Responses have been edited for length and clarity.
I know the best spot in my ward for …
Tool repair—at Hellgate Tool Repair.
If loving this is wrong, I don’t want to be right
If loving hunting is wrong, I wouldn’t want to be right.
This year, I really want to achieve …
Getting elected to city council and working on changing our farm up. Politics and farming. Those are my two things.
What I order for the table
Chicken wings.
Never have I ever …
Left the Big Dipper without a chocolate milkshake.
How can we alleviate tax pressure on homeowners and renters?
It’s not something that the city council can do by itself. It needs help from the county and, most importantly, the state. I definitely believe that there’s a lot we can do within the city’s budget to try and lower some of our numbers, but that is going to be kind of a small impact. Without state assistance, we really can’t develop new ideas like the gas tax. I am not in favor of the sales tax.
Change my mind about …
Hunting and fishing and how they are every bit as much a support of conservation of our wildlands as other recreational sports. It doesn’t matter whether it’s hiking, bicycling, even ATV’ing through the woods—they’re all in support of conservation and they all need to work in concert together. We’ve got to really work against the forces that are trying to divide us on issues such as this.
I wind down by …
Listening to music. Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of Nina Simone and older country like Hank Williams.
What’s a specific approach or policy that a community elsewhere in the country has employed to reduce homelessness that you think might also work in Missoula?
Identifying smaller locations where we can take the homeless community more as a reflection of where people are at in homelessness, because not everybody is living on the streets with severe addiction and mental health problems. We need more smaller shelters that help identify what the needs of a homeless person are, and then we can channel them towards that option. That also helps spread out the burden onto the city at large, rather than putting it in one or two neighborhoods.
I geek out on …
“Star Wars” and farming.
My best dad joke
My kids will say, “Dad, I’m hungry.” And I’ll respond and say, “Nice to meet you. I’m Friday.”
Three infrastructure priorities?
Streets, sidewalks and trails, and snow removal.
My cry in the car song
Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car.”
That fire levy though …
I fought fire in multiple capacities in my younger years in the military. And I also volunteered with structure fire. So, the fire levy has my full support. I absolutely see the need for it and I understand the budget restrictions that we’re under. And that is our best option currently to fund such a thing. Without federal and state help, the burden goes on the local community. And I just don’t feel like we can ignore that burden.
Unusual skills
Grafting tomatoes. Arborism.
Together, we could …
Tackle the issues of today.
