The Whitehall Ledger - Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana

Hi Folks, I want to talk a little about COVID. During our first round of COVID-19 those with underlying conditions and the elderly were the populations most at risk from COVID. When younger, healthy people caught COVID their symptoms were fairly...

Hi Folks, The COVID 19 crisis can make everything else, including the Census, seem less important. But completing your Census form only takes 10 minutes and will benefit and influence our community for the next ten years. Census counts are used to...

Hi Folks We didn't have a regular meeting last week. I hope everyone had a very great Thanksgiving. Carole and I were able to go help with the free dinner at the Stageline Pizza on Thanksgiving Day. Event Coordinator, Bruce Binkowski and his wife Chr...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week, we heard the quarterly Tax Increment Board update from Tom Harrington. Both of our Increment Districts are doing well. The one in the North County is almost sold out. This past year has seen a great amount...

Hi Folks, I was in Butte at a training about Tax Increment Financing Districts, Targeted Economic Development Districts, and Urban Renewal Districts last Tuesday at the same time as our regular meeting. The information was great. Some of the types...

Hi Folks, I didn’t make it to our regular meeting last week, but Bob and Cory only dealt with a couple of items on the agenda. They canceled the taxes on a few mobile homes that are no longer functional and where we would have no opportunity to...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week, we started at 9:30 reviewing the claims. That process consists of each of us looking at each claim that is submitted that week and initialing it. Most of the time the claims are pretty routine and straight...

Hi Folks, At last week’s regular meeting we gave final Plat approval for the Ridge Minor Subdivision near Clancy and approved Resolution 37-2017 which created The Ridge Rural Maintenance District. We also had a lengthy discussion with a couple of...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week we were finally able to get all of the various levies in from the Towns and Schools so we could approve Resolution 32-2017, Fixing Tax Levies for FY 17-18. We also approved Resolution 33-2017, Declaring...

Hi Folks, Interesting change of weather this past week. There wasn’t much easing into the change. It went from the 90’s to the 40’s in about three days. This should go a long way toward ending our fire season for this year, especially since we...

Hi Folks, I hope everyone had a great Labor Day. At our regular meeting last week we held a series of four Public Hearings. The first Hearing was for the use of Title III funds that we have received over several years from Secure Rural School’s...

Hi Folks, At our meeting on the 22nd, someone said we had been pretty fortunate in Jefferson County that we hadn’t had any big fires since they were all around us and it was so dry. Thursday we got hit twice. The first fire reported was in the...

Hi Folks, At last week’s regular meeting, we signed a contract with the First Boulder Valley Bank for them to provide banking services to the County. We approved Resolution 25-2017 which provides for a loan of about $300,000 from the Metal Mines...

Hi Folks, We didn’t have our regular meeting last week, but we did end up having two Special Meetings. One of the meetings was to approve Resolution 24-2017 which puts all of Jefferson County’s private lands under Stage One Fire Restrictions. The...

Hi Folks, At our last meeting on July 25th we discussed some of the fees the Fair Board charges the Rodeo Club for events at the Fair Grounds. We appointed Commissioner Kirsch to represent the County on the Boulder Development Fund Board. We...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week we heard a quarterly report from Tom Harrington about our Tax Increment Finance Districts (TIFD). The North TIFD has seen a huge amount of growth so far this year. There have been several buildings...

Hi Folks, At last week’s regular meeting, we approved a Large Group Function Permit for Rockin’ the Rivers, contingent on the Sanitarian giving her final approval. We decided to purchase a building on Main Street in Boulder that is owned by Goldf...

We didn’t have a regular meeting last week. Tuesday evening we held a Public meeting to talk about the proposed rest area at the Boulder interchange. We have some interest in establishing a Targeted Economic Development District (TEDD) West of the...

Hi Folks, I missed last week’s meeting so I could attend the National Association of Community Development Extension Professionals Conference in Big Sky. Community Development Extension Agents from around the country attended. Micky Zurcher, Tom...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week we tabled a Public Hearing and Resolution for a Budget Amendment and transfer of funds for the Museum in Clancy. We held a conference call with Ken Brown, the Executive Director of the Western Counties...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week, we granted a road variance for the R.D. Marks Subdivision at Clancy and removed the requirement for dedicated park land at the Alhambra RV Park. We opened two bids for the Jail meal contract. We approved...

Hi Folks, We didn’t have our regular afternoon meeting on Tuesday last week. We did meet with the Road Supervisor and as the Solid Waste Board. We had been talking about holding several Public meetings early this summer to talk about the...

Hi Folks, We held last week’s meeting at Bordon’s in Whitehall. We approved the Pre-Disaster Mitigation Plan for Jefferson County. DES Coordinator, Doug Dodge has done a lot of work on this and has involved folks from all over the County. We held...

Hi Folks, At our regular meeting last week Boyd Andrews Community Services CEO, Amy Tenney and Elkhorn Treatment Center Director Dan Krause gave a presentation about their programs in Jefferson County. Owen Voigt talked with us about some mine...

Hi Folks, We’ve had a few issues discussed at our regular meetings over the past couple of weeks. On April 25th we held a discussion about a locked gate on Rocky Road South of Boulder. We have had several requests to look at getting the road open...