During a standing County Commission agenda work session on Oct. 2, tension among the commissioners again bubbled to the surface.
Commissioner Rae Grulkowski asked during the meeting to add a resolution establishing meeting protocols to the agenda.
Commissioners Jim Larson and Joe Briggs said they had only just received the document that day and weren’t ready to send it to a formal meeting.
All three commissioners are Republicans.
Briggs said it would be better suited to discuss in another meeting since they already have processes approved by legal for placing items on the agenda.
He said he’d skimmed the document that day and noticed some aspects that would be problematic so it needed further review before being placed on the agenda. Lason agreed.
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Grulkowski said she disagreed at that there had been times while she was in office that they only had six days to review a document before making decisions.
“This is something that the commissioner has been arguing about for many months,” she said.
Grulkowski lost in the June primary, but filed as a write-in candidate for the November election.
Last week, she voted to support a resolution disallowing stickers to be placed on ballots for write-in candidates.
She filed for a write-in with 146 variations of her name that county election officials and volunteers will have to review on ballots on Nov. 5.
Briggs said he had no intention of debating Grulkowski, but that she was omitting emails in which he had delineated the process approved by legal and was asking for more time to review her new document before formally considering it on a a meeting agenda.
Briggs and Larson said they’d put the resolution on the next work session agenda for consideration.
Grulkowski said she wanted a report from the county’s courthouse security committee since it met last week.
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Larson said was an initial meeting to introduce themselves and start a discussion, but no decisions were made.
Grulkowski said she also wanted to discuss a travel request document that she was awaiting signatures from the other commissioners for herself and Clerk and Recorder Sandra Merchant.
As Larson, board chair attempted to call for public comment as was next on their agenda, Grulkowski said she might have something else to discuss.
Larson asked what she was doing and if it was for the agenda for their upcoming meeting.
She said no it might be for another meeting, then said that she had more to cover.
Briggs said there wasn’t an item on the work session agenda to talk about things beyond what they were putting on the agenda for their formal meeting.
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Grulkowski said this was the meeting when they brought things up, to which Briggs said it was when they set the agenda for the next meeting.
“Well, when do we talk,” Grulkowski said.
Historically, commissioners have brought up topics for discussion via email, Briggs said.
“Well then my emails are going to a black hole,” Grulkowski said.
Briggs said he thought they needed to follow the agenda and call for public comment.
Grulkowski asked when they would resolve their other issues, so which Larson said, “I guess you can walk up to the podium.”
She said, “I’ll sit right here.”
“If you’re chastising this board, you should go up there and talk to us,” Larson said.
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Grulkowski said that in the past, before 2006, department heads came to the work session to make statements.
Briggs said that prior to 2006, they didn’t have staff meetings where those department heads raised issues that needed to be addressed.
Grulkowski said that those meetings weren’t recorded and that department heads could approach individual commissioners for decisions.
“We are a board right now and you’re trying to silence me as a member,” Grulkowski said, as well as department heads, by telling us we have to have it on the agenda, but she couldn’t get things on the agenda, “isn’t that amazing.”
She said she rarely saw department heads in their commission meetings and that they didn’t often ask her opinion of how they were doing.
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Department heads regularly sit at the table with commissioners during public meetings when presenting agenda items or sit in the audience and provide comment as needed. During the Oct. 2 work session, four departments had directors or their representatives at the table: planning, public works, sheriff’s office and legal.
Briggs said that when he needs to speak to a department head, he picks up the phone.
He said they have operational authority to speak to department heads and items that don’t fall under the state law open meeting requirements.
“That’s reality,” he said.
Grulkowski said that she heard a rumor that she was never in the office and wanted to bring that up. She said “that’s completely a lie,” and said that Briggs had been traveling out of town for the last few weeks and she didn’t know what he was doing.
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She said she wanted reports when commissioners came back from traveling.
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Grulkowski said that on Oct. 1, she walked by one of the other commissioner’s offices where they were talking and asked if she needed to be included. She said that Larson told her she’d be told when he was ready to tell her. She said she knew it was about a certain department and investigated, getting statements from employees who said that the Sweetgrass Development Authority director to said commissioners “were going to hand her ass” to the director.
She did not specify the department or issue she believed the conversation to be about.
Larson said, “I don’t know where you got that kind of business. Nothing like that was said anywhere. I never said anything like that.”
He said he asked Briggs a question that had nothing to do with what Grulkowski was talking about.
She said if she wasn’t getting answers, she was going to bring up issues during the work sessions and wanted a report on commissioner travel.
Briggs said the trips aren’t secret.
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He said his recent trip included work with the National Association of Counties, visiting with members of Congress on items of importance to counties such as the payment in lieu of taxes program. He also met with defense officials on the Sentinel missile program, which is important to the the county, Briggs said.
Briggs said he also attended the Montana Association of Counties conference that Grulkowski skipped.
“You didn’t go,” he said.
He also traveled to San Diego last week to meet with the national association’s executive committee and that the county didn’t pay his travel expenses.
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Grulkowski asked what the executive committee does and Briggs said she could look at their website for details on what they’re lobbying for in Congress.
She said she didn’t skip the MACO conference, but having lost the June primary, figured she wouldn’t spend tax payer funds to attend.
Her upcoming trip that she wanted the other commissioners to sign off on was a MACO county finance training.
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“If you’re not going to be in office on Jan. 1, why would you need the county to pay for you to go to finance training,” Briggs asked.
Grulkowski said she didn’t get updates from the county finance officer so she wanted to go the MACO training for information.
Since two of three commissioners didn’t support Grulkowksi’s resolution on commission meeting protocols, it will not be on their Oct. 8 agenda.
