News you can use
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HELENA — Montana has enough cash in the bank to cushion a temporary delay in federal funding to the states if the debt-ceiling showdown in Congress continues into next week, Gov. Brian Schweitzer said Friday. The Democratic governor announced Thursday that the state ended the fiscal year with a $340 million surplus, making Montana one of eight states not facing a shortfall. That cash would allow the state to weather the storm for a month or possibly longer if the government defaults because of gridlock over raising the n...
HELENA — A California Indian tribe has donated $200,000 to the American Red Cross of Montana for its ongoing efforts to assist American Indian communities affected by spring flooding along the Little Bighorn and Missouri rivers. The contribution from the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians was announced Thursday by Tribal Chairman James C. Ramos. San Manuel's contribution is meant to support recovery and cleanup efforts and to secure ongoing shelter and daily living necessities for those affected by the flo...
GOP plans abortion parental notification ballot measure The Associated Press HELENA — Abortion opponents are putting forward a proposed ballot measure that would require parental notification for abortions being considered by girls under the age of 18 who are not legally emancipated minors. The measure would allow lawmakers to put the question to voters in 2012, should the governor veto another measure advancing through the Republican-controlled Legislature that would simply make the change in law. Supporters say the n...
SEATTLE — Clarita Vargas was sent to an Indian boarding school some four decades ago to study her ABCs and learn to blend in with majority culture. She says she instead learned a nightmarish lesson — that children sometimes have no one to protect them from pedophiles. On Friday, the 51-year-old had her "day of reckoning and justice," when an order of Jesuit priests agreed to pay $166.1 million to hundreds of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives who were abused at its schools around the Pacific Northwest. Settlement one of...
Education funding plan goes back to committee HELENA — Senate Republicans searching for votes on their primary education funding plan sent the measure back to committee for more tinkering. The Thursday move followed a floor vote on Wednesday where the measure deadlocked 25-25. Republicans hold a 28-22 advantage in the chamber, but face some opposition from those within their ranks worried about how it treats some resource-rich rural areas. Democrats are opposing it, arguing they like Gov. Brian Schweitzer's education plan b...
HELENA — From her wheelchair on Friday, Shyla Patera told the panel of lawmakers something they don't often hear. "I want to live and work and pay my taxes," Patera told members of the Senate Finance and Claims Committee. Patera represents four Montana independent living centers that help disabled people with the daily tasks of life so they can stay in their own homes and be a part of their communities. In 2003, enrollees in the program were reduced to three showers per week. If budget cuts proposed by Republicans become r...
BILLINGS — Aging coal-fired power plants across the West could be forced to install costly pollution control equipment under an agreement between federal regulators and environmentalists aimed at jump-starting a delayed clean air initiative. Many utilities already cut air pollution emissions sharply over the last decade to meet federal health standards. Next up are even deeper cuts, to improve visibility in 156 national parks and wilderness areas by clearing the air of pollutants that cause haze. The reductions are r...
AP Photo/Shelby Promoter/Chris Muller Investigators survey the scene of a school bus accident Friday near Devon. The bus carrying about 40 people returning from a church camp flipped on its side Friday on a rural highway in northern Montana, injuring several students, none of them seriously, authorities said. A camp counselor says three people remain hospitalized after a school bus carrying about 40 people returning from a church camp flipped on its side on a rural highway in northern Montana. Malachy Horning tells the Great...
BILLINGS — Facing mounting pressure from Congress, wildlife advocates and the U.S. Department of Interior on Friday reached an agreement to lift gray wolf protections in Montana and Idaho and allow hunting of the predators to resume. The settlement agreement — opposed by some environmentalists — is intended to resolve years of litigation that have shielded wolves in the Northern Rockies from hunting, even as the predator's population has sharply expanded. Terms of the deal were to be filed in U.S. District Court in Monta...
LOLO — Former militia leader David Burgert has found a perfect location to carry on his private battle with law enforcement officers: a remote corner of the Rocky Mountains on the Montana-Idaho border that is heavily forested and lightly populated. The hunt for Burgert, 47, moved into its fourth day Wednesday with no sign of the practiced survivalist whose mother said he slipped into paranoia after repeated run-ins with Montana law enforcement. Court documents and interviews with law enforcement officials painted a picture o...
Republican wants to link state coffers to gold The Associated Press HELENA — A Republican lawmaker says his plan to link state coffers to gold would spur rethinking of currency. Rep. Bob Wagner of Harrison told a House committee Monday that he wants Montana state government to trade with some taxpayers and contractors in units of gold. He envisions the exchange will be done electronically rather than with actual precious metal. Supporters say the new currency exchange will be "separate and parallel" to the traditional e...
BILLINGS — The Obama administration on Tuesday struck a new deal with wildlife advocates that would require the Interior Department to consider greater protections for hundreds of imperiled animals and plants. The agreement was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., by attorneys from the government and the Center for Biological Diversity. If a judge approves it, the deal would set a 2018 deadline for the administration to decide whether Endangered Species Act protections are needed for species as diverse as the w...
HELENA (AP) — U.S. Sen. Jon Tester is reporting raising another $1.2 million in trying to fend off a high-profile challenge from U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg. Both sides are expected to continue raising big money as both parties target a race that could help determine control of the Senate. Tester reported Tuesday that he raised $1.2 million in the second quarter, bringing his total this cycle to almost $4 million. He holds about $2.3 million in cash on hand. Rehberg's report for the quarter was not yet available. It will be h...
