An interlocking group of people has board members on four of the five taxing districts specific to the Three Mile area. Those four taxing districts are embroiled in controversy and, increasingly, do not have the support of the Three Mile public.
When the Lone Rock School District put up a mill levy this spring it was soundly defeated. The Three Mile Fire District recently made headlines when the district put up private property signs at the fire station on the Eastside Highway to prevent its use as a school bus stop.
The Lone Rock division of the Ravalli County Park Board has been embroiled in controversy over everything from the naming of the community park to the proposal to build a community center at the park, with a price tag of $450,000.
The two commissioners for the Bitter Root Irrigation District in the Three Mile area are currently claiming, along with the district, that the district’s responsibility to operate and maintain the Three Mile Project Gravity Pipeline System ends in February 2016 upon pay out of the 30-year contract to pay for construction of the system. But this is simply not the case, according to a prominent law firm retained by a group of concerned Three Mile Project water users. The irrigation district remains responsible for upkeep and maintenance of the Three Mile system after the bonds that financed its construction are retired, according to the prominent law firm.
The school, fire, and irrigation districts, along with the community park, are the vital heart of the area. An interlocking group of people should not be allowed to control that vital heart to serve their own narrow interests.
The two Three Mile Fire Stations are not private property. They are public property, paid for by Three Mile residents through their property taxes. It’s time for Three Mile residents to make that clear to the interlocking group of people who would claim otherwise.
Don Baty
Stevensville