Changes proposed for Darby town government

by John Dowd

Last Thursday night the Darby Study Commission presented its tentative final report that laid out the changes they will propose to the voters this fall. The meeting was attended by a handful of community members and two of the three Government Study Commissioners, Christina Harrell and Sam Conner. The meeting was also attended by Nate Robbins, a Darby Town Council member and ex officio member of the Darby Study Commission.

The presentation highlighted the major changes the commission would propose, including changing council representation to “at-large,” meaning that instead of council candidates needing to live in a specific ward, they can come from anywhere in Darby. According to Commissioner Harrell, this was because, “there’s not a million people that want to jump up and volunteer.” She cited the difficulty the town has with finding people to run for positions in Dardy’s local government. With a small population, Darby has also experienced challenges when a ward does not have representation and there is no one in that ward that wishes to run for a council seat. This way, according to Harrell, representation would be for the whole of Darby, and could come from the whole of Darby. 

Another proposed major change would be to extend the mayor term from two years to four years. According to Harrell, “you are just getting your feet under you at two years,” as a mayor. Another issue with the small population of Darby, Harrell and Conner cited, was that it is often not only difficult to find a mayor, but that mayor often starts out knowing little to nothing about how to be a mayor or the current situation of the town. Harrell described how it can often take a full two-year-term for a new mayor to get situated. With this change, a longer term would allow that onboarding process and then give the mayor time to be effective. 

The commission also wanted to adjust the charter to allow the mayor to chair the council meetings, instead of having a committed chair. According to the commissioners, previously the chair was always looking to the mayor for information on the projects anyway.

“I feel like they (the mayor) would be a much better guide to those things (town issues),” said Harrell, because the mayor is often working on the proposed issues and projects for months before it comes to a council meeting for decisions. 

Also in the proposed changes, the mayor would be allowed to break a tie vote. The current charter is written without giving the mayor the ability to do this, meaning many stand-stills. “That doesn’t feel like an effective way to get things done,” said Harrell.

The study commission decided not to make any change to the form of government. They did make several other minor proposed changes to the charter. These included: 

update to the state reference to the Oath of Office, change the time to hold a special meeting within 48 hours, change terms throughout the charter to align with state code, the effective date of the document (assuming the changes are voted in) along with election transition changes to allow for the adoption of the updated charter as well as personnel transition dates, updates and additions to procedures when elected positions become vacant, change to allow the council to elect a president as the presiding officer in the absence of a mayor, grant some legislative powers to the council members, and finally updates to the terms from “commission and aldermen” to “council” throughout the charter. 

The tentative report will now need to go to the Ravalli County Attorney, who will check the changes to make sure they would be legal and to make any suggestions. Once accepted, it will be submitted to the Ravalli County Clerk and Recorder for review. Finally, the changes will be placed on the November general election this year. 

If voted in, these changes will come into effect in January of 2026. 

The final report will be posted as a notice in the newspaper and will appear as a small notice on the ballot to vote on in the next election. The report, as it is, is currently available at the Darby Town Council meetings, as well as on the town website. 

There was some public comment on the proposed changes at the meeting. According to community member Christine Olivo, “I think you people should be commended for this.” She said this regarding all the work the commissioners did to look through the charter and identify needed updates and changes. 

Gordon McKinney was critical of some of the changes, expressing concern about the extended mayor term limits. His worry was that this would give a mayor too much power, and would mean the town could be stuck with an ineffective or negative mayorship. 

McKinney also expressed concern over the “at-large” change to council representation. His worry was if, hypothetically, a single group in a single ward were to fill the seats and push a narrative the rest of the wards would be against. 

All comments were taken into consideration. Robbins wanted to note for the public that after three years, the changes to the charter can be undone through a petition to the council. The public also retains the right to bring forth another government review, which can be requested and voted on any time after the three years as well, to give these changes a time to take effect and to see if they work.