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Welcome to “The List” Featuring 10 items that the Butte Local Development Corporation has checked off on our list in the last month.

May 9, 2025/

BLDC Butte
  1. Brennan Hammer, the Director of our Food and Ag Development Center, passed his certification exam after many hours of studying and is now a certified HUD counselor!
  2. Our first Homebuyer Education Class since 2024 is scheduled for May 28-29, 2025. Register Here.
  3. May 13, 2025 – Butte Brewing: Join us for an info session on BLDC’s and Butte’s involvement in the $41 million grant awarded to the Headwaters Tech Hub. Tech Hub Director Tim VanRenken and Operations Manager Courtney McKee will be there to answer questions and provide an overview. RSVP Here.
  4. BLDC assisted Butte-Silver Bow and the Chamber of Commerce with a refresh of the design and logo for the Basecamp Butte website. Be sure to check out the new interactive trails map feature! Visit the website and see the new logo here.
  5. Jay Doyle, Kayla Lappin, Melissa Wanamaker, and Brennan Hammer from our team attended the Montana Economic Developers Association (MEDA) conference in Livingston, Montana, April 22–24.
  6. On April 10, BLDC hosted our Annual Dinner and Awards Ceremony at the Copper King Hotel. We had over 230 attendees, 7 award winners, and a keynote by Jason Yager, head of the Montana Photonics and Quantum Alliance (a Headwaters Tech Hub partner). View our award winner videos here.
  7. Our Small Business Development Center (SBDC) has served 29 small business clients since January—15 of them are new!
  8. Melissa Wanamaker has been diligently advancing our EPA Brownfields Program. Our first loan was completed in April! We still have $495,000 available to lend. Applications are due by June 10, 2025. Interest rates are 1% for nonprofits and 2% for for-profit businesses. Contact Melissa to Apply.
  9. In collaboration with Kristen Rosa at Butte-Silver Bow, Kayla Lappin, our Director of Marketing and Business Recruitment, has submitted 11 Requests for Information (RFIs) to the Montana Department of Commerce since January to support business recruitment in Butte-Silver Bow. Kayla also attended SHOT Show with the Montana Department of Commerce in January and will be representing Butte at SelectUSA in Washington, D.C., May 11–14.
  10. We’ve been working behind the scenes to open up two new positions on our team—job postings go live next week, so keep an eye on our LinkedIn account!


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