Former speaker of the House starts Facebook page on Havre representative

Former Montana Speaker of the House Bob Bergren, a Democrat, recently set up a public Facebook group called Rep. Ed Hill - the Accountability page, in an effort to host discussion of its namesake's activities in the Montana Legislature.

Bergren said he would have made the page for anyone representing the area, but he's especially concerned about Hill, whom he said he suspects may not be communicative with the people he represents.

The Havre Daily News reached out to Hill multiple times in the past two weeks to respond to the page's creation and Bergren's concerns and about Hill's first days in the Legislature, but he has not responded.

Bergren said that, when he was in office, he would make a point to keep people up to date, but so far he hasn't seen anything like that from Hill.

"I would do call-ins once a week," he said. "... I called into the radio stations, and was available to the newspaper, and I just haven't seen any communication from him."

Bergren said the inciting incident that led him to creating the page was Hill voting for a bill that would effectively legalize concealed-carry on college campuses.

He said he's not sure Montana State University-Northern Chancellor Greg Kegel would agree with such a measure and that Hill should speak with people like him before making such decisions, which he's not sure he did.

Neither Kegel nor Hill have responded to the Havre Daily News' requests for comments on this issue.

Bergren also said he invited Hill to join the Facebook group upon its creation two weeks ago so he can address people's concerns directly, but had not heard back from Hill.

"We'd like to hear it from him, but if not, I guess we'll just have to glean the information coming out of Helena," Bergren said.

He said it's important to communicate with people back home in the age of social media, especially in the case of Ed Hill, who Bergren said he's concerned about as a legislator and suspects will be guided by ideology rather than what his constituents need.

"He's a self-proclaimed radical-right conservative," he said, "and I don't think that reflects the values of the city of Havre."