Tensions escalate over City Attorney contract

Tensions between Libby Mayor Doug Roll and some members of the Libby City Council are rising in the wake of the mayor’s refusal to schedule a special meeting to discuss proposed changes to the contract between the city and the law firm of Doney Crowley P.C. for the city’s legal representation.

The council’s judiciary committee has proposed a number of changes to the contract for the coming year. Council members Gary Neff and Allen Olsen, along with Council President Brent Teske, requested Roll schedule a special meeting to discuss the proposed changes prior to the regularly scheduled Dec. 7 meeting. Roll declined, telling council members it is his responsibility to negotiate the city’s contracts, not theirs.

“In response to the request for a meeting to negotiate a contract directly with our current City Attorney, I would remiind council that contract negotiations are carried out by the executive, not the legislative,” Roll wrote in a Dec. 2 email message. “I would welcome council input concerning issues council may have with the current contract. I understand that two members have already come up with some kind of draft contract. I would ask that individual council put their suggestions or ideas in writing and put them in my box at city hall. I will incorporate them in my negotiations with our current City Attorney, and if those negotiations are unsuccessful, with any other qualified candidate that I would feel comfortable with appointing, as per our City Charter.”

Neff said Roll is wrong in his interpretation both of the process and of how the changes are being proposed.

“Two members did not develop or come up with a draft contract,” Neff wrote in an email to the council. “The Judiciary committee assembled a contract that was the product of a work session of the entire Council.  I personally placed a copy of this contract in the Mayor’s box.  The Mayor asks individual council members to place their suggestions, in writing, in his box.  The council as a whole created the contract. That makes it policy, and has been placed before him. The Mayor can ignore a divided council; but, a united council must be obeyed. The contract he has received is the contract he must negotiate for.”

Teske said the situation demonstrates the city’s lack of leadership.

“This is another example of how fractured and dysfunctional this council is, due to a lack of leadership,” he said. “The City Attorney contract has been a very controversial subject and should be addressed by the council as a whole. We know that it is the executive’s job to negotiate contracts, however, in this instance face-to-face discussion and debate should take place to hash out concerns. Then the executive can negotate with the party involved. Placing suggestions in Doug Roll’s drop box, as he has requested, isn’t the proper way to deal with this issue.”

Olsen said the problem dates back to the May decision by the Montana Commissioner of Political Practices, who ruled there was sufficient evidence to support a charge of improper use of city resources to manipulate an election by Roll, along with five current and former council members, Bill Bischoff, Robin Benson, Vicky Lawrence, Barb Desch and Peggy Williams, and former City Attorney James Reintsma.

“Since May 12, when the Commissioner of Political Practices came out with his decision on Roll and his election fraud, along with the other named six, Roll has done everything in his childish ways not to allow Libby to move forward,” Olsen said. “Every move that we have made to move Libby forward has been met with bad advice or no advice from our City Attorney. All of the meetings that Roll has canceled have cost the taxpayers thousands of dollars. Roll is so arrogant that there is just no reasoning with this guy. He can sit there in one of our seven or nine minute meetings and tell you how transparent we are, yet with the help of his private attorney they keep everything hidden from the council and the public.”

The proposed contract offered by Neff and Olsen includes several changes to the existing contract between the city and Doney Crowley, which expires as of Dec. 31, 2015.

The first significant change the councilmen proposed would require the city attorney to be physically present at a minimum of one council meeting per month. Under the existing contract, a representative from the firm is required to attend the meetings, but attendance at any or all of them is allowed to be done by phone.

The proposed contract also incorporates two financial changes. First, the base compensation under the contract is dropped from $70,000 per year to $60,000 per year, less $200 per month for the lease of an office in city hall. The proposal also reduces the hourly rate for approved non-standard legal work to $60 per hour, from the $75 per hour stipulated in the existing contract, and requires council approval for any non-standard billable hours. The proposal also shifts the costs of telephone service from the city onto the attorney.

The other significant change to the contract is the addition of a code of conduct clause for the City Attorney. The code of conduct requires the City Attorney to maintain open and honest communication with the council regarding the attorney’s representation of the city, and honesty in all of the attorney’s conduct. The proposal requires the City Attorney to keep the council “reasonably informed” of all pending matters, to report and explain the practical implications of legal strategies and positions and to consult with the council concerning the objectives of legal representation and the means employed to achieve those objectives. Additionally, the proposal would require the attorney to provide written notification to the council when there is a potential or significant risk of a conflict of interest arising due to the attorney’s past or current representation of another party. 

The council is scheduled to meet at 7 p.m. Monday, Dec. 7, at Libby City Hall. As of press time Thursday, the agenda for that meeting was not available. It is the last regularly scheduled council meeting prior to the expiration of the current contract.

Neff said the renewal of Payne’s contract with the city was a foregone conclusion.

“The mayor is nothing, if not predictable,” he said. “At the recent council work session, he dictated that only one subject could be discussed. He tossed the council a bone with no meat. We constructed a contract beneficial to the city, one I knew he would ignore. He is going to walk in Jan 1, toss a contract created by Payne, beneficial to Payne, on the council table and claim he did his job. The mayor has broken trust with the council and the council needs to step up and assert it’s authority.