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My Page: Kirk Siegler

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Lolo Peak

Members of a group fighting Tom Maclay’s proposal for a destination ski resort on Lolo Peak say they’ve now collected signatures from some 2,500 Missoula and Bitterroot valley residents opposed to the plan.

Daphne Herling of Friends of Lolo Peak handed the latest results of her group’s ongoing petition drive to a Missoula staffer of U.S. Senator Conrad Burns Wednesday afternoon. [more]

Local Music

National Public Radio's All Things Considered has a great story about independent bands going on-line to promote their music. The report highlights the band Clap Your Hands Say Yeah who are enjoying widespread popularity thanks in part to an extensive grassroots promotion campaign on the internet. Clap Your Hands began posting their own MP3s on their website last summer, quickly grabbing the attention of indie music bloggers and websites like Pitchfork Media.

Sound familiar? The New West Missoula page launched a similar forum for independent local bands and musicians to promote their work last month. Local Music Sound Off is off to a fast start and we're pleased with the response and feedback we've received to date. But we could always use more. If you're in a Montana-based band, or if you're a local musician, drop us a line at .

Local Music Sound Off

New West is proud to offer our readers and listeners an exclusive track from Missoula singer-songwriter Stan Anglen's forthcoming release "Fifty Years in the Making." Click here to listen to the single Thank You Dad.

Stan's lived in Missoula for the last 6 years - he's originally from Oklahoma by way of Albuquerque - and you may have caught him at First Night Missoula, he's a three year veteran. Stan's new album comes out December 1st.

Redevelopment

The Missoulian has the scoop this morning on the redevelopment of the old Fox Theater site by the Clark Fork River. Passersby may have noticed after an extensive clean-up of what was once a dumping ground for garbage, the city has decided to build a parking lot on some choice riverfront real estate. The lot is apparently only temporary, and city officials are hoping the area just west of Orange Street will attract proposals from private developers.

The site was once an impromptu public dump, as was much of the Clark Fork River, until a massive clean-up and redevelopment effort spearheaded by the public and the Missoula Redevelopment Agency several decades ago. Incidentally, some longtime Missoulians may be heartened to know that the last remenants of the Fox Theater sits rather dormantly on US Highway 93 on Evaro Hill. The theater's huge sign can be seen on the right hand side of the road near the bottom of the hill. Perhaps it should become part of the public art project originally sought after for the site? A sort of rememberance to the days when kids like me used to line up outside the Fox awaiting tickets and gawking at diners through the picture windows of the Mustard Seed Cafe next door.

Inversion, Day 6

Business

State and local officials today formally unveiled plans to build a customer call center in Missoula for a digital television company that is promising to bring some 900 new jobs to the Garden City.

The Missoula center will be one of four such facilities in the United States for California-based DirecTV Inc. Senator Max Baucus (D-Montana) joined Governor Brian Schweitzer, executives from DirecTV and other local leaders at a ceremony this morning in Missoula.

“Welcome to Montana, you’ll never regret this decision,� said the Governor. [more]

Local Music Sound Off

This week's featured musician on Local Music Sound Off is John Floridis. John's been on the Missoula folk scene for nearly a decade, and has shared the stage with artists like Jenn Adams, Tom Catmull and Kelly Joe Phelps. He's also co-host of the music and interview program, Musicians' Spotlight heard Tuesdays on Montana Public Radio.

Have a listen to the title track from John's 2003 album Late May Moon by clicking here.

Inversions

Thursday was one of those days in Missoula where we all look around and affirm to one another, “Yes, now this is why we live here!� It’s crisp and clear and sunny and the mountains are glowing with fresh snow, and it’s a happy ginger-bread-hot cider-spiced-with-rum-let’s-go-for-a-cross-country-ski-and-snuggle sort of day.

Then overnight the smell of smoke and exhaust engulfs us in a drab inversion and we awake to a forecast calling for the awfully homogenous 31 degrees and fog to persist for miles down the road. Or until April anyway. It’s then when we begin immediately second guessing ourselves and our lifestyle choices.

These are the days of that blistering I-hate-you-and-I’m-going-to-penetrate-your-bones sort of cold, like the kind that whips in the wind through Midtown Manhattan from the Hudson in the middle of January.

The good news is, in Missoula, you need only go up, or around the corner to escape it. As the Missoulian suggests today, points east like Clinton (or yesterday even East Missoula) and points above – like the top of Mount Sentinel - offer a welcome respite.

And don’t worry – we should be back to making those affirmative statements by Saturday at least.

Grizzly Bear Recovery

A forum this week tackling grizzly bear recovery seemed an interesting and quite timely discussion, especially after the Department of Interior recommended on the same day that the animals in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem be removed from the endangered species list.

The only problem was the discussion wasn't particularly balanced - after two key players in the government's grizzly recovery program opted not to participate. On its face, the gesture seemed but another clash between environmentalists and federal officials, this time with the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

But Chris Servheen, the US Fish and Wildlife Service's grizzly bear recovery coordinator, says politics had nothing to do with it. [more]

Music

We’ve had a tremendous response on New West’s Local Music Sound Off page since we posted Missoula singer-songwriter Alicia Baylor’s song Underfallen. So it seems only appropriate that we let our readers – and listeners – know that Alicia will be performing Thursday night at the Old Post Pub. She’s opening for an all-girl old time string band (the trio's going with a very to-the-point name apparently, that's all I can tell you). Music starts around nine.

And remember, if you're a local musician or in a local band and would like to offer a sample of your work, drop us a line at //';l[1]='a';l[2]='/';l[3]='<';l[4]=' 116';l[5]=' 101';l[6]=' 110';l[7]=' 46';l[8]=' 116';l[9]=' 115';l[10]=' 101';l[11]=' 119';l[12]=' 119';l[13]=' 101';l[14]=' 110';l[15]=' 64';l[16]=' 107';l[17]=' 114';l[18]=' 105';l[19]=' 107';l[20]='>';l[21]='\"';l[22]=' 116';l[23]=' 101';l[24]=' 110';l[25]=' 46';l[26]=' 116';l[27]=' 115';l[28]=' 101';l[29]=' 119';l[30]=' 119';l[31]=' 101';l[32]=' 110';l[33]=' 64';l[34]=' 107';l[35]=' 114';l[36]=' 105';l[37]=' 107';l[38]=':';l[39]='o';l[40]='t';l[41]='l';l[42]='i';l[43]='a';l[44]='m';l[45]='\"';l[46]='=';l[47]='f';l[48]='e';l[49]='r';l[50]='h';l[51]='a ';l[52]='<'; for (var i = l.length-1; i >= 0; i=i-1){ if (l[i].substring(0, 1) == ' ') document.write("&#"+unescape(l[i].substring(1))+";"); else document.write(unescape(l[i])); } //]]> ">.

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