Camera stolen at Lion Lake

To the editor,

Last week I took a friend up to Lion Lake and when I got back to my car I noticed someone had stolen his camera. I'm really disappointed. This used to be a town where you could leave your car running or doors unlocked and no one had a worry. Now, these kids are breaking into vehicles right in front of people and no one seems to care. My step-mother had her window smashed out in front of Glacier Gateway school; luckily the thieves only got lesson plans, bet they were happy!

I am just asking people to please help bring this community back to what it was, teach your kids how to be respectful of others and that stealing is wrong. And if you happen to be reading this and you stole the camera, please return it. You can drop it off at the Nite Owl, no questions asked.

Jay Marquesen

Columbia Falls

Scottish emigration information sought by Livingston woman

To the editor,

My name is Rona Wilkie from the University of Edinburgh, and I am conducting a study into Scottish emigration into Montana between the years of 1870 and 1930. I would be very interested to hear from any of your readers if they are aware of any family or friends who emigrated from Scotland during this time period.

Any amount information would be appreciated from a name to a whole biographical account!

They can contact me at ronawilkie@gmail.com, 701 Northern Lights Road, Livingston, MT or phone at (406) 222-0099.

Rona Wilkie

Livingston

'Change' is here; now what?

We the People" have risen up and ensured that "change" will take place with a new county commissioner to be elected in Flathead County in November 2008, so what do we do now? How can we hold our elected officials accountable for their governance sooner than waiting for their six-year term running its course and voting them out of office?

For starters, what if the new triumvirate of commissioners pretended they were non-partisan independents, forgetting altogether that they belong to any ideological political party? What if they made their independent decisions based on the needs of the community, without regard to pressure from special interest groups but based them on benefiting "We the People"? How can we make that happen?

What if we all agreed that personal, private property rights were sacred, but that they should not violate the "quiet enjoyment" of personal, private property rights of our neighbors? There is nothing liberal or conservative about that position. It is what everyone would like to achieve. Is it not doable? (Sure, but don't put that gravel pit next door to me!! Heh, heh.)

What if we all agreed that the quality of our drinking water and the air we breathe is crucial? What is political about that? It means that we actively prevent water pollution by nutrients that result from storm water runoff, such as phosphates and nitrates, e.g., and by septic/sewer source pollutants, from entering our waterways and drinking water tables. That can be accomplished by sensible, science-based well-depth standards over shallow aquifers, and buffer zones and setbacks from our waterways for building construction, especially those on steep slopes. It means that we treat dusty roads so those people with allergies and asthma do not unnecessarily suffer, but do it in a scientifically, medically safe manner for all people and wildlife. It means that we recognize that dusty roads are also a public safety issue for driving visibility. What is political about that humaneness to our fellow citizens?

What if we declared that a wildlife-urban-interface (WUI) was a special, zoned place whereby people agreed to share it with wildlife and behaved accordingly? And what if we cooperated with federal and state laws that protect wetlands as wildlife sanctuaries? That would remove those areas from conflict between capitalists and environmentalists. It would recognize that wildlife also have property rights. That should be non-partisan. It can be accomplished and still preserve our heritage of public access to wilderness recreation.

What if we thought about planning and zoning not as an imposition on property rights, but rather treated it as a way to direct growth in a way to effectively plan for future, required infrastructure to support that growth while minimizing increases in property taxes? We all want to limit increases in property taxes, don't we? By predicting where growth is going, the necessary property needed for future police stations, fire stations, schools, libraries, et al, can be purchased many years ahead of time at today's property values, rather than at highly inflated future property values. That results in lower taxes. A system of incentives can be developed to ensure no one loses property value due to planning and zoning to control growth patterns.

Many communities in other states have suffered through growth agonies like ours long before us, and we should learn from their experiences. None of those communities could have weathered the storm of rapid growth without the employment of impact fees to cover infrastructure costs. You either charge developers and builders fees to cover the impact their new developments have on the existing community, or you must raise taxes on the current populace! The money has to come from somewhere! Higher home prices resulting from impact fees will merely be passed on to new homeowners moving in from out of state. Better it should come from outsiders moving here from other states, since they come from areas of much higher wages than here and sold their old homes for much higher prices than prices here. It is their cost to live in "The Last Best Place." They can afford it, and they won't even notice it. And, the current homes of locals appreciate in value due to those impact fees raising the prices of new housing. Could you stand higher home values and lower tax increases?

