“Darned Poor Judgment” is the rating I give Gov. Steve Bullock for infrastructure performance during the past four years! Clear back in 2013 the governor’s bad judgment became obvious. That year the Legislature passed a fix for oil boom infrastructure by a heavy margin, only to have the governor kill it with a veto. Read More…
Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte is calling for Gov. Steve Bullock to fire his commerce director, over a tourism-promotion contract awarded to an out-of-state company. At a gubernatorial debate in Billings this week, Gianforte said the contract was awarded in a “rigged process” that caused job losses in the state, and was “given Read More…
The State of Montana is blessed with an abundance of energy resources. We have areas of high quality wind and solar opportunities, and we have one of the nation’s largest reserves of high quality coal, plus new reserves of natural gas. The recent announcement of the complete shutdown of Colstrip units 1 & 2 was Read More…
Local officials in Colorado acknowledged “very serious” voter fraud after learning of votes cast in multiple elections under the named of recently-deceased residents. A local media outlet uncovered the fraud by comparing voting history databases in the state with federal government death records. “Somebody was able to cast a vote that was not theirs Read More…
Billings-based GTUIT, LLC has earned the 203rd position on Inc. magazine’s 2016 Inc. 500 list of fastest-growing private American companies with a three- year revenue growth rate of 1,894%. For 35 years, Inc. has tracked the fastest-growing private companies which have included firms like Microsoft, Under Armor, Oracle and Yeti Cooler. GTUIT stands out because Read More…
Six businesses will receive Montana Family Business Program awards at the 2016 Montana State University Jake Jabs College of Business & Entrepreneurship State Farm Insurance Family Business Day, set for Friday, Oct. 7, at the Best Western Plus GranTree Inn in Bozeman. The 2016 Family Business Day award winners are: Elliotts of Montana of Bozeman Read More…
Agriculture in Montana looks to be back on the right track after last year’s rough market and drought-ridden growing season, the state reported, and local farmers are finding more success in their harvests than last year. “We’ve experienced more volatility in the past five years than we have in the past several decades,” Mountain West Read More…
In a household with five children under the age of 7, a simple date night away for the parents can feel like a spa day, a few hours to recalibrate and breathe, to ignore the kids’ menu and enjoy conversation with other adults. Amanda and John Mark Creamer understand how important this sliver of Read More…
If you have listened to Montana gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte speak on his economic plans, one key area regarding jobs is to bring the state’s kids home with high paying jobs in the technology sector. Gianforte and his wife founded and grew RightNow Technologies in Bozeman before selling the business to the multi-national corporation Oracle. Read More…
The Wyoming Mining Association endorsed Republican Liz Cheney for the state’s lone U.S. House seat, the trade organization announced Monday. “The WMA believes Liz Cheney understands the critical issues and challenges facing Wyoming’s mining industry, and that she is the candidate best prepared to be our most effective advocate in Congress,” Jonathan Downing, the association’s Read More…
Wyoming’s unemployment rate fell in August for the first time in 18 months, the Department of Workforce Services reported Tuesday. The shift from 5.7 percent unemployment in July to 5.5 percent last month is not a statistically significant drop, but it offers hope that the state economy is stabilizing. Natrona County had the fourth-largest decrease Read More…
The Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation that this year’s fire season has been near or below average in the Treasure State. During an Environmental Quality Council meeting in Helena earlier this week, the DNRC’s Bob Harrington reported that 252 fires this season have burned 23,000 acres of state-managed land. The total cost to fight the blazes is Read More…
Members of the Chippewa Cree Tribe gathered along the bank of the Missouri River in Great Falls on Tuesday evening to show their support for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in North Dakota. The group is joining in protest of the multi-billion dollar Dakota Access Pipeline that would cross the Missouri River several times across Read More…
Montana Congressional candidate, Michael C. Fellows, died in a head on collision Monday night in Potomac. Fellows was running as a Libertarian. A Montana Highway Patrol dispatcher told MTN News that Fellows, 59, was driving a Lexus passenger car west on Montana Highway 200 near Potomac when he crossed the center line just after 9 Read More…
What we need to see in our next state auditor is someone who understands what it takes to help small businesses grow and create Montana jobs. It deeply concerns us that Jesse Laslovich has none of that experience, and worst of all, his record shows him to be anti-business and anti-jobs, and that kind of Read More…
MISSOULA — More than 11 million out-of-state travelers come to Montana every year, yet it is only one of five states in the country with no statewide sales tax. Proponents of a sales tax say it’s a giant missed opportunity to generate revenue from those tourists. Detractors say it would disproportionately hurt lower-income residents. A Read More…
On Thursday, a crime victim forum at the Willson School gave people the chance to come forward and discuss how they feel law enforcement could better serve citizens. A man said his house was broken into three years ago and the alleged robber has been identified but never tried. Another man said a woman broke into Read More…
Here’s a question a few of my friends are asking me. Why would a pro-choice, liberal-leaning woman like myself, who typically votes for Democrats, be supporting Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte? First, a little background. I’ve had decades of experience in business and economic development. In 2000, I began running a small economic development Read More…
Both major party candidates for governor of Montana making the rounds today to tout their jobs platforms. Governor Steve Bullock and republican candidate Greg Gianforte stopped by ABC Fox Montana’s Studio “K” to chat with us. Greg Gianforte: “This is the dream that many Montanans have. They want their kids back around the table on Read More…
Republican-leaning websites Friday posted stories questioning trips that Gov. Steve Bullock and administration officials have taken to Missoula and the Kentucky Derby. The governor’s office says the trips were, respectively, to conduct state business, and to fulfill Bullock’s role as head of the Democratic Governors’ Association. Newstalk KGVO’s assertion that Bullock also traveled to Puerto Read More…
