The Helena City Commission held a public hearing this week on a resolution to bring the city into compliance with a 2023 Montana Legislature overhaul of the municipal public records fee process. Under the new structure, the first hour of staff time responding to any public information request is free. Beyond that, the city may charge up to $25 per hour. A $5 fee for certain other records-related services is also on the table.
The timing of the hearing was not without irony. A member of the public stepped to the microphone and told the commission that a public information request they had filed with the city had gone unanswered for 45 days — with no communication from city staff despite multiple follow-up attempts. The speaker's name was not recorded in the meeting transcript. "Why has there been no communication whatsoever?" the commenter asked. "Why has the request not been fulfilled?"
The two items — the new fee structure and the resident's complaint — weren't formally linked on the agenda, but they landed in the same meeting for a reason. Helena is being asked to formalize how it charges for records access at precisely the moment a member of the public is testifying that the city isn't providing records at all. The commission did not respond on the record to the commenter's specific complaint during the hearing.
The fee structure change is a compliance matter, required by state law passed in 2023. Whether the city addresses its underlying response capacity is a separate question — one that, based on Tuesday's testimony, at least one Helena resident is waiting on an answer to.