HELENA — Gov. Brian Schweitzer is looking into what a state government shutdown would look like even as he continued talking to Republican leaders about a budget deal. Schweitzer says he spoke to House Speaker Mike Milburn and Senate President Jim Peterson on Monday as the Republican leaders were finalizing their budget plan in each chamber. Schweitzer has made it clear he may veto the bill or send back a proposed rewrite. The governor also is asking the attorney general to define which state services would be deemed e...
AP Photo/The Billings Gazette, Larry Mayer The Crow Tribe rounds up horses on the former Leachman Cattle Company ranch east of Billings, Mont. on Monday, March 21. Hundreds of horses were placed in the former ranch feedlot ans will be sold at an upcoming sale. The Bureau of Indian Affairs condemned the horses on March 1 because they were trespassing on tribal land. BILLINGS — A bankrupt Montana rancher whose starving horses were fed donated hay over the winter bought back dozens of the animals at an auction. The sale was held...
Senate backs annual Legislature referendum STEPHEN DOCKERY, Associated Press HELENA — The Senate is backing a constitutional referendum to have the Montana Legislature meet every year, rather than every other year. The measure calls for voters to decide if lawmakers should continue meeting for 90 days every other year or for 80 days spread over two annual sessions. Supporters say the annual meetings would make the Legislature more efficient and more open to the public. Those opposing the measure say annual sessions would e...
Montana judge orders hysterectomy, patient appeals The Associated Press MISSOULA— The Montana Supreme Court has delayed an order that a cancer patient undergo a hysterectomy to give her time to appeal a finding that she is not mentally competent to make such a decision. District Judge Karen Townsend issued a March 1 ruling ordering the woman to undergo a radical hysterectomy on March 3 to treat her cervical cancer. The woman is identified in documents by the initials L.K. Says she a deeply religious woman L.K.'s appeal says s...
0-year-old Great Falls boy shot, killed; sixth-grader charged GREAT FALLS (AP) — Great Falls police say a 10-year-old boy has been shot to death and a sixth-grader is facing a negligent homicide charge in Youth Court. Police tell the Great Falls Tribune the shooting was reported at 7 p.m. Sunday at an apartment complex. The 10-year-old was pronounced dead at the hospital. The sixth-grader appeared before Judge Dirk Sandefur for a juvenile detention hearing and was released to his father's custody after investigators v...
HELENA — Former congressman Rick Hill is leading Republican gubernatorial candidates in fundraising, while Democratic Attorney General Steve Bullock is keeping pace without yet saying whether he'll actually run for the state's top job. Candidates filed their campaign finance reports for the last three months with the state Commissioner for Political Practices with less than a year before the June 5 primaries to decide the party nominations for governor. The biggest question hanging in the gubernatorial race is whether Bullock...
HELENA (AP) — A railway official says a 110-car train loaded with corn has derailed, shutting down the main rail line through Montana. Burlington Northern Santa Fe spokesman Gus Melonas says it's unclear what caused 10 cars to derail Tuesday afternoon about 60 miles east of Havre near the town of Savoy. The train was bound for Tacoma, Wash. No injuries were reported and the cause of the derailment is under investigation. Crews planned to work throughout the night to clear the tracks, but Melonas says the line isn't e...
BILLINGS — Exxon Mobil Co. reassured concerned regulators that an oil pipeline beneath the Yellowstone River was buried deep enough and not in danger just a month before it broke in a flood and spewed an estimated 1,000 barrels of crude into the waterway. Details about Exxon Mobil's actions leading up to the Friday night spill into one of the West's premiere rivers emerged in federal safety documents as cleanup work continued downstream of the rupture site in the Montana town of Laurel. AP Photo/Jim Urquhart Oil covers a p...
Senate bill would lift wolf protections in MT, ID MATTHEW BROWN, Associated Press BILLINGS — Gray wolves in Montana and Idaho would lose their Endangered Species Act protections and become fair game for hunters under a provision buried deep in a U.S. Senate budget bill introduced Friday. The provision was included in a broad measure introduced by Democrats to fund the federal government through the end of the fiscal year. The one-paragraph passage on wolves — which appears on page 253 of the bill and doesn't mention the ani...
AP Photo/Doug Dreyer A sign outside of a sandbagged home owned by Deb and MonteA Kenworthy expresses their displeasure at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Ft. Pierre, S.D. FORT PIERRE, S.D. — Sitting atop a 6-foot wall of white sandbags hastily stacked to protect his home from the rising Missouri River, 82-year-old Helmet Reuer doesn't buy the official explanation that heavy rains caused a sudden flood threat. Along with his neighbors in an upscale section of Fort Pierre, Reuer thinks the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers b...
HELENA — High waters from huge amounts of rainfall combined with melting snowpack over the past month are prompting the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to release massive amounts of water from Fort Peck Dam earlier than expected. Roosevelt County officials announced Thursday afternoon that engineers plan on releasing 50,000 cubic feet per second of water from the dam starting June 9, revising an earlier plan to release that amount of water in mid-June. That decision likely will spell higher floodwaters sooner in the Dakotas. T...
AP Photo/Matt Gouras Barry Beach, left, and attorney Peter Camiel listen to testimony Monday in Lewistown that they hope will lead to a new trial for a 1979 murder Beach says he did not commit. Beach, convicted in the 1979 beating death of a teenager on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation asked a judge Monday to consider evidence to support his claim that a group of girls was actually responsible, bringing forward witnesses and claims overwhelmingly rejected four years ago by a parole board. LEWISTOWN — A man convicted in the 1...
