Social Justice

Social services and pandemic response in Montana

By Alex McKenzie | March 28, 2020

This week’s guests are:

—Rose Hughes, executive director of the Montana Health Care Association, on how long-term-care facilities are balancing safety measures with prolonged isolation

—Stephanie Stratton, chief programs officer of the Montana Food Bank Network, on how increased demand and limited supplies are challenging the food safety net

—Journalist Amanda Eggert on how Montana daycares and community organizations are responding to a disrupted childcare system

—MTFP reporter Eric Dietrich on the state’s budget preparedness for a pandemic

Environment

Fort Peck tribal chairman signals desire to join Keystone XL lawsuit

By Hunter Pauli | August 8, 2018

Fort Peck Indian Reservation tribal chairman Floyd Azure said he plans to urge the tribes’ executive board to join a lawsuit that accuses the federal government of failing to address the threat a foreign-owned oil pipeline poses to the tribes’ drinking water.

Crime and Justice

Lawsuit claims Yellowstone County judge, sheriff’s officer violated civil rights in illegal immigration arrest

By John S. Adams | February 26, 2018

A Yellowstone County man who claims a judge illegally ordered his arrest is now suing that judge, and the officer who arrested him, in federal court. In a lawsuit filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Billings, Miguel Angel Reynaga Hernandez claims former Yellowstone County Justice of the Peace Pedro Hernandez violated his civil rights when he ordered Cpl. Derrek Skinner to arrest him, despite the fact that Reynaga had not committed a crime.

Energy

Mine Cleanup Concerns Spike as Industry Sputters

By John S. Adams | March 15, 2016

Dylan Brown, E&E News
If you want to mine coal in the United States, you have to promise to clean up the mess. But the industry’s dramatic downturn has raised questions about the ability of companies to follow through with that promise and whether taxpayers will be responsible for returning land and water to pre-mining conditions.

Crime and Justice

Isolation Nation: While some U.S. states are reforming solitary confinement laws, in Montana, secluding inmates is still a reality.

By John S. Adams | December 17, 2015

Editor’s note: This report was produced in collaboration with Outlaw Partners and appears in the Winter 2015/2016 edition of Mountain Outlaw magazine. It is republished here with permission from Outlaw Partners.

Otter Creek

Tribes resist proposed coal mine

By John S. Adams | September 26, 2013

OTTER CREEK — Sitting just a few hundred feet from the banks of Otter Creek, on the fertile plains the Northern Cheyenne Indians have called home for thousands of years, Sundance Priest Kenneth Medicine Bull carefully packs tobacco into the bowl of a ceremonial pipe. About a hundred onlookers, many wearing red T-shirts with the words “Save Otter Creek” stamped on them, watch silently as Medicine Bull rhythmically recites a prayer in his native tongue.

Cody Marble

Double standard for perjury in Missoula County?

By John S. Adams | July 18, 2011

Late last year I wrote here about a story that Lee’s Mike Dennison has been following about a Missoula man has fought for nearly a decade to overturn is rape conviction. Cody Marble, 27, was convicted in 2002 of raping a 13-year-old fellow inmate at the Missoula County Juvenile Detention Facility and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Central Montana Labor Council

Cost Cutters wants employees to forfeit right to unionize

By John S. Adams | August 24, 2009

This is from a story I wrote in Sunday’s Tribune. I posted it here because I thought some readers may want to read the full text of the document employees were asked to sign.