HELENA — This year, voters in Lewis and Clark County will be electing a full slate of county leaders, including one member of the county commission.
Commissioner Tom Rolfe was first elected in 2020. He’s now in the last year of his six-year term, and two candidates have already announced they want to run for the seat he holds.
(Watch the video to hear from the candidates.)
Brent Colbert has spent 30 years with the Lewis and Clark County Sheriff’s Office – as a detention officer, deputy and, since 2020, undersheriff. He says his experience and familiarity with county and city departments make him a good candidate for the position.
“I think over the 30 years, I've shown my leadership and how I can get things done,” he said. “I have a good working relationship with not only local, but with state and federal.”
Colbert says he wants to see the county be more “proactive rather than reactive,” especially on issues like infrastructure and emergency preparedness.
“We need to be a little bit more prepared,” he said. “We have not only people, but we have planes, trains and automobiles that we have to worry about also, along with the urban interface.”
Jakob Miles, originally from Miles City, has been in the county since 2019. He works on overdose prevention and suicide prevention with Lewis and Clark Public Health – a job that he says allowed him to see how the county works behind the scenes.
“That gave me a unique perspective to realize that I could bring a positive voice and some real change to create more opportunities for people here in Lewis and Clark County,” he said.
Miles says his top priorities include focusing on the need for affordable housing, investing in public lands, public safety and public health, and supporting good-paying jobs.
“We need to restore faith and trust in our government, and the best way to do that is by listening to our constituents and the people of the county that I would be representing in this position,” he said.
Rolfe told MTN Monday that he is planning on running again, and that he’ll be announcing more about his campaign in the coming weeks.
This year’s election is for a seat representing Lewis and Clark County’s District 2, which includes much of central Helena, parts of the Helena Valley and the Augusta area. Candidates must live within that district, but people in the entire county will be able to vote.
Lewis and Clark County elections are nonpartisan. All the candidates will appear on the same primary ballot in June, and the top two finishers will move on to the general election in November.
The start of the candidate filing period – when candidates will be able to officially file to appear on the ballot – will be in two weeks, on Feb. 17.
