One city's blight, another agency's plight

SMELTERVILLE ­— A recent Smelterville City Council meeting got a little heated as a handful of residents aired their frustrations with the Shoshone County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO) and what they see to be a mishandling of the city’s law enforcement responsibilities.

In May of this year, the city and SCSO agreed on a continuation of a contact that was originally signed in 2015.

This official contract stated that the City of Smelterville would pay the county $1,000 a month for patrol coverage from SCSO.

However, a verbal/handshake agreement between the two entities, made after the official contract was signed, amended the total to $1,775 in exchange for more patrol hours and an emphasis on enforcing blight ordnances.

According to the residents and members of the City Council, SCSO isn’t exactly holding up their end of the deal.

“I understand that we hired them to patrol more and handle our blights (blight ordinances) but, in my opinion, and I am not the only one with this opinion, we are getting nothing back from them,” Smelterville resident Brenda Stellmach said. “They rarely patrol the town itself, they spend all of their time sitting in front of the county shop texting on their phones. If we’re going to pay them then they need to be here.”

Tom Benson, Smelterville mayor, was upset to hear this from one of his constituents, but he also shared her displeasure.

“I’m frustrated with the law enforcement here too,” Benson said. “If they spent more time driving around, were more visible, the people causing the trouble around here would leave. They are in serious danger of losing their contract with us.”

Stellmach has a particular dog in this fight as she lives in a neighborhood that has been subject to some questionable activity over the past year.

“My neighbor has trash everywhere, cars everywhere, propane tanks lying around everywhere,” Stellmach said. “There is a terrible odor coming from the house. Every night, like clockwork between midnight and 2 a.m. there are guys showing up wearing masks. I have had guys banging on the walls of my house, shouting about money that is owed because they think my house is my neighbors house.”

Dennis Fratheim, City Councilman, heard Stellmach’s frustrations and was very blunt in his thoughts on the issue that the city is facing.

“Do you think we would have their attention if we stopped paying them?” Fratheim asked.

According to Stellmach, SCSO was invited to attend the meeting and had gotten an agreement to send a representative, but no one from SCSO showed up.

Since that heated meeting, Benson told the News-Press that he has meetings with Sheriff Mike Gunderson, but as for addressing and fixing the issues- heis going to wait and see.

“I have had two meetings with the sheriff since the city council meeting,” Benson said. “I have let him know the concerns of the city and where I see where improvements can be made. He took it under advisement. We will see how things go.”

Sheriff Gunderson spoke of his discussions with mayor Benson over the past week and defended his office’s work within the city.

“As far as I’m concerned, there is no issue between us (SCSO) and the City of Smelterville,” Gunderson said. “We’ve been providing anywhere between 90 to 160 hours of patrol in Smelterville each month.”

Gunderson further addressed the specific complaints from Stellmach and the other residents.

“This is more of a neighborhood dispute and not everyone understands our limitations,” Gunderson said. “These blight situations take time. We’re trying to get the residents to clean up their property on their own and not to have to do anything that would require the city to have to pay for any of the cleanup.”

According to both Benson and Gunderson, the verbal/ handshake agreement between the two sides did not include a set number of patrol hours.

Benson and the Council are currently working with Keisha Oxendine, Shoshone County prosecuting attorney, to draft a municipal citation ordinance that will allow the city to levy fines against residents who are not in compliance with city ordinances.

The county is also in the process of drafting an official agreement (to take the place of the 2015 agreement) that would clearly define dollar amount from the city and expectations of the SCSO.

Neither the ordinance, nor the new agreement, were complete by press time, but the Shoshone News-Press will provide further information upon their completion.