With an end of summertime quickly approaching, it’s been a busy farm week of harvesting crops like potatoes and onions. It’s heavy work, the kind that signals an end to our northern growing season.
Regardless of farm work, we’ve made time to attend multiple events throughout the Flathead, like curling at the Whitefish ice rink with other local novices. I laughed when they called us experienced, we’ve been twice. What an amazing facility locals built, with such friendly staff. Whitefish has great public amenities. No doubt about it.
We enjoyed a sunny outdoor dinner in Columbia Falls with a hundred local farmers and friends, hosted by the Whitefish Lions Club. The club grows food which is donated to local school kids. Big Sky City Lights played powerful, riveting music and Forage catered the tasty local foods. Thank you.
I spoke to a live podcast at the Montana Tap House about how expensive living got in Montana over the past few years for local working people. Everything like state taxes, home and health insurance, and housing is priced through the bloody roof and ignored by the billionaire politicians of Helena.
Last week it was reported that locals suddenly need to earn more than $130,000 per year to afford an average monthly home mortgage in Montana. The state’s median household income is less than $68,000. What state lawmakers did over the past few years in Helena is not working.
Hopefully, the next Legislature musters enough courage to overturn Gov. Greg Gianforte’s outrageous ban on worker housing ordinances in places like Whitefish and Bozeman, which assured affordability to locals when big development muscled into small towns seeking to build more million-dollar condos for Yellowstoners migrating to Montana.
I attended a political event south of town for several state candidates, surprised by the number of locals coming to hear inspirational messages of a better future. I, like most locals, tire of the constant negativity spewing from the mouths of leaders. It was good to hear a way forward, united by common values of community.
Alexis McGill Johnson, the president of Planned Parenthood, recently told local voters on the other side of our big state that, “the path to freedom runs right through Montana.”
As Sen. Jon Tester took the stage, he told the energized crowd that the Supreme Court overturning Roe and stealing the right to access an abortion, was the “biggest reduction of freedom in my lifetime and yours too.”
“If there’s one thing that makes you a Montanan, it’s your love of freedom,” Tester said, “You don’t want a politician or bureaucrat or judge telling you, especially if you’re a woman, what health care decision you’re going to make.”
I reminded myself that I really liked how organic grain grower Jon Tester always seems to aspire to the future. His politics like Montana’s southern rail line is forward looking. Tester fights for your right to live, work and retire in Montana.
The Montana electorate changed during the great migration years and it seems like the youth vote might save freedom. The elderly and youth share common values like freedom.
I ended my week by going back to the Tap House in Whitefish to hear former Gov. Brian Schweitzer energize hundreds of locals. Schweitzer was very good to Montana, conserving thousands of acres of public lands around our towns, starting and funding all-day kindergarten, and making living more affordable to working locals and retirees. He listened to people.
Schweitzer said that when the big winds recently hit Seeley, it was neighbors helping neighbors that cleared the back roads and driveways of fallen trees. The values we share in common, he said, are much stronger that our disagreements.
Ryan Busse joined Schweitzer on stage as Doc hosted the live podcast. They inspired and thrilled a packed pub house seeking a less expensive, more united way forward in Montana.
I left the evening armed with the old knowledge that the future involved fighting for the very freedoms we seek to protect in the state constitution like the right to privacy, right to a clean and healthful environment, right to a public education, right to personal dignity. It’s about us. About the vote.
The crowd at the pub liked how Busse and Schweitzer spoke with conviction, heart, knowledge, and humor about the best of Montana. Busse reminds me of a younger Schweitzer with his ability to listen, work hard, and connect with real people. Good ideas, I’m reminded. It’s our time, our place, together and forward looking.
Who we elect as governor in Montana matters a whole bunch more than who we elect as president when it comes to the kitchen table issue facing locals. Working people who’ve lived here a while know how to split up the votes on ballots when it matters most. Lots of independents in Montana.
Locals see it’s time to harvest our gardens, turning the basil into pesto, canning the tomatoes of summer. Fall is here. Oldtimers don’t much care when people moved into town. We seek leaders who put our future and shared values first. We are stronger and better together. There’s room.
We deserve leaders who’ll work to make the future brighter, helping solve the everyday obstacles facing students, retirees and working Montanans. The future is you, filled with opportunity. Go ahead and vote for it.
Mike Jopek formerly served in the Montana Legislature and is now a farmer in Whitefish.