MATR Newsletter – November 7, 2022
The state with the best education wins!

Come Home Montana

• ‘Ocean to Table’ Seafood Company Lands at Flathead Valley’s Shores

  Molly and Steve Box of Worthy Seafoods are returning to their Montana roots – and bringing freshly caught Alaskan halibut with them

• Find the Best Places in Downtown Great Falls, Montana

  Easily locate the local businesses that make Great Falls Great.

Montana Department of Commerce

• Montana Department of Commerce seeks to match flood-impacted families with housing

  According to data from FEMA, more than 300 families say their homes still need repairs before they can move back in.

• ‘Last Best Pace” – Montana C-PACE Financing C-PACE financing is now available to Montana businesses!

  Across the nation, C-PACE financing (Commercial Property Assessed Capital Enhancement) is making energy efficiency upgrades and renewable energy investments more attainable to commercial building owners. C-PACE is a fit for most industries including farms, commercial office buildings, nonprofit organizations (including places of worship), and multi-tenant buildings.  Common investments include solar panels, HVAC systems, lighting, motors, and more.

• Made in Montana Monthly November 2022. If it’s produced in Montana, it’s produced with pride

  Join Made in Montana’s Members Only Group

Big Sky Commerce

• Opening of Missoula’s Chick-fil-A prompts traffic concerns for North Reserve Street – Please Join A Walking Audit to Missoula’s Chick-fil-A on Reserve Street – 11/22 – Big Sky Commerce

  If you have been to a Chick-Fil-A restaurant, you know the lines are long and the Missoula location will probably be no different.

Big Sky Economic Development

• Edge of the Plains – The Documentary

  This documentary is a rare glimpse into the inspiring stories of entrepreneurs throughout central and southeast Montana who turned their pipe dreams into a reality. Audience members will experience an inside look into the unique processes each company uses to create and manufacture the products they sell.

City of Bozeman Economic Development

• “Make Cents for Montana” Sales tax, housing, road safety among Bozeman’s priorities for 2023 Montana Legislature

  Calling it “Make Cents for Montana,” the city’s document outlining its legislative priorities includes support for giving municipalities the option to implement a sales tax on items targeted to tourist spending, like outdoor guiding services, alcohol, hotel bookings and restaurant meals.

Great Falls Development Authority

• Latest Videos from Grow Great Falls Montana

  Videos from the Great Fall Development Authority, Inc. (GFDA), a regional public/private EDO which focuses its efforts on the 13-county Great Falls Montana trade area, also known as Montana’s Golden Triangle. Our region includes the Great Falls Montana MSA (Cascade County) and a vast rural/tribal region that extends over 44,000 square miles

Montana Business

• Does your brand have a great story behind it? If so, tell it. – Montana’s ‘Tell Us Something’

  Everything—faith, science, love—needs a story for people to find it plausible. No story, no sale.”

• MSU to host panel discussion with indigenous entrepreneurs- Nov. 10 – Museum of the Rockies

  “Entrepreneurship in Montana: A Native Perspective” will include panelists John Pepion, Brocade Stops Black Eagle, Cedar Bulltail and Stefanie Kujaczynski. The event is hosted by MSU’s chapter of the American Indigenous Business Leaders, a national student group dedicated to engaging business students in hands-on business experiences beyond the classroom.

• Big Sandy Organics (“Kracklin’ Kamut” roasted wheat snacks) scores big at this year’s Trailmix competition presented by Albertsons during Boise Entrepreneur Week.

  The company, known for its popular “Kracklin’ Kamut” roasted wheat snacks, earned $50,000 along with shelf space at the Albertsons’ Broadway Avenue Store in Boise, Idaho.

• Spy High Mounts: a Montana company changing the way we use trail cameras – Mount them High.

  The typical trail camera can only be hung as high as one’s arms can reach, leaving them susceptible to tampering whether it be by a person or animal, but Spy High Mounts from Montana is trying to change that.

• Montana Business Assistance Connection – Remote Worker Skill Training with introduction and education that makes the client competent and available for current job openings.

