The Valley Signal

Government & Accountability

Victor's Watch Dogs Form a PAC: The Victor Valley Collective

The recall group that pushed out Victor's mayor has registered the Victor Valley Collective, a PAC funded by its own treasurer.

By Wade Williams ·

VICTOR — The residents who pushed Mayor Will Frohlich to resign have registered a political committee, the Victor Valley Collective, to carry their campaign past the recall and into Victor's city elections.

The Victor Valley Collective registered with the Idaho Secretary of State as a political action committee and appeared in the state's roster this week. Carol Nowakowski, who filed the recall petition against Frohlich in March, chairs it. Paul Merrill is its treasurer.

The committee's entire treasury is a single $2,000 contribution from Merrill himself. He gave it on June 24, the day Frohlich announced he would resign rather than face the recall, and the committee disclosed it three days later in a 48-hour "timed contribution" report. As of that filing, it had reported no other donors and no spending. Idaho law bars a committee from accepting money before it certifies a treasurer to the secretary of state, so the Collective had named Merrill its treasurer and organized on or before June 24, when it took his $2,000.

In a June 27 opinion column, Nowakowski announced the committee on behalf of the Victor Watch Dogs, the informal group behind the recall, and laid out its aims: to "support candidates who represent constituents over developers," press for "transparent and lawful governance," and "organize the everyday citizens" of the valley.

Nowakowski then turned from the mayor to the City Council. The council members "that enabled these decisions ... remain in place," she wrote, and "the real work ... is just beginning."

What the committee will spend money on and when is unclear. Idaho holds city elections only in November of odd-numbered years, so Victor's next council election is more than a year away, in 2027. Until then, the only way to remove a sitting council member is a recall, the same tool the group just used against the mayor. Nowakowski's column does not say whether the Collective will try one.

This is the recall effort's first campaign-finance filing of any kind. Nowakowski wrote that the recall itself was "not funded by outside interests" and had "no money behind" it; the campaign registered no committee and filed no reports with the state, as The Valley Signal reported in May. The committee she announced in the same column is funded entirely by one man from outside the city: Merrill, of Teton Springs, who cannot vote in Victor's elections.

Frohlich announced that he would resign effective July 1 rather than face a recall residents had qualified for the ballot, an effort rooted in the city's wastewater dispute with Driggs. Council President Stacy Hulsing becomes acting mayor on July 1, and the council appoints an interim mayor on July 8.

What to watch: the Collective's upcoming financial reports and whether the group fields candidates for the 2027 election or moves to recall sitting council members before then.

Sources

Elections