Study commission asking for return to partisan elections

Lincoln County may be going back to partisan elections soon.

The county’s Study Commission has been researching the issue for two years and will present its findings of fact to the public at 7 p.m. Wednesday in the Ponderosa Room at Libby City Hall.

Study Commission chairman Steve Curtiss said the commission discovered that the county’s non-partisan election process is not compliant with the law. The county’s elected official form of government requires partisan elections, he said.

County voters approved a change to non-partisan county elections in November 2009 after the county commissioners “arbitrarily decided” to put non-partisan elections on the ballot, Curtiss said. “They had no authority to do that,” he said.

Curtiss said the county could conceivably have non-partisan elections, but it would have to change its form of government to the commission form to do that.

The study commission hopes that the commissioners will approve a move back to partisan elections by mid-December before Commissioner Greg Larson’s seat is filled in January.

According to the minutes of the county commissioners’ Sept. 28 meeting, study commission member Rita Windom said there was definitely a lack of transparency and felt that the public didn’t know what was going on when it voted to approve non-partisan elections. She said she felt that the public would not have voted for non-partisan elections if they were informed on the history and facts.

At the Sept. 28 meeting, Commissioner Mark Peck said he feels the information the study commission has put together is pretty compelling and said it’s clear that mistakes have been made.

The study commission will prepare a final report following Wednesday’s meeting in Libby and one at Eureka High School on Thursday at 7 p.m.

The county commissioners can appoint a study commission every 10 years, Curtiss said. The current study commission’s work will end after its final report is filed, said Curtiss, who ranches near Eureka.

Caleb M. Soptelean can be reached at 293-4124 or by email at csoptelean@thewesternnews.com.