Supporting Our Deputies: A Common-Sense Solution to the Overtime Challenge

When you live and work in a tight-knit community like Powder River County, you understand the value of a hard day's work. Our local sheriff's deputies carry a heavy responsibility. Whether they are responding to a medical emergency, handling a public safety call, or patrolling Highway 212, they put in long hours to ensure our families are safe.

However, one of the biggest challenges facing rural law enforcement across Montana, and right here at home, is deputy retention. It is incredibly difficult to keep experienced, well-trained officers when our local compensation structures struggle to keep pace with the demands of the job. A major part of this puzzle is the issue of overtime.

Many folks are surprised to learn how deputy overtime works in Montana. Under state statute (MCA § 7-4-2509), deputies aren't automatically granted standard overtime pay; instead, the law leaves it up to individual Boards of County Commissioners to authorize and set those rates through local resolutions.

For a rural county like ours, this puts our commissioners in a tough spot. Because the state historically underfunds us, even though our local emergency services handle a massive amount of out-of-state and commercial traffic on Highway 212, the county budget is stretched incredibly thin. Without outside revenue, authorizing paid overtime would mean putting a heavier burden on local property owners. That isn’t fair to our taxpayers.

But leaving our deputies without fair compensation for their extra hours isn't sustainable either. We need a practical solution.

If elected, my approach will be to bring new resources to the table rather than asking our community to pay more. It all connects back to our plan for an independent Highway 212 traffic and vehicle classification study.

By securing grant funding and getting official, county-owned data on the sheer volume of traffic passing through our backyard, we will have the undeniable proof we need to lobby Helena. We can show state lawmakers exactly how much wear, tear, and emergency response pressure out-of-state traffic puts on our local resources.

When we successfully bring those state dollars back home to Powder River County, we can solve the overtime problem properly. I intend to work collaboratively with our County Commissioners to use that new state funding to establish a fair, sustainable overtime structure for our deputies.

This isn't about making big political promises or fighting the system. It’s just about using the tools Montana law already gives us, finding smart ways to fund them, and making sure the people who protect our county are taken care of. When we support our deputies, we build a safer, stronger community for everyone.