News you can use
News you can use
Sorted by date Results 937 - 961 of 3214
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...
Have you ever felt like you don’t really know what’s happening until it’s over? If I’m not around people to mirror back to me what I’m doing or saying, it is easy to fool myself. When I begin to fool myself, it is easy to slip back into unhealthy behaviors from my past. A few days ago I told my daughter, “I think I’m mildly depressed.” “Ya think!” she replied, with THAT tone of voice. Truth be told, what I was fishing for was sympathy. I’d cast my line in the wrong pond. Dee D...
I remember, a long time ago, when I used to have a social life. My husband, Peter, and I have been visiting his sister, Lori, once a week while she battles cancer. She was in yesterday for another radiation treatment, and we are waiting to hear if she will be feeling well enough for a visit this weekend. And so we stay home, as we have since March of last year. Lately, we have taken to picking up our groceries at the curb. I was skeptical. I’d never had another person c...
Selena Not Afraid. Ashley Heavyrunner Loring. Kaysera Stops Pretty Places. For decades in Montana, Indigenous people — mostly women, like these three — have gone missing, many times murdered and leaving behind families to search desperately for their loved ones. And many times, these families of Native people have had to go it alone, to search for their missing loved ones without the aid of authorities and with limited resources. We’re keenly aware that some of our neighbors are treated differently, invisible and left behin...
The weather has warmed up and so has the legislative process. Up until now, the bills have been trickling into my committees. I picked up a bill, Senate Bill 284, that I am carrying for the counties. It is what folks are calling the Gravel Bill. More on that in a bit. There are now 284 Senate bills picked up and are either moving forward or stopped along the way. Transmittal, which is the deadline when all non-revenue bills must be in and moving, will be a week from this coming Wednesday. We were informed today that it is pos...
I clearly voted against the Board of Health’s mask order last week in our meeting, and I’d like to comment on that meeting. We are in direct opposition to all surrounding counties and the entire Hi-Line with our order. It will be interesting to watch the numbers in those counties and see if there are perilous spikes as is presumed. Mayor Tim Solomon’s comment that we need to be the “bad guys” and not local entities is quite convenient as it will clearly be the county and not the city that is the “bad guy” here. He also clear...
Helena’s contentious debate on the role of taxes has brought Montana to a critical crossroads: Do we follow the path of states like Kansas, which paid for tax cuts for the wealthiest with major cuts to education infrastructure, and more? Or will Montana stand up to wealthy interests and instead invest in our people and the services that will move our state’s economy forward? Supporters of tax cuts for the wealthy disguise those cuts as an economic growth plan. In reality, tax cuts do very little for the average Montanan and...
I don’t mean to alarm anyone, but I almost died of a heart attack Wednesday night and, frankly, I’m too old to be having this kind of heart trouble. Specifically, my heart issue was not of the coronary thrombosis type, but rather the emotional-slash-psychological type seen most in excitable young people who lack years of experience to make them jaded, bitter and numb to random stimuli like a proper adult. The moment, with its unexpected rush of fear-based adrenalin, com...
I love it when Leo comes from the post office with a real letter in hand. Here it is mid-February and I just received your Christmas card. Denise’s arrived last week. I’ll not see Karen’s for a while because she mailed it mid-December! Our post office was closed for weeks; both postal workers were down with the COVID virus. Simultaneously, the lockdown closed government offices. In ordinary times, mail in Mexico is slow. We never get over worrying about our children, do we? I...