We have to protect the right of heritage to perform legitimate family transfers as was originally intended by law, while monitoring that practice to prevent its abuse by new buyers of land whose intention is to bypass planning board approval in order to avoid subdivision regulations. No one wants the elimination of family transfers, so let's regulate against its abuse. That is bi-partisan. While we are on the topic of regulations, we need to encourage the commissioners to make provisions to maintain law and order in Flathead County as we experience a phenomenal growth rate consisting of people moving here from throughout America with many different cultural backgrounds.

The real estate proverb "highest and best use" of land need not always mean that the value of land must be measured in dollars and cents only. A community might value land most as open space or as a wildlife sanctuary. We should attempt to develop ways to utilize the concept of conservation easements in order to affect compromise that satisfies everyone's needs. It is doable. Also doable is ample consideration of new development housing densities and the impact they have on nearby existing neighborhoods and traffic congestion.

Finally, we cannot remain an apathetic silent majority and leave all lobbying of the commissioners to the special interest group vocal minorities. We each have to participate and exert influence on our county commissioners as to whether we want a system of neighborhood plans to dominate our county planning and zoning philosophy, or allow the county to dictate a common approach for all areas. Once again, it should be a non-partisan decision. There are pros and cons to both approaches and they should be debated in public forums, administered by the commissioners, for final resolution. Are there economies of scale for better planning by having one central plan, or do we prefer the local flavor and character of a consortium of uniquely different plans? Is it possible to incorporate both approaches into one plan? Let's have the debate.

Bill Baum is an independent living in Badrock Canyon.

Smear campaigns, trust and the public good

The election season in Montana is off to a pretty rocky start, at least if civility matters to anyone. First the Montana primary election saw the "conservative" wing of the Republican Party defeat the "socialist" wing in a smear campaign pretty much unprecedented in my experience; then Republican State Representative John Sinrud took a shot at "environmental radicals and their pet politicians", meaning Democrats. At least Sinrud was targeting the political opposition. I don't recall reading of the Democrats eating their own, but just because it didn't make the news doesn't mean it didn't happen.

It's enough to make a person not want to vote, and that's exactly the purpose. The tactic is to turn off people who might vote for the opposition, and make sure that the people who will vote for your candidate show up and vote. As much as the American public decries the mean spiritedness of negative campaigns they work because we let them get the better of us, and either don't vote or vote for the least offensive candidate; and how we can accurately tell who that is is not an easy call given the amount of misinformation and outright lies that are purposefully circulated.

There is no candidate, no matter how pure, who is invulnerable to a smear campaign, to wit; former Sen. Max Cleland of Georgia was defeated in 2002 after an onslaught of accusations by his opponent that he was "soft on national security". Sen. Cleland lost an arm and both legs in Vietnam. How anyone has the gall to call a war hero's patriotism into question is beyond me, but why the public will buy into the misrepresentation is even more mystifying.

I am to the point of voting for the candidate that has gotten the worst of it in a smear campaign.

Although I understand how this kind of stuff works, I don't understand what causes that amount of meanness in those people who mount smear campaigns. The rationale that the end justifies the means just doesn't wash with me. Political history is full of the ghosts of people whose lives — not just their political careers — were ruined by other people's lies and the willingness of the public to believe them. President Lyndon Johnson was very good at keeping politicians in line because they knew he wouldn't hesitate to ruin even a friend's career if it could serve as an example. Sixty years ago, Joe McCarthy, a Democratic senator from Wisconsin ruined the lives of hundreds of Americans by falsely accusing them of having ties to Communism.

