leave a Comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.