There are a lot of important decisions to make as you fill out your ballots over the coming days and weeks, but perhaps none affect things closer to home than the five candidates you will select to serve on the City of Bozeman Study Commission and the seven candidates you will select for the Gallatin County Study Commission. We've heard a lot of feedback from residents in both the city and county that many of them don't fully understand what the local government study is, but they just know that we need to take advantage of the once-in-a-decade opportunity to review the way our local governments operate and represent us. 

That is why we at the Gallatin Valley Sentinel decided to host a Town Hall and Candidate Forum for the Gallatin County and City of Bozeman Local Government Study Commission Candidates this past September. All 22 county and 15 city candidates were invited to participate in the event and complete our candidate questionnaire, and most recently have been invited to record a one-on-one Zoom interview with one of our volunteers to be shared on our website. We asked Dan Clark, Director of MSU's Local Government Center, to give a presentation at the town hall to help explain what the government study is and what it can and cannot accomplish. We've also dedicated a section of our website to the Local Government Study that we will be updating regularly with more information on the city and county studies and will keep it up-to-date once the actual studies begin after the November election. You can follow along with that information here.

Before casting your votes for the study commission candidates, we encourage you to take the time to watch the recording of our town hall and to learn more about each candidate at their individual links provided below. We encourage you to vote this November 5th. The consequences both locally and nationally are too grave not to. You can check your voter registration status here and learn more about Gallatin County Elections here. We strongly encourage you to either vote in person or hand-deliver your ballots considering the plague of issues with the Bozeman Post Office.

Town Hall Time Stamps

0:00 – GVS Introduction

4:00 – Dan Clark presentation on what the study commission can and cannot do

1:16:38 – City candidates introduce themselves

1:44:10 – City candidates answer a question about whose voice is not being represented in Bozeman right now

1:57:15 – County candidates introduce themselves

City of Bozeman Candidates

Roger Blank - GVS Interview coming soon

Deanna Campbell - GVS Candidate Questionnaire; GVS Interview coming soon

Barb Cestero - GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Emily Daniels - GVS Interview coming soon

Becky Franks - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Harrison Howarth - GVS Interview coming soon

Barrett McQuesten - GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Wylie Phillips - GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Connor Pollock - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

McCullough Roach - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Rio Roland - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Stephanie Spencer - GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Janis (Jan) Strout - GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Carson Taylor - GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Michael Veselik - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Gallatin County Candidates

Ted Barkley - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Mitchell Blaszczyk - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Anne Donovan - Link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview; did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Andrew Epple - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Robert Fish - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire or interview with Bozeman Daily Chronicle

Rene Flynn - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire or interview with Bozeman Daily Chronicle

Christopher Gray - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Janae Hagen - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Jacqueline Haines - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Amber Jupka - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Jamie Just McCray - Did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire or interview with Bozeman Daily Chronicle

Jeff Krauss - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Elijah Mathias - Link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview; did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Billy McWilliams - Link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview; did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Teri Patterson - Link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview; did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

EJ Porth - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Josh Sadaj - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Donald Seifert - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Joshua Tuininga - Link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview; did not complete GVS Candidate Questionnaire

Klaas Tuininga - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Robert Webster - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview

Steve White - GVS Candidate Questionnaire and link to Bozeman Daily Chronicle interview