Fifteen new candidate filings were submitted to the Montana Secretary of State’s Office this week as the 2022 candidate filing season enters its final 24 days. The deadline to file for office is 5 p.m. on Monday, March 14. This week, two candidates entered the race for Montana’s two Congressional seats — Monica Tranel filed for U.S. House District 1 on Monday, while Penny Ronning entered

An effort to garner lawmaker support for a special session of the Montana Legislature to tackle two hot-button issues missed its stated deadline this week. In an unsigned letter emailed to Gov. Greg Gianforte’s office Friday by Rep. Derek Skees, R-Kalispell, Republican lawmakers involved in the attempt wrote that they were unable to gain majority support for such a session in either the House

The U.S.-Canada border crossing at Coutts, Alberta, reopened Feb. 15 after protesters ended a two-week blockade. The crossing links to Sweet Grass, Mont. The Ambassador Bridge, the busiest commercial crossing between the U.S. and Canada, reopened recently after police removed protesters. Normal operations resumed at the Pacific Highway border crossing in British Columbia Feb. 14, after police

Despite an outstanding performance by Keein Ackerman, Frazer’s boys fell 78-70 against Dodson in loser-out play at the District 3C tournament in Wolf Point on Friday, Feb. 18. Ackerman, a 5-8 senior, accounted for 40 points in the contest. The Bearcubs enjoys a 39-35 half-time advantage as Ackerman scored 22 points in the half. The scoring of Ackerman, Joseph Beston and Blue Fettig

At its Feb. 4 meeting, the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission approved hunting regulations for the 2022 and 2023 hunting seasons with a significant focus on changes to elk hunting opportunities. All final regulations approved at the meeting will go into effect when the new license year begins on March 1. New regulation booklets for moose, sheep, mountain goat, bison, deer, elk and antelope

Montana’s state parks hosted 3.4 million visitors in 2021, a 1.3 percent decrease from record highs set in 2020, according to a recently released report from the state’s Fish Wildlife and Parks Department. According to the report released on Feb. 11, state parks were on track to lapse the 2020 numbers through July but fell off due to smoke, drought conditions and colder temperatures. Still,

Dear Editor: It has come to my attention throughout this year’s basketball season that we may have made a grave error in electing this year’s varsity boys’ basketball coach. I’m sure that there will be a lot of gums a flappin’ about this, but I feel this needs to be addressed. As everyone knows, there is no “I” in team. Yet there seems to be favored individuals which then turns