Good morning; on the Beacon today, a controversial proposal to gill net lake trout in Flathead Lake has highlighted the distrust and often-cantankerous relationship between some Northwest Montana anglers and government. On Feb. 13 at the MetraPark in Billings, the Flathead Braves won their fifth straight Class AA wrestling tournament and sixth in the past seven years. Flathead County officials have released the name of the 19-year-old Eureka woman, Lakeisha Dawn Thibault, who died in a two-vehicle crash on U.S. Highway 2 north of Kalispell last week. Butte native Bryon Wilson is having a good week after winning a bronze in men’s moguls. Meanwhile, the Revenue Department is facing another lawsuit over property taxes in our weekly index of what’s up, down and in between.
A 26-year-old soldier from Billings, Sgt. Jeremiah Wittman, was killed by a suicide bomber while on patrol in Afghanistan over the weekend. The former president of a Billings branch of Yellowstone Bank, William Guy Paul, has reached an agreement to plead guilty to embezzling $17,000 from the bank. President Barack Obama, defending his economic stimulus plan on its first anniversary, is dispatching his Cabinet across the country to try to calm an anxious public as Democrats head into potentially devastating midterm elections. Livingston city officials say the city spent over $21,000 in federal economic stimulus money to resurface its tennis courts last summer. Sen. Jon Tester visited the Flathead County landfill Monday to see how methane is converted to electricity. Lining U.S. Highway 93 in Hamilton, more than 50 members of the so-called tea party movement used the Monday holiday to vent their frustration with the federal government currently being run by Barack Obama and congressional Democrats. Calling for new tribal leadership and a break from the federal government, founders of the first Crow Indian Tea Party movement rallied Monday in Hardin. The Mexican consulate in Idaho has provided services to about 15,000 people in Boise and Montana during its first year of operation, Consul Ricardo Pineda said. The Montana Guaranteed Student Loan Program is reporting a preliminary default rate of 1 percent in fiscal year 2008 for the early months of student loan repayment. It is the lowest rate the program has ever recorded.