In a recent letter to the editor, Gerry Jennings urged support for the upcoming school levy. After making a suspect claim about class sizes, Jennings regurgitated an even more questionable argument about public education and its relationship to economic development. “My four children received the best education the state had to offer during the ‘70s…
Is it time for the Great Falls Public School District to take their foot off the levy pedal and apply the brakes? It is apparent that the school district’s overpaid administrators and the local rubber-stamp school board are heading full speed ahead with guns blazing to take another $1.75 Million from the taxpayer’s pockets on…
If you’re tried to reach us in the past few days, you probably noticed that our website had a few glitches. For that, I apologize. We have been in the process of upgrading to a managed hosting service. Simply put, E-City Beat now receives too much traffic to operate any other way. In March, this…
Is the GFPS District really short of cash, or are their cries just a sleight of hand? If, as Mark Finnicum, a school board member who also serves on the board’s budget committee said, the $1.75M upcoming levy isn’t to add new programs or staff but “is maintaining what we already have” is true… …why…
The Great Falls Public School District would like you to believe that the impact of the proposed $1.75M operational levy would result in a very small increase to your property taxes, $16.27 on a home valued at $100,000 and $32.54 on a home valued at $200,000. The fact is that the impact of the levy…
No, we are not talking about the graduation rate at the District’s two high schools, not even close. And we are not talking about the District budgeting acumen either. What we are talking about is how much of the proposed $1.3M operational levy will be going for raises for staff and administrative positions and increases…
Although, lying has been around forever, it is now becoming a common practice by propagandists and pundits wanting to promote individual, or collective agendas. Straight-out lying has been destigmatized if it advances a certain propaganda that leads to what might be considered a worthy, or important goal. Whether the goal, or objective pursued is objectively…
If you paid any attention to the recent Great Falls City election, you know that three things are true: a positive, pro-growth, pro-transparency agenda reigned over all, that name ID and incumbency forgave serial malfeasance, and that screeching, far-left nobodies were tossed into the electoral trash heap. What is one to make, then, of last-place…
To recap a wild week here in River City, Mayor Bob Kelly took significant heat for unilaterally inviting refugees to Great Falls. (He has since apologized.) While some of the comments on E-City Beat and elsewhere have not been particularly receptive to the mayor’s mea culpa, I think it’s possible that some of us have…
In honor of Bob Kelly’s recently exposed extracurricular activities, I thought it would be interesting to share a story from 14 years ago, penned on New Year’s Day in 2006. It is from Gregg Smith’s old blog, and it tells the tale of another big government liberal mayor of Great Falls: Randy Gray. Back then,…