My Page: Amy Linn

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Opinion: UM President's Departure

George Dennison has been president of the University of Montana since 1990, ruling with what some faculty members call an autocratic touch—and getting an awful lot of things built. During his tenure, the once quaint UM campus has sprouted many new buildings, offered new programs and forged a number of new paths to the future, observers say.

But as news spread today about Dennison’s retirement, there was also a sense of relief among some faculty who think his style of leadership is outdated and give him bad marks for responsiveness, whether it’s in handling the needs of faculty, the community or students. Some locals refer to him as ”King George.”

Monster Trucks

Let’s talk big traffic.

Big, as in a truck pulling a 24-foot-high “module” that is 54 yards long, nearly 10 yards high, and weighs 220 tons—the equivalent of about 40 elephants.

Big, as in rigs so tall they won’t fit under highway overpasses; so wide they take up two traffic lanes; and so ponderous, their top speed is 30 mph.

Big, as in the roads they travel would have to be modified so the modules don’t snap overhead power lines and take out traffic lights.

Which leads to a potentially large problem for Montana—or at the very least a big deal. Because the Montana Department of Transportation (MDT) is considering a proposal that would allow as many as 200 of the jumbo loads to roll down Montana roads and highways—including across Rogers Pass, in winter—during a 12-to-18 month period that could start late this year.

Vaccinate Against A Killer Virus

Three states in the nation don’t require children to get hepatitis B vaccinations before entering day care or school—and Montana is one of them, according to the Associated Press. The oversight puts children at risk, a new study concludes.

Why are hepatitis B vaccinations—typically requiring three shots—so important? Hep B is a silent killer, a liver infection that, if chronic, can lead to liver failure, cancer or permanent scarring. According to the Centers for Disease Control, an estimated 1.2 million people in the U.S. have chronic Hepatitis B and an additional 43,000 people become infected each year. Many people are unwitting carriers, since they often don’t discover they have the disease until symptoms of liver damage appear, sometimes a decade or more after infection.

The good news is that Hepatitis B is entirely preventable, with just a few shots.

Montana Movie Debut

It’s not every day that a made-in-Montana documentary gets exalted by the New York Times, or that filmmakers spend eight years finishing a movie about aging cowboys driving sheep to an alpine summer pasture.

But Sweetgrass, debuting today in New York, manages to win in both categories, portraying the hardships and beauty involved in moving 3,000 sheep into the Absaroka-Beartooth mountains—one last time. Times reviewer Manohla Dargis calls Sweetgrass “the first essential movie of this young year” and describes it as “wonderful,” “astonishingly beautiful,” and “a graceful and often moving meditation on a disappearing way of life.”

Climate Change to Hit Home

A University of Montana study led by acclaimed scientist Steven Running shows that climate change will significantly extend drought periods in the Northern Rockies, stressing forests and inviting more frequent and virulent wildfires.

Running, the author of the study, is a Regents professor of ecology in UM’s College of Forestry and Conservation and a co-winner of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his leading role with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The peer-reviewed study, conducted with the help of other UM forestry researchers, predicts that global warming will have a dramatic impact on regional forests. Rising temperatures could spark an epidemic of insect infestations and cause catastrophic fires in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho, “potentially affecting more than 360,000 people who live in homes in the forest-urban interface that are valued at $21 billion,” according to a UM announcement about the study.

Say Goodbye to Macy's

Macy’s Inc. announced this morning that it will be closing its Missoula store, an economic and historic touchstone for the downtown district. The brick building at the corner of Higgins and Front Street, a landmark for more than a century, will close as part of a corporate “pruning” that includes shutting down four other under-performing stores nationwide, including one in downtown Boise, Idaho.

Preliminary reports say the Missoula store, which has 55 employees, will close in two months. The other closures involve stores in Michigan, Missouri and New Jersey, affecting 307 employees total, Macy’s said.

Environmental Votes Counted

Montana Senators Max Baucus and Jon Tester were given top marks and named “environmental champions” for their voting records on legislation involving major environmental issues, according to an annual Congressional Scorecard released today by Environment Montana. 

Victims' Families in Need

The Missoula Federal Credit Union has set up a “Hellgate Girls Fund” to help the families of four Hellgate High School freshmen who were struck by an allegedly drunken driver Saturday night, leaving two girls dead and the other two hospitalized.

The tax-deductible donations will help the victims’ families pay for funeral and medical expenses.

Donations can be made at any Missoula Federal Credit Union location, including branches on Spruce, Reserve, Russell, Brooks, and Main Streets, and in the University Center on the University of Montana campus.

Drunken Driving Commentary

Turah resident David James DelSignore, 29, was charged this afternoon with two counts of vehicular homicide for allegedly striking and killing two teenage girls with his pickup truck along Highway 200 in Missoula late Saturday night, an incident that left two additional teens injured.

Wearing an orange jumpsuit, looking pale and shaken, DelSignore made his appearance in Missoula County Justice Court via a video feed from the county jail. Speaking on DelSignore’s behalf, attorney Christopher Daly asked Justice of the Peace Karen Orzech for DelSignore to be released from jail on his own recognizance and wear a SCRAM (secure continuous remote alcohol monitor) ankle bracelet, a device that alerts authorities if the person drinks alcohol.

Orzech denied that bid and, in agreement with Chief Deputy County Attorney Kirsten Pabst LaCroix, set bail at $120,000. DelSignore, a Costco employee, faces additional charges of two counts of negligent vehicular assault for injuring the two surviving victims.

Water Pollution in Missoula

In “Toxic Waters,” a fine New York Times series about water safety around the nation, reporter Charles Duhigg found that millions of people across the country are drinking contaminated tap water, and thousands are getting sick as a result.

“More than 20 percent of the nation’s water treatment systems have violated key provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act over the last five years, according to a New York Times analysis of federal data,” Duhigg writes. “That law requires communities to deliver safe tap water to local residents. But since 2004, the water provided to more than 49 million people has contained illegal concentrations of chemicals like arsenic or radioactive substances like uranium, as well as dangerous bacteria often found in sewage.”

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