Brekke reflects on returning to Havre City Council

City Council members elected Andrew Brekke Tuesday as the new sitting City Council member for Ward 3.

Caleb Hutchins resigned from Ward 3 earlier this month.

Hutchins announced last month he had accepted a job with Spokane Community College in Spokane, Washington.

Brekke resigned from the council in 2018, after being on it for 11 years, but in seat Ward 4. 

He said he ran for the first time in 2007, and was elected again two other times after that.

"I didn't really have a specific agenda," he said. "It was an open seat - the previous seat holder in Ward 4 at the time, Emily Mayer, had chosen not run so I had chosen to run in her position, and I thought that I could give some new blood on the council and try something new."

At the time, he said, the big thing that was going on in Havre was the First Street project, adding that it now has been completed.

U.S. Highway 2 that runs through Havre as First Street was torn up and replaced throughout all the city limits of Havre, with Montana Department of Transportation putting in new concrete structures and concrete storm box drains underneath for water and sewer connections, he said.

"At the time, I remember the Department of Transportation saying it was the largest urban project they'd ever done in a city," Brekke said. "... That was a massive project that was going on right at the time that I was running and when I was elected."

The city was also figuring what to do with urban sprawl, he said, so annexation was the topic at the time.

In 2018, he said he moved into a house in Ward 3 and wasn't able to represent Ward 4 anymore, and had to resign.

"It's been two years since and I hadn't thought about joining the council again or running for it again until the position opened," he said. "... I decided that, I suppose, in two years I've recharged a little bit and am willing to reconsider."

He said he was pleasantly surprised that two other people were interested in the position and that is what motivated him to put his name in.

The big item that continues to be on the front burner for the council is the continued issues with infrastructure, he added.

In Havre, he said, it has reached the age with infrastructure needing replacement.

He said he thinks special improvement districts are the best move of action going forward. 

"That continues to be the main challenge and focus and the overall issue of keeping our economy intact and growing our tax base continues to be a challenge of all rural Montana," Brekke said. "Even though we are the largest community on the Hi-Line, we're still rural, whether we like it or not. We're a little town in big town britches."

He said what he has learned and will take into this go-around in the council is trying to see the other side's point of view.

"We have the right in this country to disagree with each other, but we shouldn't despise one another for our opinions, he said. "So, over time, I think I learned to, I hope I would at least, I certainly do have more time to learn about it. You have to try to see the other side's point of view and, even though in the end you might not agree with that point of view, you have to respect the other point of view.

"In a small town like this we have to learn to live together and work together to solve problems, and so I think Havre does that quite well. We always have, but I think we always have the ability to do a better job in that area," he added. 

One thing is, he said, people should be better at is listening.

Brekke has multi-generational ties to the Hi-Line, he said.

He said he grew up in Harlem, went to Chinook schools followed by attending Montana State University and received a degree in political science before coming to work in Havre.