Complaints, Claims & a Truck Fleet: Did the Town Council Violate State Law?

Video of Meeting

Meeting Agenda

STEVENSVILLE — August 27, 2026 — Residents used Thursday night's Town Council meeting to press the mayor on employee complaints and to challenge the town's account of its budget deadline, before the council moved through a full agenda that included a used-truck purchase, two September event permits and a temporary appointment to lead public works.

Council members Bailey, Wandler and Smith were present along with Mayor Crews. Council member Ross was excused.

Public comment turns to personnel and the budget

Gerald Gaylor, the town's parks manager, returned to allegations he raised at the council's previous meeting, saying his concerns about a hostile work environment stemmed not from a disputed truck-maintenance email but from behavior described by town employees in formal police complaints. He directed the council to two Stevensville Police Department case numbers SP2507-015 and SP2509-016 and read aloud from an officer's report in one of them.

According to the passage Gaylor read, Mayor Crews asked the police officer to write citations to town workers for damaging grass at Lewis and Clark Park, said employees were too lazy to unlock a gate, and told the officer to "rip their toenails off" and bring the hammer down. The same report, as Gaylor read it, noted that the gate was open at the time and that there was no evidence anyone had driven across the grass. Gaylor said additional former employees would attest to similar treatment. The mayor did not respond to the allegations during the meeting.

Gaylor also questioned the town's spending priorities and asked whether Stevensville can produce documentation required under OSHA's confined-space standard — training records, designated roles, equipment, testing capability and permit systems — for the public works employees who operate and maintain the water system. He described it as a second example of hazardous conditions he has raised.

A second speaker, Autumn of Evenson Lane, thanked Bailey for her budget objections and then challenged a claim she said had been made to a council member: that penalties could follow if the budget were not adopted by Sept. 1. Under the Montana Local Government Budget Act, she said, no automatic penalty, fine or violation attaches to that date. State law allows local governments until the first Thursday after the first Tuesday in September, or 30 days after receiving certified valuations from the Department of Revenue, and the Department of Administration's filing deadline is Oct. 1. Stevensville has adopted budgets later in September before, she said, and warning council members about penalties "creates false urgency."

An organizer of the town's 911 memorial also spoke, announcing a 25th-anniversary service on Thursday, Sept. 10 at 6:30 p.m., featuring a pipe and drum band, county partner agencies, a silent procession down Main Street and a reading of names at Lewis and Clark Park. Because the service conflicts with the council's Sept. 10 meeting, she asked whether the meeting could be pushed to 7 or 7:30 p.m. Further in the meeting, Councilmember Bailey asked about moving the September 10 meeting later so members could attend the 911 memorial. The mayor said that requires suspending council rules, so it must be agendized and voted on — and it's already too late to advertise it for the upcoming special meeting.

Trucks draw scrutiny — did Town Council break the law?

The council approved bi-weekly claims that included payment for replacement public works vehicles, prompting the night's longest discussion.

While there is a reference to a competing quote - from a Missoula dealer that had a single truck available - it is not clear that the law was followed regarding the $177,404.36 purchase of 4 public works vehicles. The vehicles the town bought are 2022 models purchased used from Missoula Chevrolet, arriving with snow plows and sand and salt boxes already installed.

Based on the transaction records provided in the Agenda Packet, the Town of Stevensville appears to be in direct structural violation of Montana competitive bidding law (MCA § 7-5-4302).

The legal and financial breakdowns of this transaction indicate several key points:

1. The Evaded Contract Value

The town did not execute four separate contracts; they executed a single massive procurement action with a single vendor (Missoula Chevrolet) on the exact same date (August 25, 2026).

• The Math: Four separate claims (Claim numbers 20578, 20579, 20580, and 20581) were processed for $44,351.09 each.

• The Total Transaction: Combine these four identical, simultaneous purchases, and the town spent a total of $177,404.36 with a single dealership.

• The Legal Violation: This total significantly exceeds the statutory threshold of $80,000. If the town failed to publicly advertise a formal Request for Proposals (RFP) or call for competitive bids in local newspapers before selecting Missoula Chevrolet, they violated MCA § 7-5-4302.

  
  

2. Evidence of "Component Purchasing" (Bid Splitting)

The claim log displays classic hallmarks of "component purchasing" or "bid splitting"—an illegal practice where a public entity artificially breaks a single large purchase into sub-units to avoid triggering oversight mechanisms.

• The town processed these as four distinct invoice subsets labeled 1021713, 1021713-2, 1021713-3, and 1021713-4.

• In the transcript, council members explicitly acknowledged that they negotiated this as a package deal ("discounted because the town is buying four"). Montana courts evaluate the intent and the aggregate cost of the transaction. Because the overall procurement intent was to secure a fleet for $177k, treating them as individual $44k items to bypass an advertisement for bids is a compliance failure.

Is Mayor Crews and his Town Council going down the same illegal road as former Mayor Dewey? How do we find out the truth?

Two vehicles from the existing fleet may be salvaged; the rest are likely headed to surplus. Crews invited anyone curious about their condition to inspect a one-ton truck parked outside, saying it has just 42,000 miles and has been badly abused.

Smith, who drove that truck back from the mechanic, told the council he was appalled by its condition and recommended daily inspection sheets. Crews replied that the personnel manual already requires vehicles be kept operable and clean, and that the town will add at least a weekly inspection checklist. "Those trucks do not belong to us," he said. "They belong to these people out here."

Interim supervisor

The council consented to appointing Eddye Oliver as temporary public works supervisor until the position is posted and current employees can apply. Oliver, who was not present, has worked in collections systems for the City of Missoula and as a construction inspector for a water and sewer district. Under questioning, Crews confirmed he does not yet hold the water and wastewater certifications required for testing currently performed by another employee, but is training toward them.

A public question about who has served as acting supervisor since the public works director resigned was not directly answered on the recording. Does that mean no one has been monitoring our creaky, leaky water and sewer system?

Crews closed by saying he intends to bring forward a resolution — or a personnel manual change — extending the town's electronic communications security policy to cover conversations that can be overheard by people not entitled to hear them. I'm dying to hear how he intends to prevent others from listening to him shout into the telephone. It's the speaker's responsibility to speak where they can't be overheard.