Bozeman Build #65

Happy June and welcome back to the 65th edition of the Bozeman Build dated June 2nd 2025. Today we cover the May USDA Newsletter, 4 day school week, boater decal no longer needed, supertags, low interest loans for wood product business, extra pollen, boulder busting, rural developments, PETA, spearfishing survey, unannounced utility price hikes, $64M in sewer systems proposed. In Bozeman we discuss Salvation Army breaking ground, fluid dynamics in fire fighting, 12.5% vacancy rate, HRDC 50 years, upping the I-90 speed limit. Around the Northerly region we mention the Northern Lights, ND pipeline failure, coal plant to nickel processing plant, Wyomings nuclear boom, Cheyenne planning a magnesium plant.

Make the most of it!

Daniel

_{When and what is the Bozeman Build? The BB is a 1x/week free email newsletter delivered Monday mornings focused on Montana trade content and business news. We are not a financial or building advisors.}

_{The 65th edition of the build is brought to you by bluecollarfilm.com} 

Montana and Bozeman Trade Pulse

Montana trade pulse

May 2025 USDA Montana Newsletter (USDA)

Abundant Montana — Connecting Montanans with Montana Food & Farms. In 1950, 70% of the food Montanans ate was grown in Montana. By 2004, that number was less than 8%. Today, it is down to 3%.

May 26, 2025 More schools are adopting a 4-day school week. One Montana town tried to fight it. Rural districts consider 4-day school weeks a way to lure teachers, but research shows they might not work for student learning. (Montana Free Press)

May 27 2025 Commerce Awards Small Business Grants to 25 Native-Owned Businesses in Montana (Commerce MT)

May 27 2025 Montana DNRC Hosts Wildland Firefighting Academy in Dillon (DNRC MT)

May 28, 2025 Boaters in Montana no longer need a validation decal from Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks thanks to legislation signed into law by Gov. Greg Gianforte on May 1. (FWP)

May 28, 2025 Hunters have until June 30 to purchase a chance for a SuperTag for the 2025 hunting season. Eight hunters will win a SuperTag (FWP)

May 28, 2025 A law passed during the 2025 legislative session could provide $6 million in low-interest rate loans for an entity that wants to start up a wood products facility. (KBZK)

May 28, 2025 Bridger Aerospace Group Holdings, one of the nation's largest aerial firefighting companies, has agreed to a sale-leaseback with a private equity investor for its headquarters campus in Belgrade, Montana. (Co-Star)

May 29, 2025 Somebody on Reddit is commenting how pine pollen has been excessive this year, others seemed to agree. One explained “we had a wet season, that lead to a nice hot couple weeks, that lead to an extremely dry, windy period. So, everything had lots of hydration, then it got warm enough for it to believe that it was time, then it popped, got dry, and the wind picked up hard. ” (reddit)

May 29 2025 The Agriculture Development Council will meet June 3, 2025, to hear Food and Ag Development Center Network (FADC) presentations and address general updates. Meetings will start at 9:00 a.m. on Tuesday, June 3, 2025. (AGR MT)

May 29 MDT Butte finally took care of the big boulder that fell on the side of I-90 using the Boulder Busting technique where crews put shells into a water filled hole that they drilled into the boulder, then they’ll use a primer to set these shells off and the hydraulic pressure from the blast will hopefully split the boulder. (KBZK)

May 30, 2025 The city of Great Falls held public forums this week to discuss implementing tax-increment funding in its downtown district to fund housing projects in the area. (KRTV)

May 30, 2025 It’s been a long time coming for Shay and Katie Richter of Fort Benton, but it’s finally here - the ‘Little Sage’ subdivision, a 24-acre property with 23 lots, finally has homes being built. Katie emphasized that the purpose of this development is not to reel in any "outsiders," but rather an opportunity for locals and area residents to find a home that better fits their needs and give Fort Benton alumni the opportunity to return to their roots. (KRTV)

May 30, 2025 Huge crowd turns out at Smoked BBQ to defy PETA in Great Falls, the PETA tour also stopped in Kalispell and Billings during its “Hell on Wheels” tour (KRTV)

May 30, 2025 FWP launches survey to study new spearfishing opportunity in Western Fishing District (FWP)