Montana State Rep. Bruce Malcolm, whom I have had the pleasure of working with on several occasions, was one of the "Socialist" Republicans who lost his primary. He is first a gentleman, second a statesman, and later on down the line a politician. The last time I saw Bruce I told him that his loss was Montana's loss, and he replied, "It wouldn't have been so bad if they had done it honestly." Malcolm was accused of befriending serial child murderers because in 2003 he had voted to abolish Montana's death penalty. Malcolm's 2007 vote to keep a similar death penalty abolition bill from being debated — essentially a reversal of his 2003 vote — went unmentioned. His real crime was his willingness to vote his conscience.

The negative aspects of smear campaigns go much further than just offending the public sensibility; they give the public a legislature that is dysfunctional. Not every candidate who is the target of a smear campaign loses, and when they take office they are faced with working with some of the very people who were involved in their opponent's campaign. I can tell you from personal experience it is extremely hard to work with someone who has publicly and purposefully made false statements about you, and it is virtually impossible to form a trusting relationship with them.

Trust is the single most important ingredient in forming a working relationship among legislators of different political philosophies and parties. It used to be that majority and minority legislative leaders would meet for a morning coffee or an evening beer to go over the work that was before them. Today there is little mutual cordiality, let alone trust, between legislators in those positions.

If we want a government that serves us well and respectfully, we have to reject the politics of personal attacks and false accusations. It's as simple as that, and it's as difficult as that.

Jim Elliott is a state senator from Trout Creek in his 16th year of legislative service, and is chairman of the Senate Taxation Committee.

Analysis of Plum Creek Land deal

What does this massive 320,000-acre Plum Creek Forestland sale actually mean? It is claimed that the deal between the nation's largest private property owner, The Nature Conservancy (the world's largest land trust), and The Trust for Public Land, will set a precedent, an example for land transfers throughout the country.

A deal it is, but is it ideal? Who are the winners; who are the losers? "Land Grabs" of all types are gaining momentum throughout the country, consuming billions of dollars. Our government is buying out the people's land with our own money. As land is acquired by, supposedly, non-profit governmental agencies, there goes the County tax base. Also that portion of this Plum Creek sale going to the U.S. Forest Service will be subject to the same roadless, no access gate-closures, no timber harvest and "just let it let burn" federal policies that their 193 million acres are experiencing nation-wide.

There went our jobs; our livelihoods. Federal "Secure Schools" funding compensating for lost timber revenues expired this year leaving supposedly "secure" education dangling in forested communities. State School Trust lands provide revenues to communities only when productive: providing resources, industry and jobs. When the U.S. Forest Service absorbs State land, there goes school funding resources. Conservation-easement encumbered land, if saleable, experiences severely reduced taxable value and restricted, limited use potential.

Conservation easements ban mineral, oil and gas extraction on both private and public lands. Non-tax-paying agencies, placing both private and public lands under conservation easements, eventually make this country dependent upon foreign countries for finished goods. Regulations and restrictions, on use of our own natural resources and raw materials, discourage investment in reactivation of our own manufacturing capability.

Is our government setting us up for a "sellout" of land and natural resources to other countries, or are we already collateralized with imminent take-over by foreign countries, our Federal Reserve and/or global financial institutions? We cannot continue to be the world's best, most lucrative market place while continuing the loss of our own capability to produce, provide jobs, incomes and national revenues.

Is this situation evolving through ignorance or through a massive plan fed by greed of a few ruthless benefactors at top levels? I sense that this expansive, complex real estate sale is far more about acquisition of land, wealth and power, than about the highly clouted protection of our environment, wildlife, recreation and enjoyment of the ordinary citizen.

The rest of the story is yet to be revealed, especially if this becomes an established procedure for land transfers to compliment the other assorted agency-driven and legislative programs underway. We simply must protect private property and rights of the property owner, the very foundation of our form of government and its success. This event urgently deserves very serious consideration by our entire Congress, not just one U.S. senator seeking re-election recognition and notoriety.

The land and its natural resources is the source of all wealth, security, comfort and freedom for citizens. Totalitarianism involves property ownership by rulers of the state with control over all aspects of citizen life and productive capacity. The people become serfs on the land while paying all the bills.

Clarice Ryan is a resident of Bigfork.