News you can use
News you can use
Sorted by date Results 1495 - 1519 of 3210
The current Republican majority in the state Legislature has been proud in following its idea of no new or increased taxes. And they have expressed initial satisfaction in “cutting fat” from various department budgets while “retaining indispensable state services.” The Department of Public Health and Human Services is one agency especially targeted for the Republican budget treatment, as it is the largest agency in the state government. By defunding over 100 DPHHS positions, which have remained vacant for more than a year, t...
As we enter the third year of the Trump administration, we’re fortunate to have a president who understands the vital role women entrepreneurs play in our economy. The U.S. Small Business Administration supports the president’s business advocacy by nurturing the entrepreneurial spirit and making sure small business has a voice at the table in Washington, DC. During Women’s History Month, we salute women entrepreneurs who take a risk in pursuit of their passions and who see setbacks as steps towards something bigger and bette...
I feel like my whole education and employment history has come together today to bring you this column which celebrates liberal arts in the news. To start this list off, we’ll look at the headline I read titled “Punctuation Marks.” Grammar and punctuation are like candy to word nerds. Then I saw that the article was from Architectural Digest and I was all “Ooooooh, I do wish to see the myriad ways high-brow architects incorporated the comma into their buildings. Did they us...
At the Department of Public Health and Human Services, we are committed to providing direct services to Montanans that they rely on for their health and livelihoods. That’s why it’s disappointing to see Reps. Matt Regier and Carl Glimm imply in their March 19 editorial, “Republicans are working to trim fat from state agencies,” that vacant DPHHS FTEs must not be necessary. And it’s especially disappointing because the positions that have been left open for over a year are a direct result of managing complex budgetary pressure...
On April 2, Montanans will join hundreds of other alzheimer’s advocates from across the country in our nation’s capitol, meeting with Senator Daines, Senator Tester and Congressman Gianforte. The resounding message will again be loud and clear: alzheimer’s is the most expensive disease in America and must be a public health priority. Indeed, it is the epidemic of our generation. An estimated 5.8 million people are living with the disease, and nearly 14 million will have the disease by 2050. Families are struggling under...
Three weeks and counting. Two deep wells supply the municipality of Etzatlan with water. One of the city well pumps quit working. Died the good death after a life of service to his community. Down on the lower edge of town, we in my neighborhood experienced an extreme decrease in water pressure. We had no idea or thought of concern to what was occurring up on the hillsides. A week passed before we were aware of a problem. Until our own water ran out. I took immediate measures...
The Montana Legislature has gone all in on big government and socialism with House Joint Resolution 28. American Prairie Reserve has legally acquired federal grazing leases. The Montana Legislature is proposing to instruct the BLM to use “science to dictate” grazing practices on lands owned by the U.S. government and managed by Montana ranchers and the American Prairie Reserve. American Prairie Reserve and BLM have used science to study the grazing. The intent is to keep native bison off of native pasture in Montana. Rep...
Our daughter, Maci, was in Helena with her family to spend this past week with us. Last session, she was the only member of our family who was unable to visit me at the Capitol, so it was special to have her and two of her children here. Judy and I enjoyed playing tour guides by showing them around Helena and the state campus while getting in some visiting. On Tuesday, the CJI junior and senior classes came to Helena to observe session, learn, and tour the Capitol. I spent a couple minutes with them before our session began,...
In 1947, thousands of WW II veterans eligible for G.I. Bill higher education benefits were overwhelming the Montana University System. The feeling in Montana and the rest of the country was that nobody was entitled to a living, but that everybody should be entitled to a fair chance to earn one. Education makes opportunity possible. Those who benefit from it can take advantage of opportunities, and create them for others. Those without an education are often left behind. This, in today’s increasingly technical world, is e...
A federal appeals court in Michigan gave unanimous support Wednesday to your First Amendment rights to communicate clearly with your middle finger. The Associated Press reports that in 2017, Taylor, Michigan, police officer Matthew Minard pulled over Debra Cruise-Gulyas and gave her a ticket for a minor offense. After the stop was over Cruise-Gulyas flipped off Minard, who then stopped her again and gave her a ticket for a more serious speeding offense. Cruise-Gulyas sued,...
Last Thursday Kathy, Richard, Nancie and I drove into Guadalajara for a night of highbrow music. El Teatro Santo Degollado, in the Centro Historico district where the Orquesta Filamonica performs, is a spectacular building of European architecture, a treat in itself. Are you impressed? I am. I grew up minus music, other than what I heard on the radio broadcast from Havre. Kathy, however, an avid cello player for many years, is in a different league and knows music intimately,...
It’s helpful to be at the same line of work long enough to be able to be proven wrong. I’ve been working with NAMI Montana to improve Montana’s mental illness treatment system for the past 10 years. We’ve been really active on the local, state and national levels. That amount of work has brought plenty of opportunities to be wrong and we haven’t been able to avoid them all. One of the biggest times that I was wrong was on Medicaid Expansion during the 2015 legislative session. NAMI Montana fully supported Medicaid Expansion...
