Montana

Billings taxi owners, others fight Lyft application

By: |
Lyft

In a tense and often clumsy hearing in Helena on Monday, a handful of taxi companies tried to convince the Montana Public Service Commission to deny an operating permit for a national rideshare company looking to expand to the state.

Members of the commission took nearly four hours of testimony from multiple parties regarding a request by Lyft Inc. to begin operating in Montana. The commission approved a similar application by Uber in late 2015, giving a reluctant nod to changing technology and the demands of the traveling public. Continue Reading →

CapreAir_Variable
Montana

To the rescue: After bad fall, man now helps deliverers

By: |
Rescue

On Aug. 3, 2014, late in the afternoon, Dr. David Lehnherr lay in a shelter near Black Canyon Lake, high in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness, all alone.

He had had a nasty fall and a long tumble down a rocky slope earlier in the day, and he had sustained several serious injuries to his legs, his ribs and his head. His hiking companion had left him there while he walked out in search of help, but it was getting dark and the weather was taking a turn for the worse. Continue Reading →

Diversions

BugBytes: Thoughts on cool beetles and squeamish adults

By: |
Bugs

Finally, springtime is in full swing and summer is just around the corner. This invigorating seasonal shift signals the revival of two key insect-related events:

1) The transformation of our house’s western exposure into a Bacchanalian bone zone for randy swarms of box elder bugs recently sun-flushed from their winter hideaways and onto our front stoop. The result is like something out of a John Waters film: excrement-stained walls and windows, a mailbox filled with copulating foursomes doing it in the dark, and let’s not forget the dribbled gobs of abandoned egg clusters that, when crushed, dissolve into a smear of blood-hued vitals. Continue Reading →

Prairie Lights

Prairie Lights: When ‘taking responsibility’ is not enough

By: |
RMC

If Congressman-elect Greg Gianforte appears in Justice Court in Bozeman this week to enter a plea on a charge of misdemeanor assault, he won’t be able to say anything deliberately untrue without putting himself at risk of being charged with perjury.

So, is there nothing we can do about the deliberate untruth his campaign released in the immediate aftermath of Gianforte’s attack on a newspaper reporter? Continue Reading →

Montana

For conservationists, vetoes took sting out of dim session

By: |
NPRC

A legislative scorecard released this week by one of the state’s major conservation groups paints a stark picture of the partisan divide in Helena.

The Northern Plains Resource Council, based in Billings, tallied votes on seven pieces of legislation considered important by its members. With the state House and Senate both controlled by Republican majorities during the recently concluded 2017 Legislature, it perhaps wasn’t surprising that the NPRC was on the losing side of all seven bills. Continue Reading →

Montana

Montanans pan withdrawal from climate accord

By: |
Guv

Montana Gov. Steve Bullock led a chorus of state and regional environmental groups in condemning President Trump’s decision Thursday to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate accord.

In a written statement, Bullock called the move “short-sighted and dangerous” and out of step with what Montanans from all walks of life know to be true. Continue Reading →

Montana

At town hall, Tester hears of broken VA health system

By: |
Choice

When combat veteran Christine Bailey first discovered the lump in her breast, her first call was like that of any veteran. She dialed up to the VA Montana Health Care System, only to learn that it didn’t offer breast care for women.

Bailey’s problems compounded when, under the CHOICE program, which allows veterans to seek care outside the VA, she was met with a tangle of red tape and lengthy delays in trying to get authorization to pursue mammograms and biopsies. Continue Reading →

Montana

VA Montana director says ‘help is coming’

By: |
Doc

The VA Montana Health Care System is looking at both short- and long-term solutions to address a number of challenges within the state, including a lack of providers, problems with tele-health screenings and the absence of physician training, its new director said Wednesday.

Kathy Berger, director of VA Montana, answered questions from area veterans and Sen. Jon Tester during a town hall meeting at the Partnership Health Center in Missoula to gather feedback on problems within the VA. (See related story.) Continue Reading →