May 30, 2025 Governor Greg Gianforte recently signed Senate Bill 426 into law, marking a major overhaul of Montana’s Uniform Commercial Code. This 134-page bill was enacted in large part thanks to the efforts of Professor Jonathon S. Byington at the University of Montana's Alexander Blewett III School of Law. (UMT News)

May 30, 2025 NorthWestern Energy makes a rate hike without telling PSC or customers, Hessler and Ross are two of the approximately 400,000 electric customers in Montana who will see an increase of 17 percent increase that works out to, average about $17 more on their monthly bill. (KXLF)

June 1, 2025 - Zinke proposes $64 million for sewer systems, other western Montana infrastructure projects (News Journal)

MDT News

MDT News released last week

• Kootenai River Bridge to receive repairs

• Montana Aeronautics Board Meeting Scheduled for June 3

• Pavement preservation work to begin on Farm to Market Road

• Proposed US 191 rehabilitation near Big Sky (Construction is tentatively planned for 2026 depending on completion of design and availability of funds.)

Bozeman trade pulse

Ascent Auction has a three auctions this month, two are live at the time of this posting.

May 28, 2025 Salvation Army breaks ground on new facility in Bozeman (KULR 8)

May 29, 2025 Montana State University scientists explore how fluid dynamics can help improve aerial firefighting. The work begins on the smallest of scales: examining how fluid dynamics affect the spread of water or retardant once it is dropped from an air tanker onto or in front of a fire. Since 2000, wildfires have burned roughly 340,000 acres annually in Montana, according to the state’s Wildfire Library database, with upwards of $180 million dedicated to fire suppression in 2023 alone. (MSU News)

May 30, 2025 Vacancy rate in Bozeman could rise. Our current vacancy rate is 12.5% within Bozeman city limits, That ultra-low vacancy rate during the pandemic led many developers to break ground on new multifamily projects. But real estate takes time, and those same projects are just now being completed and brought to market. There are still over 3,000 units in the planning pipeline. We would anticipate that a lot of those projects would not be moving forward due to the current vacancy rates (KBZK)

May 30, 2025 HRDC celebrates 50 years of serving Bozeman (Montana Right Now)

May 31 2025 - MDT updated the speed limit from 65 to 75 between 19th Street and Belgrade, please verify before going 75! Someone made a comment mentioning “The lower speed limit increased wrecks significantly. They found much like Missoula that wrecks and road rage increase with these lower speeds. They went as far as stopping and ticketing people lane blocking trying to play traffic cops for road rage.” (Reddit)

June 1 2025 - Bozeman Area Restaurants With Some of the Best Views (94.7 The Moose)

Montana's Largest RV & Boat Show

Was stationed last week May 19 - 29 at the fairgrounds by Bretz RV and Marine, always interesting to see what new toys are hitting the market, id also think it would be a good time to buy used given the amount of covid era purchases. I was chatting with one of the sales guys about the triple axle toy hauler mentioning it weighs 12 tons requiring a full ton truck to tow it around.

Downtown Strip Demo and New Build

A Langlas project, uncertain what the end use will be, interesting to see all the layers of these heritage buildings, it would be even more interesting to see what lays in-between the buildings.

Northern Rockies

Northern Lights were spotted across Northern states Saturday night/Sunday morning.

May 26, 2025 A pipeline failure in northwest North Dakota caused an estimated 73,000 barrels, or nearly 3.1 million gallons, of brine to spill in Williams County, the Department of Environmental Quality reported this week. (Daily Montanan)

May 29, 2025 North Dakota coal mine to become processing site for Minnesota nickel, The processing plant operated by Talon Metals will bring 150 jobs to Beulah, with processing expected to begin in 2028. (Daily Montanan)

May 29, 2025 Even Industry Insiders Find It Hard To Keep Up With Wyoming Nuclear Boom (Cowboy State Daily)

June 01, 2025 Two Cheyenne companies have their sights on building the largest magnesium operation in North America in order to supply the U.S. with the metal of choice for lightweight vehicles and aircraft. China and Russia control over 90% of the global supply of magnesium. (Cowboy State Daily)

Thanks for reading,

Daniel

bozemanbuild.com & blockbiome.com