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A friend of mine told me he wouldn’t wish the job on his worst enemy.

He was talking about the chief executive of Butte-Silver Bow, a job I will run for in 2024. It is a tough one, he said.

Of course, my friend was right. The job is not for the faint of heart.

Back in August, current Chief Executive J.P. Gallagher told The Montana Standard he was reconsidering his decision to seek re-election — in part because of personal attacks levied upon him through social media, phone calls, letters and emails.

Nobody would want to put up with all of that, but it doesn’t scare me.

When it comes to standing up for my hometown, they better come at me with more than that. No threats can quash my passion for the Mining City.

One of the main reasons I am running for chief executive is secrecy. We need to end it in our local government.

Over the last year, the Standard threatened to sue the government because it has violated Montana’s open-meeting laws, and members of the Council of Commissioners pushed for a resolution demanding transparency on Superfund cleanup.

Recently, we learned that a secret committee with secret meetings had a secret plan to dump toxic material from Butte’s Consent Decree cleanup in the Dublin Gulch. 

That came three years after residents of the Timber Butte neighborhood learned of secret plans to dump that stuff next to their homes and Copper Mountain Park.

Residents around town must be asking themselves, “Is my neighborhood next to be put in the crosshairs?”

In 2020, I joined residents of the Timber Butte neighborhood, which is not close to my neighborhood, and we were able to push back that dumping plan. I will fight until my last breath to make sure that we do the same for the Dublin Gulch, the site of the first house built in Butte.

I will fight to make sure that they never dump near any neighborhood or park.

More importantly, I will fight to make sure that the citizens and commissioners are no longer left in the dark when it comes to major decisions like this. 

Sure, many politicians have campaigned on transparency. It is an easy thing to promise.

For the past 25 years, though, I have been in the business of exposing secrets, not keeping them. Working at the Standard, ButteSports.com and now for my podcast, the ButteCast, I have been living a highly transparent life.

You can look back on 25 years of writing opinion columns, and you read all about me. I am an open book.

You can read about my interests, loves and passions. You can read about my children and my wife. You can read about how I stopped drinking alcohol after the death of my good friend Leo McCarthy’s daughter in 2007 made me take a long, hard look in the mirror and make a change.

You read about me running the 2009 New York City Marathon for Mariah’s Challenge.

More than anything, you can read about my love for Butte. I have spent my career highlighting the people of the Mining City and fighting for those people.

Most of that came while I was as a sportswriter. For the past seven years, I have also done that as the executive director of the Butte Sports Hall of Fame. For the last 13 months, I have done it as the host of a podcast that showcases the best and most interesting people from Can-Do City.

That podcast, by the way, will continue during the campaign. It won’t be a political tool; it will still be about the people of Butte.

For the last couple of months, I have been fighting the lack of transparency and what I consider to be subpar cleanup Butte has received from the Superfund cleanup. I have stood up to fight back against plans to leave partially contaminated dirt — they like to call it “grey fill” or “dirty dirt” — when the work from the Consent Decree finally begins.

For the better part of 40 years, Butte has settled for less when it comes to Superfund cleanup. Anaconda got a Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course that has been a boon to the local economy. Butte gets “dirty dirt.”

This is not because the people of Butte are easy to settle. It isn’t because we are a city full of pushovers. 

To the contrary. Butte is filled with the toughest and most-giving people on the planet. It is filled with people with strong resolve and a belief in doing the right thing, no matter the cost.

One big reason Butte has gotten the proverbial shaft when it comes to cleanup is secrecy. Those negotiating on our behalf were forced to do so in secret.

That is why we find ourselves, as a friend recently said, clipping coupons for British Petroleum, one of the richest companies in the world. The interests of the responsible party seem to weigh more heavily than the interests of a clean, healthy environment. 

It is time to remove that cloak of secrecy for good. It is time to stand up and fight for a cleanup that is worthy of the great people living in Butte today and 100 years from now.

It is time to stand up for all the people in town, threats and name calling be damned. 

Over the last 25 years, I have been called every name in the book. I’ve had football fans on chat sites attack me, my wife and my oldest daughter — when she was an infant.

I’ve had people threaten me with physical harm, and I’ve had a guy from Helena stalk me on the sidelines of football games.

I could wallpaper my house with anonymous letters.

Believe me, everything I’ve heard yelled at me as a referee of high school basketball games pales in comparison to the stuff I’ve had hurled at me on the internet.

It has been ugly at times.

However, that has never softened my resolve. It has never changed my mind, and it has never stopped me from speaking up about what I feel is right.

If people calling me names and making internet threats is the price to pay for fighting for Butte or defending the First Amendment rights of all of its citizens from internet bullies and unjust, illegal mandates from the legislature, then I have one thing to say. 

Bring it on. 

No, the job of chief executive of Butte-Silver Bow will not be an easy one. It never has been. It certainly wasn’t easy when the optimism and strong voice of Don Peoples helped lead Butte out of the economic depression that followed the closure of the mines.

Not for a second do I expect it to be a cake walk. But it is a job I am ready to take on because I love my hometown, and I believe we can do better. We must do better.

It isn’t enough to speak out and be a critic. It is time to step up for the city I have always been proud to call my home.

The thought of getting up and going to work to lead and defend my hometown sure doesn’t seem like a job that is as bad as my friend says.

In fact, to me it sounds more like a dream job.

I welcome you to join me today for a rally as I kick off my campaign at 11 a.m. at the Mountain Con Mine.

— Bill Foley can be reached at foles74@gmail.com. Follow him at twitter.com/Foles74. Listen to the ButteCast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.