MISSOULA, Mont. — UPDATE: Expressway lanes are back open after an accident.

The accident occurred around 6:45 p.m. today and obstructed traffic on Expressway from Majestic Drive to the Crestview Apartments Tuesday evening.

Missoula Police Department is asking the public to take an alternate route.

No additional information is available at this time.

NBC Montana will keep you updated.

Jim Elliott

Just before the official days of excessive purchasing named Black Friday, and Cyber Monday which follow immediately on the heels of the National Day of Gluttony, Turkey Thursday, I received a new credit card.

Just for giggles, I thought I’d read the fine print. The rate of interest would be 14.99 percent. “Didn’t Jesus throw the money lenders out of the Temple?” I thought. The late fee would be 29.99 percent and would apply to future purchasers at the discretion of the bank. I then thought of a friendly fellow I knew who was originally from Chicago. “What did you do there?” I asked him once. He smiled, and said, “I was in collections.” I wondered if he had worked for a bank or some other organization.

Where did these high credit card rates come from? Long ago there were state laws that prohibited usury, which is the charging of excessive interest on loans. When did that all change?

In the United State that date would be February 6, 1980, when a bill to abolish the South Dakota usury laws passed that state’s legislature. In the 1970s inflation was running at about 20 percent and to tame the trend, Paul Volker, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank had allowed the rate at which the Fed loaned money to banks to rise to 20 percent. In South Dakota and elsewhere in the 1970s farmers were having a very hard time of it for many reasons and needed to borrow money from banks just to survive. But South Dakota banks were not about to lend out money at the legal maximum rate of 12 percent when they had to pay 20 percent interest just to borrow the money from the Federal Reserve.

In a related issue, in 1978 Marquette Bank of Minneapolis was having their credit card business undermined by First National Bank of Omaha, which was issuing credit cards to Minnesota residents at 18 percent interest which was the top usury rate in Nebraska but with no annual fee. Marquette was issuing credit cards at the 12 percent maximum interest rate imposed by Minnesota, but they did charge an annual fee. They were losing business to the Nebraska bank. Marquette went to court, arguing that Nebraska banks could not charge a rate of interest in Minnesota that was higher than Minnesota banks could charge in their own state. Marquette lost. In a unanimous opinion the Supreme Court ruled that the usury law of the issuing state held, no matter where the cardholder lived.

In a second related issue, Citibank of New York was bound to the New York usury law of 13 percent and was losing money. After the Marquette decision, Citibank began looking for a new state to do its credit card business in. Under federal banking law a bank could not move to a state without an invitation to relocate, which was conveniently provided by (usury free) South Dakota on the last day of its legislative session in 1980. Citibank relocated its credit card operations to Sioux Falls, S.D. as soon as it could, bringing with it 500 new jobs, a new building, and as a special gift to its cardholders, a higher interest rate.

That’s the history of the beginning of high rates. The morality of charging high rates on loans goes back at least—as I have said—to Jesus throwing the money lenders out of the Temple when he said, “It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.” (Matthew 21:13 KJV).

People who loan money will tell you that the rate they charge reflects the risk they take that the loan won’t be repaid. The higher the risk, the higher the interest charged. It used to be that bankers didn’t like to take risks. They loaned money, sure. They made money on the interest charged, sure. But they also wanted the borrower to have a solid reason for borrowing money and to be successful in the business the customer was borrowing the money for. If it was a mortgage, they wanted you to be able to afford the loan. They did not loan money for toys or vacations. They looked out for themselves by looking out for their customers.

Now, it seems, all they want to do is make money off their customers, and the faster the better. Bankers used to educate their customers because success was a two-way street. Today, people are drowning in credit card debt, and nobody seems to care. Well, someone might, but it’s not the banks.

Have fun, but don’t go broke doing it.

Montana Viewpoint has appeared in weekly and online newspapers across Montana for over 30 years. Jim Elliott served sixteen years in the Montana Legislature as a state representative and state senator. He lives on his ranch in Trout Creek.

The Helena City Commission announced Monday the three finalists to fill its city manager position.

After nearly two months of a turbulent recruitment process that included an ongoing lawsuit, the commission selected Janet Hawkinson, the town manager from Palisade, Colorado; Douglas Schulze, most recently the city manager of Banning, California; and Helena’s Alana Lake, the current executive director of the Montana Public Service Commission.

The Helena City Commission will begin public interviews of the candidates on Monday, Dec. 8, at the City-County Building, 316 N. Park Ave. Schulze will be the first interview from 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., followed by Hawkinson’s interview from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. 

Later that day, the public will have the opportunity to ask questions of the two out-of-town finalists during town hall meetings on the second floor of the Montana Club, 24 W. Sixth Ave. Schulze’s town hall will be from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., followed by Hawkinson from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.

On Tuesday, Dec. 9, the commission will hold its public interview of Lake from 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Her town hall will be in the City-County Building’s commission chambers from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.

The city has provided online meeting links for each interview and town hall meeting, which can be accessed on the city commission’s Zoom hub.  

The commission will hold its final deliberation on Wednesday, Dec. 10, at the commission chambers from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m.

Hawkinson has been the town manager of Palisade, a town with a population of 2,600 as of 2024, since 2018. According to the city press release, she previously served as the director of community development for Minturn, Colorado. She holds a master’s degree in landscape architecture and urban planning from the University of Colorado, Denver, and a bachelor’s degree in political science from Fort Lewis College.

Schulze has more than 36 years of experience in municipal leadership, according to the city release, and has led city governments in Sandstone, Minnesota, and the communities of Medina, Normandy Park and Bainbridge Island, all in Washington state. Most recently, he served as city manager of Banning, California, a city of approximately 32,000 people, although he was placed on indefinite paid leave from that position last February, according to the Riverside Record. It’s unclear if that paid leave is ongoing. The mayor of Banning told the local newspaper that Schulze was not under an investigation but that it was ” … a matter of looking at some concerns.”

Schulze holds a master’s degree in urban studies and a bachelor’s degree in public administration, although the city release doesn’t specify where he earned those degrees. 

Lake joined the Montana Public Service Commission, the state board that regulates shareholder-owned utilities, as its executive director this past March. According to the city release, she has more than 10 years of experience in military and federal law enforcement, including work with the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations. She has led teams across the globe that involved criminal investigation, security, and counterintelligence operations, gaining experience with interagency coordination and planning. 

Lake previously served as a counterintelligence officer at the Idaho National Laboratory, advising senior officials on national security risks, guarding infrastructure and expanding intelligence programs, the release stated.

Lake graduated from Montana State University and earned her master’s degree in business administration from Boise State University. The release stated that she is currently attending the Command and Staff College through the Marine Corps University. 

The release comes after current City Manager Tim Burton announced in September that he planned to retire at the end of this year, jumpstarting the commission’s process in finding his replacement. 

That search sparked a lawsuit brought against the city by a former commissioner, who alleged that a commission subcommittee had violated Montana’s open meeting laws when initiating the recruitment process. The city responded to the lawsuit in November, claiming that the subcommittee, comprising City Mayor Wilmott Collins and Commissioner Sean Logan, had not violated any open meeting laws because the committee is not a “governmental body” or agency.

Additionally, the city also maintains that the lawsuit is void since the city revised its process to include all members of the commission in further meetings regarding the recruitment and hiring of the new city manager.

In a recent court filing, lawyers for the plaintiff have argued that the city’s change to involve all commission members does not resolve their original request for a preliminary injunction. They’ve also asked the court to disband the subcommittee.