This past week was transmittal week for the Legislature, which is kind of like spring break for Senators. Judy and I spent a couple days enjoying home in Chester and then came back down to Helena, as the Montana State Senate was back in Friday and Saturday. The House was out until Monday, Feb. 11. I attended a learning session in my tax committee regarding the Senate Bill 239. Sen. Jason Ellsworth’s bill would put a five-year moratorium on new taxes for companies installing new fiber optics cable in the ground. The bill c...
Twice a year, when the time change comes around, I am stunned by the amount of whining and complaining people do over one hour of sleep more or less. It’s an hour, not the end of times, you’ll survive. You’ll even adjust; it’s true. You will adjust, your pets will adjust, your kids will adjust, your bio-rythms will adjust, even your clocks will adjust given a minimum of effort on your part. It’s not like the sun stops shining, the earth stops spinning on its proper axis or the...
There’s an old saying in Montana that elk make people do stupid things. There’s a lot of truth to that saying. Whether you’re a dedicated elk hunter, a landowner with 400 head of elk on a haystack or a wildlife manager seeking to balance the needs of both interests, elk have a way of making simple issues complex, and bringing out some of our worst traits. As elk populations expand in central and eastern Montana, and as elk use private land across the state more and more as refuge from two and four legged predators, new confli...
I’ve heard stories about this elderly couple who live in El Amparo, the abandoned mining town in the mountains, ever since I moved to Etzatlan. Every Thursday this traditional couple, she in her long skirt, he in baggy white pants, both with wide sombreros, rode horses down the mountain road into town. They stayed the night with family and bought supplies at the Friday morning tianguis. Then in the afternoon, the couple would ride back to their mountain home, carrying their m...
Our first 45 days of the 66th legislative session have ended. We are in the transmittal break and catching up on emails and U.S. mail. I am going to change up my weekly report a bit. As legislators, we are scored on all of our votes. Some scores come from the parties and others come from unions, groups, PACs, or whomever wants to give us a grade, A to F. In the past, I have not looked at that and still do not. Historically, I have not voted straight line party on all votes. I see polarized partisan debates that attract media...
Psychologists have long lists of terms for what they — and we, the flawed masses — call coping or self-defense mechanisms because, in the end, we all have to do what we can to get through to happier, or less suckier, days. Like spring. I’m not a big fan of winter. Even when I used to ski, it was just something I did because I was surrounded by both snow and mountains. Ice fishing wasn’t my thing, but to be fair, fishing any time of year isn’t my thing. Snowshoeing and cross...
Winter, we are weary. Whether she gambols like a bleating lamb or roars like a lion, we welcome March after the grim days of February. Skies may still be gray but a fleeting scent in the air says winter is over and spring is here, or nearly so. Snow may fall, temps hit the low scale but spring will burst forth, even in Montana. The calendar tells us so. I’ve no complaint, I admit, here in my mountain valley in Jalisco. But friends and family live in frozen Montana and even w...
Montana is a state with a proud history of firsts. We were the first state to elect a woman to Congress: our very own Jeannette Rankin. We were also the first state in the nation to enact sweeping anti-corruption legislation in the Copper King era, after wealthy business interests in our state used their influence to buy a Senate seat. But in some measures, Montana’s first place status is not always worthy of celebration. According to a 2018 study by the Center for Disease Control, Montana ranks first in the nation for d...
Montana State University-Northern was in Helena for a legislative meet and greet. Last Monday, the folks from the university system had a presentation for a number of us Legislators from north-central Montana. We were made aware of some of the different crops that oil and fuel are being made with, i.e. camelina, mustard and flax. Currently, some very volatile products are being designed to provide fuel for drones. The idea is to find a lighter fuel source. Chancellor Greg Kegel experimented with fuel and fire while we sat in...
It’s often said that Montana is like a small town with long streets. Montanans may be separated by hundreds of miles but it’s amazing how many mutual friends you find you have after talking with someone for five minutes in this giant small town. A defining characteristic of small towns is that people care about one another and rally together in challenging times. Chances are you’ve attended at least a few community benefits to raise money for medical bills or to help a family that had some other misfortune strike. Today...
My husband doesn’t like beets. I do like beets. This is, I'll admit, inconsequential and the beet-thing obviously hasn’t been a deal breaker in this marriage or much of a “thing” at all (and you know what I mean by “thing” if you’re married). However, there’s always room for escalation, though, right? I like fresh-boiled beets, canned beets, pickled beets. John hates them all, especially pickled beets. I even like commercially canned and pickled beets. John hates those the...
Jim phoned, “Would you like to go to El Amparo? John and Carol are coming. Be ready in half an hour.” I’ve been wanting to go see the ghost town of El Amparo for three years. Beginning in the early 1500s, the mines were a rich source of gold and silver. From boom town Etzatlan, miners trudged over the mountains to work and brought back refined minerals through our town to Guadalajara to Spain. In the heyday of El Amparo, historians and local stories confirm that the minin...
The highlight of my week was that the Montana Association of Counties was in Helena for their annual meeting. Every session, county representatives come to Helena for their conference. I visited with commissioners, from both my district and some districts I had worked with in the past. Many hearings with bills that affect counties are scheduled the week MACo is in town. It gives the county folks the opportunity to weigh-in on whether to support the bill in question, which may benefit or hinder a county. I did have two...
