News you can use
News you can use
Sorted by date Results 929 - 953 of 3214
If citizens elect an anti-tax, anti-government legislature— like Montana’s 67th - it is not surprising that they get legislation that undermines government finances and weakens government services. Oklahoma and Kansas are two states that tried an ideological approach to fiscal policy a few years back. The results were disastrous cuts to public services, a fiscal crisis in each state, and near bankruptcy in the case of Oklahoma. They discovered that you cannot continually drain a state’s general fund and expect gover...
As I said in a column a few weeks ago, I’ve taken up archery and am completely enamored with it, largely because it has turned out to be one of those things in life that just hits me on a pretty deep and introspective level. Sure it’s fun — how can you not feel a rush shooting a bow and arrow? I split the tail end of one arrow with a perfect hit from a second arrow. That’s some next-level Annie-Oakley-with-a-bow stuff right there (Robin Hood, who?). Of course it was purely...
I’ve been having trouble sleeping lately, and among the many reasons for that is a question that seems to buzz around in the back of my head before I close my eyes: How will COVID-19 be remembered? To be frank, I fear the answer. The United States has been hit very hard by the pandemic with more deaths than any other nation, including those with larger and more crowded populations and less public health resources. Communities of color, especially Native-American communities, have seen a disproportionately high amount of i...
It’s a paradox. Constancy — firm, steadfast, permanent, consistent, un-changing. We can count on something with the property or nature of constancy. One thing we can count on is change. Saturday I double-masked my face, and with my bottle of sanitizer in hand, went to town, for the second time in a year. The first time was three weeks ago for vaccination. While this later trip was not of ultimate necessity, I let impatience rule and set off for my favorite furniture store wit...
It’s our anniversary, and Peter and I will be celebrating, like everyone has this past year, the best we are able. We have not yet won the vaccine lottery. I recently received a note from the health department that basically said, “Don’t get your hopes up.” Newspaper columnists are not, apparently, considered essential workers and, of course, I am not. Meanwhile, we continue to visit my sister-in-law, Lori, whose health remains precarious. So our anniversary celebra...
As we approach the one-year anniversary of the collapse of Drop Structure #5 of the St. Mary’s Diversion, the spotlight remains on the unaffordability of critical repairs to the Milk River Project’s aged infrastructure. From Montana’s irrigators and farmers, ranchers, recreationists, and municipalities that span from Tribal Nations to Canada, the call for affordable repairs are continuing to grow. Not only are construction costs into the hundreds of millions of dollars, Montana’s irrigators alone are responsible for 74% of...
Montana hunters are being shut out of major decisions on future access to elk. The new approach in Helena, led by Speaker Wylie Galt and Fish, Wildlife and Parks Director Hank Worsech, is to spring legislation on us. Making major wildlife management changes without public input benefits few and hurts Montana hunters. I never thought it would happen here, but we must meet this full-on effort to limit public hunter involvement in wildlife management decisions if we are to maintain the title of the “Last Best Place.” For dec...
Editor, The Montana Legislature is back in session and I was more than a little concerned when I read that Republican Derek Skees introduced HB273. HB273 if passed would overturn Initiative 80, a long-standing initiative that gives the citizens of Montana the right to vote on nuclear power in Montana. I don’t understand why Derek Skees thinks the citizens of Montana would want to give up their right to vote on whether-or-not to produce nuclear power in Montana. I personally have huge reservations about producing nuclear p...
As leaders in the health care, patient advocacy and public health community, we applaud the State House Appropriations Committee vote to retain the Department of Public Health and Human Services’ two positions dedicated to tribal health, the tribal relations manager and director of American Indian health. As statewide health organizations and associations committed to ensuring access to quality healthcare across the state, we rely on and partner closely with Native-led health organizations and tribal health authorities, i...
The first week after transmittal is always like starting refreshed, with new vigor and looking forward to seeing what the House folks have for our committees. This week, I sponsored Emma Wickum as a Senate Page. Emma is looking to study political sScience and one day do lobby work. I connected her with some Helena folks and we visited with them: Molly Kruckenberg, the director of the State Museum, lobbyist Kali Wicks, with Blue Cross Blue Shield, and lobbyist Mark Baker, who works as a contractor for a number of businesses....
Dear Montana Education Leaders, In his recent directive implementing Executive Order 2-2021, Governor (Greg) Gianforte highlighted that “access to school is essential to the developmental, social, mental, and educational needs of school-age children.” We cannot agree more that access to school is essential to the health and well-being of our children and adolescents. Across our state and nation many K-12 schools have remained open during the COVID-19 pandemic by following a multi-layered approach to protecting students, tea...
Apparently, the coronavirus social distancing guidelines haven’t slowed down the Good Luck Fairy from spreading her magical glittery stardust around the world. Good Luck Fairy, better known to her friends as G’Luck, went nuts with that glitter in Connecticut last year in order for its magic powers to play a bit of a long game. The Associated Press reported March 2 that a Connecticut man, who wished to remain anonymous for reasons that will become obvious, bought a cobalt blu...
