Lawsuit signals endgame for Ravalli treasurer

By Dan Brooks in Montana Politics 4 Comments
Suspended Ravalli County treasurer Valerie Stamey, now the object of a lawsuit

Suspended Ravalli County treasurer Valerie Stamey, now the object of a lawsuit

It seems the litigator has become the litigated: the Ravalli County Commission has sued embattled suspended hilarious treasurer Valerie Stamey for $29,000, citing 58 instances of neglected duties at $500 a pop. This news follows last Friday’s meeting, in which commissioners offered Stamey the chance to resign rather than be suspended without pay. Stamey did not attend that meeting, saying it would violate her right to due process. At the same event, independent auditor Jim Woy said “there is absolutely no doubt” Stamey failed to perform the duties of her office. You may remember Woy from Stamey’s plan to sue him for libel, which her attorney promised would be the “first of many” lawsuits. As of press time, the legal counterassault seems to have stalled.

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Van Valkenburg announces deal with Department of Justice, calls them dicks

By Dan Brooks in Montana Politics 1 Comment
FVV

Fred Van Valkenburg and a woman who loves her job, by Kelsey Wardwell of the Missoulian.

And like that, the Gordian Knot is untangled: Missoula County Attorney Fred Van Valkenburg has announced a tripartite agreement with the Department of Justice and State Attorney General Tim Fox to improve the way his office prosecutes sexual assaults. Van Valkenburg will drop his lawsuit, and the DOJ will stop investigating him and releasing statements about it while he is on vacation. Now we just shake hands, smile for the cameras and put this unpleasantness behind us. Quote:

“(The USDOJ) never once reached out—never once in two years—reached out to work cooperatively with me in this matter,” Van Valkenburg said. “The letter that (Acting U.S. Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels) issued on Feb. 14 was the single most unprofessional thing I have seen in my practice of law in 41 years…Why did the United States Department of Justice do what they did here?…People working for the United States government think there is no price to things.”

L’chaim, everybody! Samuels succeeded Van Valkenburg at the podium and remarked, on behalf of said government, that “had we had to litigate this, I am confident that we would have prevailed.”

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Three fun stories from yesterday’s primaries

By Dan Brooks in Montana Politics 0 Comment
Repawblican candidate Bingo won his primary and will face Skittles, incumbent Democat, in the fall.

Repawblican Bingo won a contentious primary and will face Skittles, incumbent Democat, in the fall.

Maybe I’m biased, but Montana politics seem to produce a better story-to-population ratio than any local politics I have seen. Case in point: Missoula and Ravalli counties held their primary elections yesterday, and they produced not one, nor two, but three interesting stories—four if you count the sheriff’s race. TJ McDermott beat his two Democratic opponents to become the Missoula County Sheriff—there are no Republican candidates in the general—shortly after county Democrats amended their bylaws to endorse him, and also after he sued the Sheriff’s Department. That’s not even the best story from yesterday, though.

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Despite panhandling law, downtown homeless remain homeless, downtown

By Dan Brooks in Montana Politics 5 Comments
Glen Harley Stephens, of Ryman Street. Photo by Cathrine Walters of the Indy

Glen Harley Stephens of Ryman Street. Photo by Cathrine Walters of the Indy

I moved into my once and future apartment yesterday, so I am no longer homeless. But the overall vagrancy rate in Missoula remains steady and maybe even climbs, despite such expedients as banning new soup kitchens and making it illegal to sit near businesses downtown. Last week in The Missoulian, the downtown association and various councilpeople complained that our new panhandling ordinance isn’t working. Instead of getting jobs or disappearing to Los Angeles, the bums are doing the same bum stuff, just in compliance with the new law. Even after we made it harder to be homeless, they stuck with it—almost as if they didn’t have a choice.

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Yes!

By Dan Brooks in Montana Politics 0 Comment
A screen cap from Friday's Missoulian

A screen cap from Friday’s Missoulian

The best-case scenario in the Ravalli County treasury fiasco got a little more likely over the weekend. Part One—Valerie Stamey turns out to have done almost no work at all between her appointment in September and her suspension in February—is already in place. That’s more fun than the news consuming public reasonably could have asked for. But dare we hope for Part Two? I am referring, of course, to the unlikely but entertaining possibility that county commissioners really have been illegally selling tax liens, as Stamey alleges. Probably they haven’t. But now the FBI is involved, so oh man—if they have.

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