City not yet ready to give up City Hall

By RICHARD HANNERS

Whitefish Pilot

The Whitefish City Council turned down an offer to sell its City Hall facility at their Sept. 4 meeting.

City manager Gary Marks said Billings attorney Clifford Edwards offered the city about $3.3 million for the property. He then offered to lease it back to the city for a little over $20,000 per month.

"That would add up to about a quarter million dollars at the end of the year for something we already own and don't have to pay for, other than utilities," Marks said.

The council agreed it didn't make sense to get the city into that kind of financial arrangement.

Marks pointed out that Edwards' offer indicates just how much the City Hall property is worth — not only money from the sale that can be used for other city projects, but also how much tax revenue can be made once the property goes on the tax rolls.

Edwards is a successful litigator who also owns a first-class bull ranch in north-central Montana. He successfully defended American Bank last year after the Montana Department of Transportation brought a condemnation suit against the bank.

Edwards set up Edwards Jet Center at Glacier Park International Airport in 2001 and added 48,000 square feet of hangar space. About 75 jets refuel there on busy days. He sold the Jet Center to Fortune 500 business mogul William Foley in July.

City attorney John Phelps speculated that Edwards needed a place to put all that money he made selling the Jet Center.

By coincidence, councilor Shirley Jacobson brought up the condition of the City Hall building during the Sept. 4 council meeting.

She said she was talking to a former city mayor the other day, and he wanted to know why the large tiles affixed to the exterior of the building couldn't be re-attached. Several of them are noticeably loose.

Marks said the tiles hang on wooden strips that have become rotten. Some of the tiles are "hanging by threads." He said he wasn't sure how difficult it might be to repair the tiles, but he agreed to talk to city building inspector Virgil Bench about the matter.

The tiles were part of an overall City Hall remodeling project first proposed in fall 1956.

Mayor Roy Duff denied rumors at the time that the city's plan to remodel City Hall included tearing down part of the old brick building that was built 40 years earlier.

The renovation added a police department and jail, a public meeting room, a new fire hall and a public library — all under one roof.

"Remodeling the present building to form a larger unit will mean a considerable saving in maintenance, janitor service and heating costs as compared to erecting another building for a fire hall or library," councilor Casey Prindiville said at the time.

City staff were working in "cramped quarters," and the need for more room was "pressing," the Pilot reported at the time. And not just for city staff.

"The jail quarters are admittedly a place no one would use for housing stock, much less human beings, and there are no separate quarters for women or juveniles," the Pilot reported.

The city planned to sell 20-year bonds to pay for the $170,000 project.