We all know what happens to the frog in a gradually warming pot of water. Too slow to react it eventually boils to death. Since the Industrial Revolution humans have been steadily turning up the heat in this big pot we call planet earth with ever increasing carbon pollution from the burning of fossil fuel. Even hard core climate change skeptics are finding it harder to deny the harsh reality of global “weirding,” as dramatized by the recent extreme winter storm in Texas where millions suffered from lack of electricity, hea...
Because of the pandemic, health cautions and precautions, these past several days, I’ve found myself to be the only gringo in town, or to be precise, on the ranch. Tom and Janet drove their big yellow cargo van to Arizona for medical appointments and to bring back another load of belongings from storage. Lani and Ariel exited Etzatlan about when winter entered, gone off to lounge on a beach somewhere near Manzanillo. John and Carol, in a fit of stir-crazy, packed up their a...
I’ve never been a fan of March. March is supposedly spring, but we all know it’s not. In much of the country, more snow falls in March than any other month. But it doesn’t have the courtesy to stay. March snow falls, makes us shovel it, then turns into a sloppy mess in three days. It becomes slush, mixed with mud. The sky stays gray. And all the ... things (you know what I mean), things that were buried in previous snowfalls ... all those things come to light. Whatever they...
Editor, Here in the United States, and Montana especially, free and fair elections are the cornerstone of our democracy. We have focused a great deal on how everyone gets one vote this year, but not enough on how everyone gets one vote. The full fairness of our democratic union is bolstered by expanding access to the ballot and ensuring that everybody gets a say in how our government is run. When only part of the state has access to the ballot, only part of the state is heard. House Bill 613 provides much needed revisions to...
Week eight was a short, but long week. As transmittal was looming, over 200 bills were dropped in the last two weeks. This led to a crunch last Saturday and again Monday. Saturday was a disappointing day for me. There were around 50 bills that came to the Senate floor and I can’t say any of them put folks to work or brought the state of Montana any money. I went home feeling a bit dismayed. I had waited for something of substance, but it never came. Then Monday was week nine with 93 bills on the agenda. We started at 8:30 a...
Nerds look things up, that’s who we are — sometimes that more for worse than for better. It started with “confab,” as in this simple reply: “That sounds fun, but John and I will have to confab on this before we commit to anything.” And all of a sudden, I realized that I don’t really use the term “confab” in everyday speaking and felt I needed to make sure I was using it correctly. Also, it sounded like an abbreviation of a longer word, like confabulation, so obviously I had t...
Whew! The election’s over. And Hooray! We don’t have to watch thousands of political ads or respond to the all too numerous requests for donations from various candidates running for office... until the next election cycle, which starts in less than a year. We all feel this way. We’re all glad it’s done, whether we’re Republicans, Democrats, independents, Greens, or Libertarians. We have something else in common. We’re trying to stop the flood of money and ads. Do you know that, in 2012, all of our 56 Montana counties pa...
Back in the olden days, in grade school, teachers used low-tech machines which made copies for all manner of school work, from pictures to color (don’t color out of the lines) to test questions. Teacher, most of whom we called Miss: Miss Brown, Miss Naomi, Miss Mary, would snap a stencil onto the drum of the machine. The slick paper, the stencil, and the ink combined to make an unforgettable sensory memory scent, sort of chemical alcohol. If you were Miss Brown, Miss Naomi o...
I know I am not the only one having travel fantasies. My husband, Peter, and I were not planning to do a lot of traveling in the past year. That was our plan, and we certainly made good on it. We didn’t realize at the time that “not a lot of traveling” would mean a bi-weekly trip to the grocery store. Like a lot of folks, we’ve been tracking how many months we’re getting on a gallon of gas. Now, however, traveling is sounding better all the time. My parents are also making tra...
The three of us have known each other dating back a half century when Dorothy Bradley and Bob Brown were young legislators and Marc Racicot was emerging as a top prosecuting attorney. Over the decades we have been fierce competitors as well as staunch allies in the rough and tumble arena of Montana politics. We have maintained our friendship and appreciated our varying commitments, which was once a worthy Montana tradition. Now, we are brought together by a common cause so compelling that we are speaking out together. Our...
Week eight is the lead-up to what is called transmittal. As I mentioned last week, all non-revenue bills must move from one house to the other by transmittal: House bills to the Senate and Senate bills to the House. Our job in committees is to either pass these bills on if they warrant being passed on or vote to table them. Tabling a bill does not mean the bill is dead, it has just hit a roadblock and may not move from that position. That being said, this week was crunch time. Many bills were passed and others, for one...
You know a word that we don’t hear very often? Giddy. And that’s a cryin’ shame. Well, of course, giddy doesn’t mean cryin’ shame. It means happy, joyful, elated, lightheartedly silly, but it’s a cryin’ shame we don’t hear about it happening more often. I was giddy Wednesday, and it took me hours to put a name to that feeling. I just couldn’t stop grinning and saying things like “I just feel all, I don’t know, whoooo!” Then it struck me. “I feel giddy. I mean, like, reee...
Havre’s Art Alley is a reality! Following the completion of the mural project in September of 2019, which culminated in the colorful artwork that adorns the west side of the Hill County Printing building, the work of the local volunteer Havre Main Street Group continued. The next project was developing an art alley in downtown Havre. The chosen alley was between Second and Third streets and Third and Fourth avenues, or the alley behind several downtown businesses, including Havre Home Center and Cavaliers. But why an Art A...
