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Commerce details years of mismanagement at Montana Heritage Commission and contract overhaul
Summary
Commerce staff recounted a multi-year investigation into alleged fraud and mismanagement at the Montana Heritage Commission, the resignation and guilty pleas of a former executive director and subsequent corrective action including new standardized lessee contracts, lease adjustments and remediation of property damage.
Mandy Rambo, deputy director at the Department of Commerce, told the committee that since 2023 Commerce has been unraveling what the agency describes as 12 years of mismanagement at the Montana Heritage Commission (MHC), which oversees historic properties in Virginia City, Nevada City and Reader's Alley.
Rambo said the prior MHC executive director resigned in 2024 after Commerce began an investigation; the department referred evidence to the legislative audit division, the attorney general and local law enforcement. The former director and an alleged co-conspirator were arrested in December 2024 and later pleaded guilty in late 2025 as part of a plea agreement, Rambo said.
As part of contract continuity work, Commerce cancelled existing lessee agreements and offered standardized new contracts to all concessionaires. Rambo described inconsistent prior contract clauses that gave preferential treatment to some vendors, such as gift certificates, free tickets and leased liquor licenses, and cited an example where a vendor left a restaurant in a severe unsanitary condition that required about $32,000 in cleanup costs paid by Commerce.
Rambo said the department has worked to restore consistent contracting, improve oversight, and pursue the statutory intent that the Heritage Commission be financially self-sustaining; she said the commission currently receives bed tax and registration fees but remains short of the earned revenues required to fully support its budget without those revenue streams. Lawmakers commended Commerce staff for their work and discussed potential policy and oversight changes ahead of the next session.
