Incumbents Retain Majority but Team Liberty wins Two Seats

With 75 percent of the votes counted, there may be more vigorous discussion over budget issues within the Missoula City Council after members of what was dubbed ‘Team Liberty’ won two seats on Tuesday night.

The results, as of 8:00 p.m. are:

Ward 1

Heidi West (incumbent) 69 percent

Amber Shaffer 31 percent

Ward 2

Mirtha Beccerra (appointed incumbent) 56 percent

Brent Sperry 44 percent

Ward 3

Gwen Jones (incumbent) 82 percent

Drew Iverson 18 percent

Ward 4

Amber Sherrill 63 percent

Alan Ault 37 percent

Ward Five

John Contos 54 percent

Alex Fregerio 46 percent

Ward 6

Sandra Vasecka 53 percent

Nick Shontz 47 percent

Ward 4’s Jesse Ramos said his ‘Team Liberty’ scored two seats on the council with John Contos and Sandra Vesecka, if election numbers hold.

“When I first ran for city council I ran on lowering taxes, having a more efficient government that spent our money more wisely in order to keep Missoula a place where everybody could afford to live and not just transform us into a country club, destination city for the very rich,” said Ramos. “I found out after the first budget meeting that that was not going to happen. I brought down 250 folks to protest and speak out against the budget, and the council still voted 11 to one to pass it with a four percent tax hike.”

Ramos was asked what the first city council meeting in January will look like with two more members of ‘Team Liberty’ at the table.

“It’s going to look like every other council meeting, except that the vote will be nine to three instead of 11 to one,” he said. “We’re not always going to agree on every issue, myself, Mr. Contos and Ms. Vasecka, but on a lot of these fiscal issues it’s going to look like nine to three as opposed to 11 to one, which I think is just beautiful.”