HELENA — In the coming weeks, voters in several Montana communities will be receiving ballots for city, school and special district elections. Voters in Helena are likely to notice something new on the ballot envelope that will be spreading statewide soon.
The Lewis and Clark County Elections Office is currently preparing roughly 37,000 ballots to be mailed out to voters for the Sept. 9 primary election. County election supervisor Connor Fitzpatrick said about half of the ballots are for voters in the city of Helena, with the rest going to people outside city limits but within the district boundaries for Helena Public Schools.
(Watch the video for more on what to expect in the upcoming primary.)
Fitzpatrick said officials weren’t expecting to hold a primary – Helena hadn’t required a municipal primary since 2001. However, a large number of candidates filed to run for Helena mayor, and Helena Public Schools leaders sought to bring two school bond proposals as early as possible in hopes that a new school could be completed by the 2028-29 school year.
“It kind of lined up, in a way,” Fitzpatrick said.
That makes Lewis and Clark County one of the first places in Montana to hold a major election since the Montana Legislature’s 2025 session, when lawmakers approved a change to ballot rules. House Bill 719, sponsored by Rep. Braxton Mitchell, R-Columbia Falls, requires anyone voting absentee or in an all-mail election to confirm their date of birth on their ballot envelope.
“If you forget your birth year or you put the wrong birth year compared to your voter registration, we will have to reject that ballot and contact you to make sure, ‘Hey, is this you that voted this?’ – just like a signature mismatch, and we're going to be processing them in the same way,” Fitzpatrick said.
HB 719 didn’t include a specific effective date, so it will go into effect on the standard date: Oct. 1, in the year of the legislative session. That means the requirement will be in place for the November municipal general elections, but not for the primary in September.
In Lewis and Clark County, officials decided to put a space on the envelope in the primary for voters to write their birth year. However, if someone doesn’t fill that information in or provides the wrong year, their ballot won’t be invalidated – this time.
Fitzpatrick said it was a way to “soft launch” the new requirement.
“if you forget it this time, no big deal,” he said. “This is kind of your big notice.”
There aren’t many county elections offices dealing with this issue. MTN reached out to officials across the state and was only able to find four places in Montana holding elections on Sept. 9: city primaries in Helena, Missoula and Geraldine, plus a special election on a proposed new fire station and operations levy in Bigfork.
State law requires local governments to hold primaries if at least five candidates are running for any single position, or if most of the offices up for election have at least three times as many candidates running as there are seats available.
In Helena, five candidates are running for mayor, after incumbent Wilmot Collins decided not to run for a third term. Only the top two finishers will move on to the general election.
Five candidates are also running for the Helena City Commission, where there are two open seats. The top four finishers in the primary will move on to the general election, and the top two vote-getters in that election will win the seats.
The Legislature approved another change to election laws this year that won’t have any impact on the municipal elections. Senate Bill 490, sponsored by Sen. Mike Cuffe, R-Eureka, would limit Election Day voter registration, closing late registration at noon on the day of an election instead of 8 p.m. and allowing for registration on the preceding Saturday.
However, that law only applies to federal elections. For this year’s municipal elections, late voter registration will be available at the same times as it has been: until noon on the Monday before the election and until 8 p.m. on Election Day.
Lewis and Clark County plans to mail ballots out to voters on Friday, Aug. 22. Ballots must be returned by Sept. 9.
