Havre's transition to charter government now official

Today marks Havre’s transition from a commission executive form of government to a charter government.

The charter proposal passed in the November election with 2,183 votes for and 1,726 against.

“What we had before was what they call general government powers and therefore, we can only do what the state allows us to do, and by going to the charter government, then we can do anything we want, as long as it’s not strictly prohibited by the state government,” Havre Finance Director Doug Kaercher, also a Democratic candidate for Havre mayor, said today.

“It opens up some options, but there isn’t actually anything in the works at this point and everything pretty much stays the same as what it was prior. So I don’t think there’s anything in the works immediately, but there are some discussions going on with some of the things that can be done,” Kaercher said.

One topic he feels is most prominent is dilapidated buildings and being able to do something with those in the community “so they’re not an eyesore,” but things are only in the discussion stage.

“They’ve looked at some different options that other charter cities have done in Montana. And they’re kind of trying to formulate a plan at this point,” he said.

In Montana, a municipal government may acquire self-government powers only with the approval of a majority of the municipal electors voting on the question.

A self-governing community can enact more proposals than a general government community, basically able to take actions as long as they are not prohibited by state law, while a general government community can only take action that is established under state law.

Previous proposals to pass a charter form included hiring a city manager to run the day-to-day operations, and that was left out of 2020’s proposal. The charter proposal including hiring a city manager failed in the 2016 election.

Under what voters approved in 2020, the city will remain in its mayor-city council form without a manager, but now will have greater flexibility in what actions it can take.