City says its making progress on police situation

On March 16, the Libby City Council held an executive session to discuss employee issues at the Libby Police Department.

“This is an employee discussion so we are going to regroup in the back room to have that discussion,” Mayor Peggy Williams said.

Due to the sensitive nature of the topic the mayor explained that information would be disclosed on a need-to-know basis.

“We will not necessarily be disclosing what we will discuss,” Williams said.

The city’s attorney Dean Chisholm spoke to the mayor.

“You should make a finding that because this is a personnel issue at this time the employee's rights to privacy exceeds the public right to know pursuant to Montana law at this point,” Chisholm said

After nearly an hour-and-a-half closed door meeting the council came out and Chisholm made the following closing remarks.

“The minutes should reflect that those gathered discussed several matters that implicated the privacy right and personnel information rights of one or more employees. The conversation was held in executive session for that reason. We have now concluded and there is no further action to be taken at this time,” Chisholm said.

The meeting was then adjourned.

In the March 20 city council meeting, it addressed the police situation.

“We have received a response from our independent investigators regarding the situation at the police department. We are in the process of reviewing that,” Chisholm said.

Chisholm said he has been in touch with the council and parties that may have been involved in the situation.

“We are looking forward to concluding this situation as soon as possible, of course we have several parties involved and we aren't in control of the timing. We are looking forward to putting this issue to bed as soon as possible,” Chisholm said.

One member of the public, Darrel "DC" Orr, asked the city whether there was a defense attorney the city was using for criminal cases, or whether Chisholm was charging the city in excess.

Chisholm responded saying that his billing was public and that he had not billed the city during these last few months for anything regarding the difficulty in the department. Chisholm also said that after the independent review, no criminal charges were referred to the attorney general. If any reason to press criminal charges were found it would have been required, Chisholm said.

Neither City Administrator Sam Sikes nor Dean were aware of the status of Police Chief Scott Kessel, or whether or not he is on sick leave or returning to work.

On March 23, the police commission met for the first time. Members of the commission met to select a commission chair, vice chair and secretary. They then assigned members to either a one-, two- or three-year term and reviewed the purpose and duties of the police commission.

Steven Boyer will chair the committee, John Beebe is vice chair and Karen Dinkins will be the secretary. They decided to appoint timelines by May instead of now, according to Sikes.