  MBAC in collaboration with MSU-Extension, Job Service, Career Training Institute and
  consultant Trepademics, purchase 20 training slots for regional residents to participate with
  Teleworks USA in training and interviews to be remote workers.

• Plains to Porch – Local goods from the prairie to your plate.

  Plains to Porch is a quarterly subscription box offering a taste of Montana’s wide-open spaces and rolling plains. It supports our ranchers and farmers.

  It’s a local farmers market delivered to your doorstep.

• We want to find Montana’s top workplaces

  Any organization with 35 or more employees in Montana is eligible to compete for 2023 Top Workplaces recognition. The program identifies the best employers in the state as determined by the people who know best: the employees. It’s an ideal way for employers to stand out in the job market, and it’s a way to make sure employers and employees are on the same page.

• Smart Cities from Emerging Technology – How many is your community considering?

  We’ve written 10 stories that explore how cities and companies think tech fits into the vibrant, complex, and human world of urban life.

Montana Governor Greg Gianforte

• Montana Governor Greg Gianforte announces proposed change to child care policy to allow childcare facilities to accept religious vaccine exemptions to any vaccine.

  Currently, childcare participants are required to receive scheduled doses of vaccines against measles, rubella, mumps, poliomyelitis, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, varicella, hepatitis B, pneumococcal, and the bacteria Haemophilus influenza type B, or Hib.

  The health department rules currently permit religious exemptions only for Hib, the infectious bacteria

Montana Economic Development

• American Prairie establishes national discovery center in the heart of Lewistown, Montana despite pushback

  American Prairie is an organization that sees Montana’s future tied to two unchanging truths: Folks will come from all over to see the big skies and wide open prairies. And without efforts to conserve the land, the entire state may be in trouble.

• Ekalaka Public Schools starts a daycare in the school system to support their employees.

  It is not easy to recruit and retain employees in Ekalaka and with that,
  Ekalaka Public Schools chose to make every effort possible to keep who we do have
  employed and be able to recruit new employees.

Housing

• A Montana Ranch Spanning 320 Acres Asks $13.95 Million – That’s only $43,593.75 an acre…

  The property, called Windcall Ranch just 14 miles from Bozeman, was purchased in 1986 by the late philanthropists Albert and Susan Wells for about $600,000, according to their daughter, Kristen Wells.

• The Housing Market Is Worse Than You Think

  There was a pandemic, followed by inflation, followed by rising interest rates: That’s it; the end. But zoom out and a more accurate picture comes into focus. The 21st century has been a tango between vertiginous swings in demand and corresponding swoons in construction, which has left us with a historically unusual shortage of available housing.

• A climate reckoning for US housing: Too many homes in harm’s way, ‘too many zeros’ in the costs

  With climate change bearing down, how much longer can the system hold?

MEDA -Montana Economic Developers Association

• Welcome to G.R.O.W. Glendive Recycles Our Waste (GROW)

  Glendive Recycles Our Waste (GROW) is a non-profit. Run by a group of volunteers, we are working to extend the life of our landfill by recycling cardboard and plastic. We also educate our neighbors about recycling.

Incubators and R&D

• Announcing the C2M Beta Fall 2022 Showcase Event – 12/13 – Online

  Join us for Fall 2022 C2M Beta Showcase Event. All are Invited

Regional Economic Development

• Cities Turn to Transit Improvements to Shape Their Future

  Transit must be part of a larger narrative for what cities can be, according to experts who gathered at the American Public Transit Association TRANSform Conference last month.

21st Century Education Initiative – “You Should Care…”

• In one state, every class teaches climate change — even P.E. – Will your state be the second to do this?

  The first state in the country to adopt learning standards obligating teachers to instruct kids about climate change across grade levels and subjects. The standards, which went into effect this fall, introduce students as young as kindergartners to the subject, not just in science class but in the arts, world languages, social studies and physical education. Supporters say the instruction is necessary to prepare younger generations for a world — and labor market — increasingly reshaped by climate change.

