The responsibility of government isn’t to solve all of our problems but rather to ensure our safety in the free exercise of our individual God-given, natural rights. Now think about that in light of our local crime problem. The primary job of Great Falls law-enforcement and our local criminal justice system is to protect and…
If you missed Great Falls Tribune editor Grady Higgins’ piece from a couple of weeks ago, chances are you might not have known that the Trib recently added a “Government Watchdog reporter,” Nicole Girten, to its ranks. And if you didn’t take the time to scroll through the many, many things (7,400+) Girten has liked…
Editors note: Below is an email forwarded to E-City Beat from Great Falls State Representative Lola Galloway. Dear State Representative Galloway, As Montana continues to discuss the state’s minimum wage I wanted to call your attention to The Heartland Institute’s newest Research & Commentary examining the economic implications associated with Senate Bill 187. Heartland’s state government relations coordinator Samantha…
Did the City’s Indoor Recreation Center and Aquatic Facility consultant selection process violate the Federal Procurement rules? In June of last year, the City hired a local architectural/geotechnical engineering team, without advertising so all interested local firms could compete for the Department of Defense $10M grant pre-application project. After the award, the City Manager said,…
What’s a 50 meter pool that is 25 meters short? If you answered, “very short-sighted”, you’d be correct, but that’s what you are going to get with the new Indoor recreation Center and Aquatics Facility. Why is a 50M pool an important feature of an Indoor Aquatics Center? According to a Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA)…
This is a special time of year for me and my family. Presidents Day holds so much meaning and so many great memories for me even now as an adult. When I was a kid, every year my brothers and I, with barely contained excitement and anticipation, would count down the days until that magical,…
The following excerpts are from an article in the Montana Petroleum Report newsletter entitled “BIDEN TORPEDOES KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE”, written by Alan Olson, Executive Director of the Montana Petroleum Association. You can read the entire article here. “President Biden’s recent executive order to rescind the permits for TC Energy’s Keystone XL, including a section of the pipeline…
The Great Falls City Ethics Committee voted on Wednesday, February 3, 2021 to dismiss all allegations of conflicts of interest and ethics violations I made against city officials for providing city employee time and city resources to Big Sky Country National Heritage Area (BSCNHA) Inc. Their decision seemed to be based mostly on the city’s…
HISTORY JUST KEEPS REPEATING ITSELF After Mantle and Maris hit back-to-back home runs in 1961, Yogi Berra said “It’s déjà vu all over again”. That quote could have been the inspiration for the 1993 movie Groundhog Day, which was about a real -time entrapment in the time loop. In Groundhog Falls we are caught in…
Last summer, I submitted a formal complaint to the Cascade County Attorney against the City of Great Falls regarding use of government resources (aka our tax money) to support a private nonprofit—Big Sky Country National Heritage Area Inc. I cited portions of both the Montana Code Annotated and the Official Code of the City of…