Timothy Montgomery has filed to run for a three-year seat on the Ketchikan Gateway Borough Assembly. There are three 3-year seats up for grabs in the upcoming municipal election.
The assembly serves as the legislative power of the borough, and is responsible for voting on action items and establishing policy for the borough.
KRBD’s Hunter Morrison spoke with Montgomery about his goals and priorities if elected to office.
Timothy Montgomery: Hello, my name is Tim Montgomery, and I’ve lived here in Ketchikan since 1967, when my family, brother and sister, mom and dad, moved from Oregon.
Hunter Morrison: What are you running for, and why are you running?
Montgomery: I’m running for borough assembly member. The reason I’m running is I feel I can help in the process that the borough’s in. The school district, their financial situation they’re in. I think I can help in that process.
Morrison: Gotcha. And can you elaborate on what some of your priorities are?
Montgomery: The main priority would obviously be the budgetary process. I’m a fairly fiscal conservative. I believe the budget should be prepared as a zero-based budget, I’m pretty sure. I’m not sure if that’s how they’re prepared, meaning that every year you start at zero and build a budget, right? You don’t just base it on last year’s numbers. You kind of do, but you don’t just add to it because that’s the simple way to do it. And then you monitor the budget on a regular, pretty regular basis. Make adjustments if you have to, and if there’s money left over, you don’t just spend it because it’s budgeted. You put it back into the general fund or any reserve fund to use for when you really need it for when the budget falls short, those types of things. And like I said, I really haven’t dived into the borough budget yet, so I don’t know exactly how the process is, because it’s fairly complicated, I’m sure, because there’s many streams of revenue.
Morrison: If elected to the assembly, what is something that you would like to do on the assembly?
Montgomery: Well, help the school district get out of their financial hole, if possible. I don’t know what rule other than allocating money based on the cap to fund the schools, but possibly some ideas. One of the budget cuts that have been made is youth activities, and I was really involved in youth activities when my kids were growing up. I coached little league baseball and basketball, and I was involved in the high school varsity basketball program for five years with the late Ed Bolburn and coach John Brown, and so I have a passion for that. I umpire baseball, I referee high school basketball and dribblers league still. The amount of money allocated for all activities, not just sports, but you have music, and you have drama, and you have debate, and all that’s been drastically cut, which everybody understands why. But there needs to be a way to help fund that because the budget for that is quite large. I understand it’s probably around a million dollars, which shocked me. And I think it’s been budgeted somewhere in the $200,000 range.
Morrison: And you know, you mentioned your involvement with local sports. What other leadership roles, community engagement roles, makes you equipped for this role?
Montgomery: I owned and operated several businesses in the ’90s and the early 2000s. Currently, I am a member of the Elks Lodge, and I’m currently the treasurer for the last four years. So I prepared budgets there. They’re not a big organization, but it’s a nonprofit. So I guess basically based on my business background and that, I could probably help out.
Morrison: And aside from what you’ve mentioned, what is something that you’d like listeners to know about you?
Montgomery: I put my mind to things. I follow through with it. I’m outspoken. I believe in transparency, not just saying that, like today in the paper, unencumbered expenses with the school district. I think you know, ‘Why don’t we tell them what it is?’ But mainly, I speak my mind. I don’t know if that’s good or bad.
Hunter Morrison is a Report for America corps member for KRBD. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep him writing stories like this one. Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution.
