[news]
WEEK IN REVIEW
VIEWFINDER
by Cathrine L. Walters
Wednesday, February 5 The Montana Supreme Court rules that a GOP-backed referendum to bar Montanans from registering to vote on Election Day can go on the November 2014 ballot. If it passes, the referendum will change the voter registration deadline to the Friday before an election.
Thursday, February 6 The University of Montana and other local schools lock down for more than three hours while an armed man who robbed two East Broadway stores during the early morning runs loose on Missoula’s streets and successfully evades police.
Friday, February 7 Maggie Voison, the 15-year-old Whitefish native who went to Sochi as the country’s youngest Olympian, suffers a leg injury while training for the slopestyle skiing event. She withdraws from competition.
Saturday, February 8 Missoula’s YMCA decks out its gym and books a DJ for its annual Father-Daughter Sweetheart Dance, a semi-formal occasion where “each young lady is treated like a princess.” More than 160 sweethearts attend the event.
Sunday, February 9 Powder hounds hit the slopes, trails and sledding hills as six inches of snow falls throughout the region. Indy staff find plenty of cross-country skiers in Lubrecht Experimental Forest and Pattee Canyon, as well as dozens of families sledding at Chief Charlo Elementary School.
Monday, February 10 Gov. Steve Bullock appoints Angela McLean to be the state’s new lieutenant governor. McLean is a teacher from Anaconda and the former chair of the Board of Regents, which governs the Montana University System.
Tuesday, February 11 Dilbert Markle, 81, slams his car into JoAnn Fabrics and Crafts on Brooks St. after his galoshes get caught beneath his gas pedal. No one is injured in the crash.
Sally Jo Beck, foreground, teaches an aerial yoga class to Madison Unsworth, right, and Patricia Skergan, back left, at the Moksha Aerial Studio Collective on Feb. 10.
Holy Spirit
Church backs same-sex unions On Feb. 6, Missoula’s Holy Spirit Episcopal Church announced that its governing body, with support from the congregation, had approved the blessing of samesex unions. It becomes the largest denomination in Missoula to approve such a rite. Rev. Terri Ann Grotzinger, the church’s rector, says her congregation went through a long process of discussion and discernment before the church’s leadership committee took a vote on the issue. “Not everybody agrees in the Episcopal church on what we should or shouldn’t do on lots of different things. We often have widely differing views in the same congregation,” Grotzinger says. “We listened to those views. … And then the [leadership committee] had to say where they were and why and vote on it.” The leadership group, also known as the vestry, unanimously supported same-sex blessings. “I personally was very awed and impressed by the thoughtfulness and the depth of caring that people expressed in written form and oral form,” says Bob Wattenberg, senior warden of Holy Spirit’s vestry. “People thought about this. … I think the church got it right.”
Along with Holy Spirit in Missoula, Saint James Episcopal Church in Bozeman and Calvary Episcopal Church in Red Lodge have also approved the rite. Holy Spirit joins a growing group of local congregations that affirm committed same-sex relationships. Other churches in the area that recognize same-sex unions include the University Congregational Church, or UCC, and the local Unitarian Universalist congregation. UCC’s Rev. Peter Shober, whose church started performing same-sex blessings in 1993, says that religious communities are moving in the right direction when it comes to gay rights. “It’s like we hit a tipping point a couple years ago and now we have gone from one way of being to a whole different way of being,” he says. “It really has been unbelievably gratifying to see that change occur and it is a great example of how, with social justice issues, there is a long arc and finally you get there.” Jimmy Tobias
Downtown
ACLU says sit ban should go The Montana ACLU warned the Missoula City Council on Feb. 10 that suggestions proposed by Mayor John
Engen to curb downtown loitering and panhandling could still leave the city on shaky legal ground. “It goes beyond this council’s police powers to ban benign acts,” ACLU staff attorney Anna Conley told council during its most recent debate about changes to the city’s anti-solicitation and pedestrian interference ordinances. In December, council voted 7-3 to prohibit sitting, sleeping and lying on a downtown sidewalk between 6 a.m. and 11 p.m., and to prohibit soliciting money in many areas of the city’s urban core. The decision sought to quell concern from business owners who have repeatedly called upon council to curb aggressive and unsavory behavior downtown. Council’s December vote was a relief to shopkeepers, but it disturbed those who felt lawmakers were in effect criminalizing homelessness. Weeks after council cast the vote—one of two required to make the amendments law—a federal judge tilted the debate when he found similar prohibitions passed in Boise violated constitutional free speech protections. The Boise lawsuit prompted Engen to address potential legal pitfalls in Missoula’s ordinances. The mayor unveiled his recommended changes this week. Engen suggested scrapping an existing after-dark
to benefit
B.E.A.R. Outdoor Mentoring Program Friday, February 21st Hamilton Performing Arts Center • 7pm Tickets: Hamilton - Chapter One & Bob Wards Missoula - Rockin Rudy’s $10 advance/$15 at the door/Kids 10 & under $5
www.bearoutdooradventures.com
[6] Missoula Independent • February 13–February 20, 2014