The Montana Supreme Court issued an opinion on June 4 upholding a district court decision on the local governing board the the Cascade County City-County Health Department.
The crux of the issue is a disagreement between Cascade County and the City of Great Falls on the makeup of the governing body as required by state law changes in 2021 in response to the COVID pandemic
The city and county have an agreement governing the operation of the Cascade County City-County Health Department that has not been modified since 1975.
In the fall of 2021, the city and county approved a temporary agreement to make the county commission, with one city commissioner as a nonvoting member, the designated governing body.
That agreement was in place through June 2022 while the city and county continued working on a new agreement for operation of CCHD.
The city and county continued to disagree over the makeup of the governing body and the matter went before a district court judge in 2022.
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District Court Judge Elizabeth Best issued an opinion on Aug. 29, 2022 that state law does not prohibit a city commissioner from serving on the governing body of the City-County Health Department.
Cascade County appealed the district court’s ruling to the Montana Supreme Court that fall.
The county argued that the governing body must be an elected body and that it should be the County Commission since they fund the majority of CCHD. They also argued that a city official can’t make decisions over the larger county population and shouldn’t be a full voting member of the health board.
The city argued that the elected bodies could designate the health board as the governing body and essentially maintain the status quo, or that the governing body could be comprised of the county commissioners with a city commissioner serving as a voting member.
In her 2022 decision, District Court Judge Elizabeth Best ruled that the law requires a governing body, which is identified by the 1975 interlocal agreement between the county and city.
Under the law, Best wrote that a city commissioner cannot be prohibited from serving on the governing body.
She wrote that the existing interlocal agreement established the Board of Health as the governing body and that agreement required that the city mayor, or his/her designee, serve on the board.
Justice Dirk Sandefur wrote the court’s opinion and said that the Legislature has long authorized joint city-county health departments and health boards to avoid the unnecessary duplication of local government services and expenses, reducing the taxpayer burden.
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The language of the 2021 law “manifests that the Legislature was certainly aware of the likely pre-2021 existence of consolidated city-county health boards and that their chartering pre-2021 city-county agreements theretofore effectively charged them by operation of law with the full scope of authority previously provided to local health boards” under previous laws, Sandefur wrote.
If the Legislature had intended to impose other requirements or limitations on “elected city and county governing bodies regarding the continued maintenance or operation of their preexisting consolidated city-county planning boards it certainly could have done so in the language” of the 2021 laws, Sandefur wrote. “Here, there is no dispute or record basis for dispute that the 1975 agreement was and remains a valid and enforceable contract under generally applicable contract law…as such, the 1975 agreement likewise an ‘interlocal agreement.’
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The county’s argument that a city member of the health board lacks the jurisdictional authority to approve health and safety decisions affecting the entire county ignores the Montana Constitution, which allows government agencies to cooperate in the exercise of any function, power or responsibility without regard for otherwise applicable city and county jurisdictional limits, so long as it is not prohibited by law or charter, Sandefur wrote.
“Contrary to the county’s assertion, a comprehensive statutory scheme specifically grants participating cities legal authority to participate, through consolidated city-county health boards, in the approval and enforcement of local health and safety regulations affecting the entire county without regard for city and county jurisdictional limits. County residents living outside the jurisdictional limits of a city participating in a city-county health board agreement are neither disenfranchised, nor subject to unlawful city regulation, because the cross-jurisdictional regulatory authority exercised by consolidated city-county health boards and participating elected city governing bodies and constituent members are both constitutionally and statutorily authorized; city-county health boards are created only upon mutual agreement of the elected city and county governing bodies; city-county health boards necessarily consist of members coequally appointed by and who serve at the pleasure of those elected city and county governing bodies,” Sandefur wrote.
In March, County Commissioners voted to make an appointment to the health board.
The county seat on the board had been vacant since April 2021.
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In 2021, County Commissioner Joe Briggs told The Electric that the county wasn’t filling their vacancy on the health board as the county and city were discussing a governing body for the health department due to changes in state law following the COVID pandemic.
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During the June 5 meeting, the health board discussed the court ruling and Briggs said “a piece of the puzzle is now answered. It doesn’t alter the fact that we need to look at the operating agreement.”
Carey Ann Haight, chief of the county attorney office’s civil division, said that she’ll discuss the ruling with the county commissioners and then the city to determine next steps.
