Seeley Lake Sewer
SEELEY LAKE - The Seeley Lake Sewer District Board had its monthly meeting on Jan. 21 when the Board discussed litigation strategy, a change in who qualifies for voting agents in the upcoming bond election and comments made by a Director at another public board meeting.
The Board closed the meeting to discuss litigation strategy with their attorney regarding a lawsuit filed in December seeking to force the District to install the proposed sewer and mandate properties to connect among other things.
After coming out of the closed session, President Tom Morris reported that the District’s attorney would be filing their response to the lawsuit Jan. 25.
In the response that was made available to the Pathfinder after it was filed, the District accepts a handful of the facts presented in the lawsuit as accurate such as the District being formed in 1992. The District denies most of the allegations and denies the “Plaintiffs’ interpretation of the law.”
The District lists eight affirmative defenses and reserves the right to assert additional affirmative defenses following completion of discovery. These defenses include things such as “The complaint fails to state a claim which relief can be granted” and the “Plaintiffs’ claims fail based on the impossibility of performance.”
The response concludes with a Prayer for Relief asking the court to dismiss the case, award the District’s costs and attorney fees and for other relief the court deems just, equitable and proper.
The full response can be found at https://www.seeleylake.com/home/customer_files/article_documents/sewer_answer_to_complaint210125.pdf
In regular business, the Board discussed adding a history document to the website. The document was footnoted in the letter sent to landowners a couple weeks ago but the Board had not approved it to be posted prior to the letter going out.
Director Beth Hutchinson made a motion to postpone putting the document on the website saying that the way it was written left out “a lot of the community’s point of view” and it would take more time to get it into balance. Hutchinson’s motion was defeated with the other four Directors voting against her.
Morris said he felt that there were some things left out of the document but that it should be posted since it was footnote number one in the letter. He moved to post it. All the Directors, except Hutchinson, voted in favor of Morris’s motion.
In her manager’s report, District Manager Jean Curtiss said that a Treasure State Endowment Fund grant for Phase 2 of the collection system is being considered by the legislature. The proposed Phase 2 project is ranked 18th in the state.
Curtiss said that an issue impacting some non-profits and other non-taxpaying entities’ ability to register a voting agent has come up. The Missoula County Elections office, with help from the county attorney’s office, has determined that only taxable properties are eligible to designate a voting agent for the bond election.
Curtiss explained that some of those properties do pay some fees like the Refuse District and the Sewer District annual assessment but because they are fees and not taxes they don’t qualify. Curtiss said that the determination as to who gets ballots and who doesn’t falls on the Elections Office not the District.
During his President’s comments, Morris said that there were comments being made and articles being published that were not authorized by the Board. He said it was fine to have different opinions but felt with the election coming up and ongoing lawsuit they shouldn’t be speaking for the Board outside of the meeting unless authorized by the Board.
While Morris didn’t name anyone in particular, in public comment, Colleen Krause referenced Director Walt Hill’s comments at the Seeley-Swan Hospital District that were reported by the Pathfinder in last week’s paper. Krause accused Hill of making comments that were “full of distortions and absence of accuracy.”
Krause suggested to remedy the situation she would like to send a set of questions to Hutchinson and Director Pat Goodover and have them respond. She would then purchase an ad to publish their replies.
Morris said he felt that would take Board authorization for Hutchinson and Goodover to reply and it was not on the agenda to discuss. Goodover suggested that the President would normally respond to questions for the Board.
Curtiss reminded everyone that all of the Board-approved information is posted on the District’s website, seeleysewer.org
Hill’s comments came up again at the end of the meeting when he stated that the bond election was about how to fund the sewer and not about whether to build or not build a sewer. He said what he had heard from the Health Department and the Department of Environmental Quality was that the sewer would have to be built either way and that if it was not funded through the proposed bonds because the election failed it would fall entirely on the backs of Seeley Lake.
Hill’s comment drew an immediate rebuttal from Hutchinson. She said that while she agreed that the groundwater pollution would have to be addressed per the Health Department and DEQ, she argued that neither agency has said the only way to solve the problem is with the proposed sewer. Furthermore she added that both agencies have said they are not in the position to force the District to build a sewer.
Morris called the meeting back to order interrupting Hutchinson and Hill’s debate stating that it was not on the agenda and if they wanted to they could add it to the next month’s agenda.
The next scheduled Board meeting is for Feb. 18 at 6 p.m. The agenda and information on how to participate will be located on the District’s website.
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