Dick Erb: “Brilliant, humble and inclusive”

Moiese Valley rancher Dick Erb brought a wise and generous spirit to life’s challenges – whether it was fine-tuning the sprinklers in his hay fields, helping stabilize the economies of nations facing debt crisis or focusing his insights and global experience on complex local issues.

“Richard was brilliant, as well as humble and inclusive,” wrote Teresa Wall McDonald, chair of the Mission Valley Power board, of Erb, who was vice chair.

Up until the week before his death on May 24, the farmer and former number-two at the International Monetary Fund was still writing memos and working on board business – a reflection of his drive and commitment to public service. His education (he earned a doctorate in economics from Stanford University) and experience were “invaluable” to the board, Wall McDonald said. “He wanted all retail rates to be fair, equitable and sustainable.”

“He made a positive impact on all of us and made us better,” she added.

Erb and his wife, Joanna Shelton, moved to the Moiese Valley in 1999, embracing a simpler life after international careers in economics and public policy. Joanna had just finished a four-year stint in Paris as deputy secretary general of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Her husband opted to follow her there, after a lengthy career that included serving in the administrations of presidents Nixon, Ford and Reagan, and appointments as deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury, U.S. executive director of the International Monetary Fund, and deputy managing director of the IMF.

The couple’s decision to move to Montana and raise hay came as a surprise to friends and colleagues. The alternative route would have taken them to London or New York City, where Erb could have continued to pursue his passion for economics.

Instead, they chose a 240-acre farm, teaching careers at the University of Montana, and for Erb, nearly a quarter century of involvement in irrigation issues, water rights, and their adopted community. He served with the Charlo-Moiese Volunteer Fire Department and on the board of Mission Valley Power. He was also an elected member of the Flathead Irrigation District, stepping down in 2017 in protest of the Flathead Joint Board of Control’s ongoing legal skirmishes over water rights.

He was a big thinker and brought that mindset to understanding the complex negotiations around water rights on the Flathead Reservation as the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes and federal and state governments spent years hammering out a water compact.

Seth Makepeace, who sat on the technical negotiating team for the Tribes and continues to work on implementing the water rights settlement, recalled frequent visits from Erb.

“I remember him once saying this water rights negotiation was more, or as complicated as anything at the International Monetary Fund,” he said. “He was surprised at all the issues we had to try to resolve and bundle in a water rights settlement.”

He described Erb as “a very engaged member of the community” who also sought to “run the best farm that he could.”

“Dick had an amazing mind ¬– he was a bulldog when he invested time in a project and was totally research and detail-oriented,” wrote Susan Lake of Lake Farms in Ronan. “That was the way he approached the water compact. First he was a skeptic, then he researched it, then he supported it and gave constant advice and direction. His presence has been missed.”

Tom McDonald, CSKT Tribal Council chair and former head of the Tribes’ Fish, Wildlife and Recreation Division, praised him as “a gentleman of gentlemen,” noting his communication skills and unpretentious demeanor.

“I really enjoyed conversations with him one on one because he was a big-picture guy,” able to distill macroeconomics and analysis into “practical solutions and recommendations – a lot of people just don’t have that capability” McDonald said.

Joanna talked about her husband’s passion for raising the best alfalfa-grass mix he possibly could, in part because “he wasn’t afraid to ask questions and learn.”

“It was a good way for him to relax, and get his hands in the soil,” she said.

Erb grew up on a small farm on Long Island, where his father raised vegetables and flowers and sold them at a wholesale market in New York City. Growing things seems to be part of the family’s genetic heritage – his brother became an organic farmer in Montana, and his youngest brother remained on the family farm in New York.

The move to rural Montana also reflected the couple’s longing, after years spent in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Paris, to put down roots. “We wanted to find a community,” she said. “We felt that the people here were so welcoming and such good people.”

Erb and his wife both found an avenue to share their expertise through the University of Montana’s Davidson Honors College, where Dick taught economics and business while Joanna gravitated to Asian studies at the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Center. The opportunity to teach “was the clincher” in their decision to move to Montana, Joanna said.

“It just seemed like the right thing for us to do,” she added of the decision that landed them here. “It’s rare when two people with the similar backgrounds that we had are ready to make the same leap in a new direction.”

Her husband’s diagnosis of pancreatic cancer last year surprised them both. “I was lucky to have 46 years with him and his death came probably a decade earlier than we had anticipated,” she said. “He was perfectly healthy until boom, he got this diagnosis – sometimes life just hits you.”

She added that her husband “was very accepting of the diagnosis and chose not to pursue treatment. We had a good year together.”

Erb’s decision to move to Montana after “working in world settings, working with third world countries, earning that level of respect in the world arena, and to bring that down to Montana, to the Mission Valley, to the Flathead Reservation, and to his small farm in Moiese was incredible,” said McDonald. “Until basically his last day on this Earth, his mind was always working, thinking of others, trying to make things better.”