The Bozeman Study Commission met on June 4, 2026, to review the draft report and proposed amendments to the city charter, hear from the public, and plan the upcoming public hearing. The meeting began with the Pledge of Allegiance and a moment of silence, followed by approval of the consent agenda and public comments.
Welcome everybody to the uh study commission meeting on uh June 4th, 2026. We have uh a lot to go over today, but let us begin with um standing for the pledge of allegiance if you're able, and followed by a moment of silence. I pledge allegations to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under indivisible with liberty and justice for all. All right, thank you very much. Um, I don't have any changes to the agenda. Uh Jan Deanna, do you guys have any changes to the agenda? No, okay. Then we're not gonna make any changes. We're gonna uh go with public comment on anything within the jurisdiction of the study commission. And if you are uh able to stay until we're talking about the charter or the report, that pretty much covers everything within the jurisdiction of the study commission. So I'll ask you to hold your comments till then. But that said, feel free to come up and provide public comment if you wish. Madam Chair, yeah. I just want to make sure you don't forget Carson when you would ask the two of us if we had any additions to the agenda or changes. Don't forget Carson. That's a great idea. Okay, Carson, did you have any changes to the agenda? No. Okay. Back to public comment. Thank you. It is a team sport. All right, none in the. Oh, Joey, go ahead. Good evening. Um thank you all for having public comment today. Unfortunately, I can't stay for the whole uh meeting today. I am on the mic. Um what's that? Can you give your full name on the money? Yes, my name is Joey Morrison. I serve as the mayor of the city of Bozeman, but I am here in my personal capacity. Um I wanted to comment on part about process and something that I uh got to experience when I came to a meeting a couple weeks ago where I got to see some of the the energy in this room that I've noticed at times. Um, sitting as the presiding officer, it is hard at times to keep these meetings um running smoothly, efficient, and without intimidation, and that often means trying to cut down on clapping and jeering and things like that. And what I saw when I was here was not only what I didn't, what I felt like was not just it not intervening when that was occurring, but almost relishing in that for the sake of doing something that we that felt popular, which I can understand the desires to want that. Um, but I think it's important to note the conversations that I was seeing play out in public comment on social media and otherwise, specifically around the inner neighborhood council, the neighborhood associations was so virulent and toxic that made it, I think, very challenging for many people to participate that disagreed with what the made the majority consensus that you guys were hearing from was. And so I wanted to offer a few a few points to rebut some of what I was hearing about that comes with the context of sitting as the inner neighborhood council liaison from the commission for two years. Um really, it's about how effective I think it is right now, and things that I think would make it stronger, are not giving it more authority and more ability to compel the commission to take action, that it actually would come from increasing representation and increasing the threshold by which the interneighborhood council and neighborhood associations need to meet from their neighborhoods to be able to take action. As an example, when the UDC was being proposed, uh at the October Inc. meeting, there was a poll to see to ask whether neighborhoods wanted to delay uh to push the commission to delay the vote on the UDC. So fairly hot button issue. And still, even for that poll, um, the highest return was the Northeast neighborhood with 53 responses in a neighborhood uh with around 3600 people, so less than one half of a percent. That is actually the highest percentage representation of any neighborhood. So to decide that that is what gives mandate to the neighborhood associations, I think is the is one of the flaws. I've lived in three different neighborhood associations in my time that I've lived here. I've never been polled, I've never been canvassed, I've never been approached by any member of the inner neighborhood council for my neighborhood associations. I would sit right there next to the new highlight view neighborhood association rep, having no idea what they were talking about when they were saying, Here are the concerns of the neighborhood today. And so all that to say just the the strength and beauty of the neighborhood associations, I don't think will be enhanced by giving them more compulsory authority over the agenda of the city commission, but instead mechanisms that encourage and facilitate and reward participation that's representative of the neighborhoods. Um that is that I think is is the is the main challenge to continue to hear that neighborhood associations are not represented, while four out of five study commissioners live in a neighborhood association. Five out of five city commissioners live in a neighborhood association.