During Barack Obama’s tenure in the White House, he has stacked the deck at the National Labor Relations Board with officials sympathetic to unions. (At one point, a unanimous Supreme Court decision ruled that Obama’s recess appointments to the board were illegal.) The NLRB has in turn issued all sorts of new rules to inhibit Read More…
By Mike Dennison – MTN News HELENA – The head of the state Republican Party Wednesday asked the Montana Supreme Court to remove the Libertarian secretary of state candidate from Montana’s November ballot, for not filing proper campaign forms. Jeff Essmann’s filing for “extraordinary relief” said Libertarian Roger Roots failed to file forms required of Read More…
There’s an EpiPen Tycoon computer game. In it, you are the CEO of Mylan, Heather Bresch, the daughter of a US senator who has been handed a drug that lays a golden egg — EpiPen, an emergency anaphylaxis treatment that stops people’s throats from closing in the event of an allergic reaction. It’s Read More…
Hillary Clinton told investigators that she wasn’t aware that a “C” marking in emails she received on her private server indicated that the information was classified at the “confidential” level, according to documents that the FBI released on Friday. The State Department determined that one email chain contained information that is classified at the Read More…
The Florida Senate race is about more than just a seat in Congress — it will determine if Marco Rubio has a future in politics. The failed presidential candidate is still one of the Republican Party’s biggest — and at 45, youngest — stars. Few GOP leaders are as charismatic or have the potential to Read More…
Either Hillary Clinton lied to the FBI or she lied on a State Department form as she began her tenure as Secretary of State. This conclusion appears inescapable after Friday’s FBI document release related to the Clinton email investigation. As revealed by those FBI documents, Clinton told agents that she could not recall “any briefing or training Read More…
An unknown individual used an anonymous web browsing tool often used to access the dark web to get into an email account on the Clinton family server, the FBI revealed on Friday. Meanwhile, in another incident, top aide Huma Abedin revealed to an unidentified person that Clinton had fears she had been hacked after she Read More…
A not-so-funny thing happened on the way to Columbus. Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein instead ended up in Cincinnati after a campaign staffer mistakenly booked her flight to the wrong “C” city in Ohio. Stein’s scheduled noon speech at Capital University in Bexley instead came at 2:35 p.m. after she jumped into a car Read More…
The Miles City Council passed a $26.7 million city budget for 2016-17 Tuesday night. The $23,668,213 spending plan includes $5 million in General Fund expenditures, nearly $900,000 in cash carryover and various enterprise funds like ambulance, water, sewer, airport and library.. Finance Committee Chairwoman Susanne Galbraith said the police department requested an additional officer, which Read More…
Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte has poured another $640,000 of his own money into his campaign, upping his total personal contributions to $1.7 million – about half his overall campaign funds. But Gianforte wasn’t the only one who opened his checkbook in Montana’s gubernatorial race last month. Good Jobs Montana, an independent political action committee Read More…
Malmstrom Air Force Base residents woke up to potentially dangerous drinking water this morning. The base put out a notice stating there were elevated chlorine levels in water and it was unsafe to drink or even wash with. Some residents stated the water smelled a little funny as early as last night. Base officials say Read More…
The University of Montana’s new slogan is “Let’s Go There!” In addition to delighting fans of “30 Rock,” this exclamation is everything you want in a marketing tagline. It succinctly conveys the university’s message to the public: Please attend our school, and if you can, bring some friends. “Let’s Go There!” models desirable behavior for Read More…
HELENA — Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte has given another $660,000 to his campaign as he and incumbent Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock began flooding the airwaves with ads. The Bozeman technology entrepreneur has given his campaign more than $1.6 million total, and he pledged to match every contribution he receives. Including Gianforte’s contributions of $650,000 Read More…
When Lori Goler, Facebook’s Vice President of People, joined the company in 2008, she got to work making the company a “strengths-based” organization. It’s a term based on Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman’s 1999 bestselling management guide “First, Break All the Rules.” The coauthors were Gallup analysts at the time and drew insights from 25 years Read More…
Donald Trump doubled down on his promises to build a wall along the US-Mexico border, saying, “We will build a great wall along the southern border” in speech on Wednesday evening. Trump has promoted the wall as a part of a solution to cross-border crime and to illegal immigration. But just a few days before Trump’s awkward meeting Read More…
Women are going nuts overLuLaRoe, a clothing brand that has catapulted from near obscurity to cult status in the past couple of years. The brand, which sells brightly-colored shirts, leggings, and dresses, isn’t available in stores or on a company website. Instead, tens of thousands of people across the US — many of whom are Read More…
Contemporary media parlor games revolve around fantasy sports and politics. Yet for politics, press interest in money raised and spent often seems more important than who will win and how policies might change. One corollary to the political-money obsession is the complaint that Federal Election Commission enforcement for alleged wrongdoers is too feeble. Critics say Read More…
HELENA — The ending fund balance for fiscal year 2016 was $255 million, or $99 million less than anticipated, according to an Aug. 25 memo prepared by the Legislative Fiscal Division, adding that figure was expected to dip down to $153 million by fiscal year 2017. “Actual revenues in FY 2016 were $142 million less Read More…
When you don’t have much new income, it’s great if you can pay your monthly bills using money coming in from smart investment of your savings. Not a lot of people have that. But public budgets in Wyoming have enjoyed some of that kind of security. Now the state is looking for the best strategy Read More…
Representatives of Wyoming firearms manufacturers were on hand Monday, as Gov. Matt Mead announced three new initiatives to promote shooting sports across the state as part of “Wyoming’s Day at the Range.” “We have a growing firearms industry in Wyoming,” Mead said at ceremony at the Otto Road Shooting Range west of Cheyenne. “Some Read More…