Columns

As principals we strive to ensure our schools are engaging, safe and healthy environments that promote learning. However, youth vaping in Montana is threatening our kids’ health and safety and creating unnecessary barriers to academic success. Montana has a serious problem with youth e-cigarette use. Our most current Montana Youth Risk Behavior Survey data tell us 26% of our high school students currently vape and nearly half (48%) of them have tried vaping. We are encouraged that most Montana youth report they do not vape, but we are very concerned about the health and well-being of the one in four students who do. While youth vaping is a discipline problem that can disrupt lea...

It’s the most wonderful time of the year. Or is it? People enjoy decorating for the holidays, cooking, baking, writing those non-brag family letters and finding the ideal gift for everyone on their list.  Or do they? For some, many even, this is the most wonderful time of the year. Peo...

Mid-morning sunshine poured through the windshield feeling much like a warm hug during a recent weekend trip to the office. I was headed to work on this week’s newspaper pages. And this week’s issue is special. It is our 1000th. The 1000th consecutively published Valley Journal. As I drove in sil...

The United States government has failed catastrophically in its obligation to protect our borders and our citizens. Representative Ryan Zinke is seeking to protect us from the latest move towards national suicide emanating from the Democrats, the Uniparty, and other elitist masterminds seemingly hell-bent on...

As we close out National Native American Heritage Month, I would like to introduce myself and my new role as the Montana Department of Labor & Industry’s (DLI) first Tribal Liaison. My name is Donnie Wetzel, Jr. I come from the Blackfeet Nation on my father’s side and Missoula/Bitterroot as a...

Have you ever thanked God that you never lived Nazi Germany? Well don’t get off your knees just yet; you might still find out what that was like. Donald J. Trump is straight out of fascism’s, central casting: think Hitler (who Trump seeks to emulate and whose speeches he quotes), Bolsonaro (wh...

This holiday season, more Montanans will be navigating the annual open enrollment period for health insurance, seeking quality and affordable health insurance plans for their families. Cover Montana has a team of health insurance navigators who can help Montanans make sense of their options during this cruci...

In the quiet corners of rural Montana, credit unions and community banks offer a unique ability to focus on bringing value to Main Street rather than Wall Street. These institutions have a vested interest in the success of their communities and often serve as economic anchors, supporting local businesses, fa...

Montana is a northern border state with a southern border crisis. After visiting the southern border this fall, my third trip in five years, I can say with certainty that the catastrophe at our southern border is now a serious threat to our national security and the result of the failed policies of President...

For much of my life, I’ve been the inviter. I enjoyed planning and inviting people to those plans. But in the last few years I haven’t invited much of anyone anywhere. I didn’t have the heart for it. I lacked momentum and (to be honest) felt broken so I took on a rather new role. I fo...