Columns

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 conflicts and challenges arise. These challenges create conflict both on the ground, and in the political realm. This legislative session, we’ve s...

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 ten years. We’ve been really active on the local, state and national levels. That amount of work...

My husband and I had to make a trip to the home improvement store last weekend for one item, just one. We started out together, but after a cursory period, we found ourselves involuntarily separated. We were looking for lye. I make soap, and you can’t make soap without lye. Usually, I order my lye o...

Is it spring yet? We are all wishing for better weather and to help you look forward to what has to eventually come, (it won’t still be snowing in June, will it?), check out the great magazine titles that you can read for free using your library card and Flipster. The cover on “Birds and Blooms&r...

As Speaker of the House, it is a goal of mine to have unity within the Republican Caucus and a positive working relationship with the minority party. At the halfway point of the 66th legislative session we are hitting those marks. Another goal of this session was to put the K-12 funding bill on the Govern...

For years news organizations have relied upon an organization called the Montana Freedom of Information Hotline to provide legal advice and assistance when confronted with closed or improperly advertised meetings or sealed documents. The service also is available to individual citizens who believe they, t...

The students I teach at the University of Montana often show up with a powerful assumption: If there is some piece of information out there, Google can find it. It’s an understandable belief for 19-year-olds who have grown up in a world where ubiquitous connection to the Internet and easy access to vas...

The recent proposal made by opponents of the CSKT Water Compact seeks to replace the long-negotiated agreement with a one-sided proposal that is illegal, illegitimate and unconstitutional. While being peddled as “a people’s compact” or “the mending fences act,” this proposal is ...

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 ...

The Missoulian ran a story on February 2 about an injunction filed by Lake County against the Montana Department of Revenue. If granted, the injunction would stop the Department of Revenue from processing any further applications and granting Temporary Tribal Tax Exemptions on fee properties purchased by the...