Montana Highlights

Jodie Cross has purchased the Montana Trolley Company, in Kalispell, from Scott Davie. The business will be mostly run by Cross’ daughters Tamina and Kaylee. The business has been operating in the Flathead Valley for 13 years.

The U.S. Department of Commerce has announced that Montana State University will be home to a newly established Community Engagement Office for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The office will support workforce development in the state and region, especially in the advanced manufacturing and computing sectors. The office will provide inventors and entrepreneurs a direct connection to federal intellectual property resources and guidance tailored to Montana’s technology ecosystem. 

A panel of Montana state medical board members has voted unanimously to revoke the medical license of Dr. Thomas Weiner. Weiner was a the former Helena cancer doctor who has been accused of prescribing unnecessary treatments and harming patients.  The ruling prohibited him from practicing medicine in Montana ever again.

Intermountain Health Holy Rosary Hospital in Miles City has been recognized as high performing among the Best Hospitals for Maternity Care in America, The rankings were compiled by U.S. News & World Report in its annual rankings.

A logging and fuels reduction project near the mouth of Rock Creek has been approved by the Lolo National Forest. The  project has the stated goal of reducing wildfire risk in a high-priority area along the Clark Fork River.

Glacier Park hosted 2.95 million visitors between January and September of this year. Officials said they expect the final total to be around the park’s record high. The current record, which was set in 2017, is 3.3 million annual visitors. Driving the surge in visitation is a shift toward more shoulder-season recreationalists. May visitation has increased 26% since 2021, and visitation during September and October has also been on the rise. Next summer, visitors will likely be able to enter the park at any time without securing a vehicle reservation beforehand. The shift is part of a program that officials said are intended to address two of the park’s most persistent issues: overcrowding at Logan Pass and an ineffective shuttle system. They also plan to enforce a three-hour parking limit on all personal vehicles at Logan Pass.

All of the financial and physical assets of the Dawson County Economic Development Council were divided among seven local organizations after i...

The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) is urging its members to support the Card Competition Act, which has been re-introduced in the US Congress.

NFIB, the largest business organization in the nation, explained in a recent report, small business owners have been concerned about excessive credit card processing fees for years but have had no recourse.

Credit card costs ha...

Investigation by Montana State Auditor and Commissioner of Insurance James Brown, and other state and federal agencies, have halted a fraudulent scheme of more than $50 million from an insurance company and the Affordable Care Act (ACA often called Obama Care).

The out-of-state fraudsters targeted vulnerable Native Americans in Montana, explained Brown. They sent recruiters to Montana reser...

By Diogo Costa

President, Foundation for Economic Education

At Davos, Javier Milei declared Machiavelli dead.

The Argentine president’s speech was an extended argument against what he called a “false dilemma”: the idea that when designing public policy, one must choose between efficiency and justice, between what works and what is right. Milei insisted that free enterprise capitalism ...

The Montana Women’s Run is celebrating 45 years in 2026. Last week, the organization unveiled their t-shirt design which is always eagerly anticipated each year by thousands of women. This year’s design was created by Jim Hein, who over the past 26 years has created 22 of the official t-shirt designs. T-shirt deadline this year is April 20. The Montana Women’s Run will feature a 2-mile race an...

Jodie Cross has purchased the Montana Trolley Company, in Kalispell, from Scott Davie. The business will be mostly run by Cross’ daughters Tamina and Kaylee. The business has been operating in the Flathead Valley for 13 years.

The U.S. Department of Commerce has announced that Montana State University will be home to a newly established Community Engagement Office for the U.S. Patent and Tr...

Stockman Bank Gets 5-Star Rating – Again

Stockman Bank is starting 2026 with another 5-Star Superior rating from BauerFinancial, the Nation’s Premier Bank Rating Firm. A 5-Star Superior rating indicates that Stockman Bank is one of the strongest banks in the nation, excelling in areas of capital, loan quality, stability and more. Th...