"We do a lot of things, and it all started with a group like this, sitting in a room," said Shelby Mayor Larry Bonderud Thursday, Oct. 12, at City Hall in Browning. The mayor also heads up the Northern Express Transportation Authority, similar to an entity Browning, Cut Bank and Glacier County have all but set up. Bonderud was invited to Thursday's meeting to discuss Shelby's success with its port authority.
In attendance at the meeting were Browning Mayor Willie Morris, Johnel Barcus of the Browning Community Development Fund, Browning City Councilman Steve Barcus, and Virgil Edwards and J.W. Eaton of the Glacier County Regional Port Authority Board.
The Glacier County Regional Port Authority still needs two members from Cut Bank to be complete. Eaton said he was "working on them now," and expected to have them named soon.
Meanwhile, the county appointments include Jasen Bronec for a two-year term, Virgil Edwards for a two-year term and Tony Sitzman, serving a four-year term.
From Browning, Johnel Barcus serves a one-year term, Steve Barcus has a three-year term, and Mayor Willie Morris serves a six-year term.
While the Shelby port authority enjoys limited direct funding from the county itself, automatically set at two mills, the body's primary function is largely accomplished through private investment. "We've formed another form of government," said Bonderud. "It's not towns, not counties and not cities...We're a clearing house for business ideas."
A port authority is in the unique position of being able to quantify and sort out the different aspects of the economy of the county, and provide that information to those who can use it. Not only that, they're also ideally situated to get people together who can get things done in Shelby.
For example, Bonderud said his group noted approximately 1,200 semis come through Shelby per day, loaded with stuff bound elsewhere. In addition, some 55 trains run through Shelby per day, and they saw the opportunity for these trucks and trains to conduct load transfers where the highway and the railroad come together. Cultivating good relations with Burlington Northern, the Shelby Port Authority got private companies to come together to create a transloading facility that works for them and provides employment for the people of Toole County.
As another example, Bonderud said they'd found out, listening to conversations at Town Pump, that some 13 truckloads of fertilized eggs from Arkansas were going through town each day, bound for Calgary. So the port authority has proposed the southern-based company move its operations to Shelby to save transportation costs.
Bonderud estimated the fertilized egg business, that supplies unborn chicks to a building in Calgary where they are hatched and raised, uses as much as 21 million bushels of wheat per year. Toole County, he said, only grows about nine or 10 million bushels per year, making the potential for local farmers truly appetizing, should the egg operation be moved to Toole County.
"We get into all kinds of things," said Bonderud. Another idea that is near reality is the Marias Food Park. Starting with a hog slaughtering facility that is nearly ready, Bonderud envisions adding cattle and fowl at a later time.
Cooperatively owned by the producers, the 1,000-acre park "will rely heavily on the Blackfeet Reservation for employment because we have no workers," he said, explaining that Toole County enjoys an employee shortage and will have to import people to fill the positions.
"Funding yourselves is the first issue," Bonderud advised the Glacier County group. "We do a lot of grant writing."
The Shelby mayor said the port authority developed close ties with county and city governments, as well as business majors operating in the neighborhood. He advised asking the county for a two mill levy, and suggested the county's citizenry might be included more personally if they were asked to approve a four-mill levy by vote.
"You've got to make a linkage, and a port authority can build those bridges. A port authority can play a very positive role in that it can be a bridge between tribal and county government," said Bonderud.
It was a thought echoed by Barcus who said the Tribe had shown interest in a port authority as recently as last September. "We need a stronger connection with tribal government," agreed board member Virgil Edwards.
Simply providing assistance to new businesses trying to get off the ground and helping existing businesses do their work better improves the climate for everybody. "If 10 businesses add one employee each because business is better," Bonderud said, "that's the same as one new business, and it's safer."
Bonderud said the Shelby authority tracks everything from gaming revenues to diesel sales in their area. But, he cautioned, things don't happen overnight.
"We started off slow, but we became a center of economic development in the county," said Bonderud. "Now anything about economic development is referred here. It is a true port authority."
"If Glacier County ever worked together..." enthused Cut Bank rep J.W. Eaton.
"That's a role a port authority could play," agreed Bonderud. "Find that one project they can all work on together, get it done and celebrate it."
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