Happy Thursday! Here are the topics for today’s column:
- Great Falls City Commission
- Elon Musk Speaks
- USNS Harvey Milk
- One More Thing
GREAT FALLS CITY COMMISSION:
Tuesday evening, the Great Falls City Commission voted 5-0 to raise our residential and commercial water, sewer, and storm drain utility service by 27%. (Source)
Yes, 27%. I watched the event online.
I am frustrated with the commission’s habit of raising fees and rates, which seems to be happening almost every month. The commission is not listening – we are hit with increased taxes, utility bills, fees, rates, etc. It’s too much. The commissioners are siding with the department heads and city staff and against the citizens of Great Falls.
Of course, we had the speeches from the commissioners trying to make their vote to stick us with a 27% increase make sense. The reasoning was pitiful.
My bottom line is that Commissioner Joe McKenney and Mayor Cory Reeves are up for reelection this year. They will not receive my vote. I hope you vote to send them packing, too.
ELON MUSK SPEAKS:
Elon Musk has come out against the “Big Beautiful Bill” that President Trump supports and the U.S. House Republicans passed.
Musk posted the following on X:
I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore.
This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination.
Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it.
Later, he posted the following on X:
Call your Senator,
Call your Congressman,
Bankrupting America is NOT ok!
KILL the BILL
Musk also said, “This spending bill contains the largest increase in the debt ceiling in US history! It is the Debt Slavery Bill.”
Soon, I bet we’ll see Trump attacking Musk on social media for these remarks.
USNS HARVEY MILK:
Politico and other sources are reporting that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is set to rename a naval vessel named after gay rights activist Harvey Milk, with several other ships honoring civil rights activists and women also potentially being rechristened.
It was also reported by Politico that the move targeting the ship named after the gay rights icon comes as LGBTQ+ communities kick off Pride Month celebrations across the country. The step furthers Hegseth’s agenda to stomp out DEI initiatives at the Pentagon, which has included removing books from service academies and scrubbing some mentions of women and people of color in the armed services from DOD websites.
I think Hegseth’s plan is a total waste of time and resources.
ONE MORE THING:
If speaking out feels dangerous now, imagine how much worse it will get if we stay silent. (Pinterest)
## END ##
The Western Word 
The GF city staff who prepared the supporting materials for the rate increase engaged in a sleight of hand to estimate the monthly dollar impact of the 27% increase. Their $17.26 per month is based on every household using just a very low winter-like volume of water every single month of the year.
When people start getting their summer bills with summer water usage for lawn watering and so on they will quickly discover this increase is far more than $17.26. Like a lot.
Between the deceptive $17.26 and the way this big increase was kind of sprung on the citizenry with no real discussion beforehand, I suspect there will be some real unhappy campers when they realize the actual magnitude of this. Especially when they also see their new Northwestern bills.
Commissioner Wolff is outta there but the other four better not have high hopes for the passage of any new public safety levy anytime soon.
I am already seeing many homes and apartment buildings not watering their lawns. When these new rates go into effect next month we’ll probably see more. -JmB
Maybe we should organize a lawn watering boycott. “Turn the Town Brown!” and ugly it up to scare off all the potential newcomers that Cory et al think we should subsidize. And in the process beat the commissioners (and city manager) out of the big windfall they think they just put over on us with the dishonest estimates of monthly costs.
That may happen!