• Applications are open for the $125,000 Youth Serve Montana Scholarships in 2023

  This year’s scholarship is being offered to high school students in two awards, $1,000 for 50 hours of volunteer service and $1,500 for 100 hours of volunteer service. The scholarships will be offered to 100 Montana seniors attending Montana Campus Compact member institutions next fall.

• Big Sky School District launches its first early kindergarten program, hopes to expand

  “One of the pinch points for our community is access to child care and effective preparation for kids as they enter the school environment,” said Brittany Shirley, principal of Ophir Elementary School.

Government News & Events

• Missoula’s commuter cyclists eye implementation of pathway expansion plan

  In an effort to mitigate risks to cyclists and pedestrians, Missoula County has been developing a Pathways and Trails Master Plan. The plan outlines and prioritizes the expansion of paved shared-use pathways, to enable safe, sustainable alternative transportation for local residents.

American Prairie

• Live Animal Event at American Prairie’s National Discover Center – 11/12 – Lewistown, Montana

  American Prairie is pleased to announce an upcoming event in partnership with ZooMontana at the National Discovery Center in Lewistown. On Saturday, November 12 from 10am to 2pm, educational staff from ZooMontana in Billings will be bringing a number of live animals to Lewistown as part of the National Discovery Center’s ongoing program, “ECO-Critters.”

  This is the third time ZooMontana and American Prairie have teamed up for “ECO-Critters. Animals visiting on November 12 include a plains hognose snake named Wilbur, an eastern screech owl named Scout, and some Vietnamese walking sticks.

Tell Us Something

• ‘Tell Us Something’ It’s the Little Things – 12/15 – Missoula

  Eight storytellers will share their true personal story without notes on the theme “It’s the Little Things.

Careers

• Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds

  New discoveries about the human mind show the limitations of reason.

South Dakota News & Events

• South Dakota Cures The Renewable Energy Blues

  South Dakota’s renewable energy resources are quickly expanding beyond hydropower, with wind as frontrunner and solar bringing up the rear.

Miscellaneous Ramblings

• Ancient Tree Rings Reveal ‘Unimaginable’ Two-Year Solar Storms That Could Destroy Global Infrastructure

  What is a “Miyake Event?”

Transportation

• New biopolymer gives asphalt roads a soybean-based-boost

  It’s being offered in several variants, including one for use in virgin asphalt, one that allows a greater amount of recycled asphalt to be used in roads, and one that helps rejuvenate asphalt shingles.

Energy and Climate Change

• Rewiring America Wants To Educate Consumers About The Energy Benefits of Electricity Available In The Inflation Reduction Act

  Rewiring America estimates that the average household qualifies for $10,600 in IRA benefits to electrify their lives. The problem is that most families don’t know about them.

• European Union Cutting €11 Billion In Gas Costs Via Record Growth In Wind & Solar

  Since Russia invaded Ukraine earlier this year, 25% of Europe’s electricity has been generated by solar and wind.

• The UN Climate Talks Are About to Face Maddening Uncertainties

  At next week’s COP27 conference, negotiators need to get serious about massively reducing emissions—and fast.

VR/AR, Blockchain, Bitcoin, Artificial Intelligence and The Internet of Things

• The rise of the machines: What your data is being used for

  Google has been fined for collecting data from children without their parent’s consent. And facial recognition technology is being used by law enforcement and corporations with little regulation or oversight.

Social Media, Connectivity & Communications

• Musk Warns Twitter Will Permanently Ban Impersonators—After He Gets Parodied By Verified Users

  Comedians Kathy Griffin, Sarah Silverman and actress Valerie Bertinelli were among several verified Twitter users who changed their display image and name to match Elon Musk and then mocked the billionaire in a series of tweets impersonating him.

• How to Find Your Twitter Friends on Mastodon

  I don’t need to tell you that Twitter is weird right now. Most of the posts on my timeline feel like the week before graduation, with people sharing their favorite memories on the site and talking about what they’ll do after. Twitter users are flocking to other sites, including the open source and decentralized Mastodon.

• Elon Musk Has Fired Twitter’s ‘Ethical AI’ Team

  As part of a wave of layoffs, the new CEO disbanded a group working to make Twitter’s algorithms more transparent and fair.

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