September 20th, 2017
By Robert Franklin, Esq.
parents@nationalparentsorganization.org
In North Dakota, a child’s chances of spending meaningful time with each parent following divorce have less to do with his parents than what county they divorce in.
For example, there’s a whopping 100% difference in joint custody between Grand Forks and Morton counties. Worse, courts are less than one-fourth as likely to order shared parenting as parents are to agree to it.
Those and other worrying facts have come to…
September 13th, 2017
William Prentice, the slickster CEO of Meridian Energy, which wants to build an oil refinery 2 ½ miles from Theodore Roosevelt National Park, blew a bunch of smoke up the ass of a young reporter for The Dickinson Press the other day, and the kid, who’s actually a pretty good writer, wrote a real puff piece about how great the refinery is going to be for western North Dakota. I’ve written about this a couple times. My pieces weren’t puff pieces.
The Bismarck Tribune and Forum…
August 30th, 2017
There’s a little blue-collar resort community at the top of the Van Hook Arm of Lake Sakakawea, a couple hundred trailers and cabins and a bait shop, a small RV park, and a boat ramp.
This spring, an oil company named Slawson Exploration moved in beside the resort, and with its huge machinery, began clearing a 25 acre site at the top of the boat ramp, which will be home to what now looks like an 8-well oil pad. The site is just a few hundred yards from the park and the homes in the…
August 23rd, 2017
“Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.” – Edmund Burke
“The history of the twentieth century has taught us that people who are rendered permanently superfluous are eventually condemned to segregated precincts of the living dead or are exterminated outright.”
– Richard Rubenstein
“To the Nazi economists goes the credit for working out a system of living on their debts. They realized the implications of the well-known fact that a dishonest debtor has all the advantage over…
August 16th, 2017
A few months ago I wrote about the long, strange saga of Jason Halek, the fellow who dumped 800,000 gallons of poisonous oilfield brine down an abandoned oil well south of Dickinson. Back in April of this year, he pleaded guilty to three felony violations of the U.S Safe Drinking Water Act for those crimes he committed in late 2012 and early 2013.
Jason was scheduled to be sentenced to 24-30 months in a federal prison on July 31.
Well, July 31 has come and gone, and no sentencing yet.…
August 5th, 2017
Of all the sleazy companies to show up in North Dakota’s oil patch in the nearly ten years since the Bakken Boom began, the sleaziest of them all has to be Meridian Energy, the company proposing to build an oil refinery called the Davis Refinery just three miles from Theodore Roosevelt National Park. I wrote about them a few months ago. Here’s an update.
Normally, when a company wants to build a large energy plant, like a refinery, it applies for a siting permit from the North Dakota…
August 5th, 2017
For the last 50 years or so, there have been just five places where you can drive your car across a bridge over the Little Missouri State Scenic River: In Marmarth on U.S. Highway 12, on Pacific Avenue in the city of Medora, on I-94 just north of Medora (two bridges, one going each way), on U.S. Highway 85 south of Watford City (the Long-X Bridge) and on ND Highway 22 north of Killdeer (the Lost Bridge).
The Billings County Commissioners have made news for the last ten years trying to…
August 2nd, 2017
When I moved to this community 23 years ago from Dallas, Texas, I knew I would have much to learn. I was coming to a part of my country that was completely different from what I had known when it came to geography, climate, and ethnicity. What I did not expect was how much I would learn from people who immigrated here from much farther away and from a wide variety of cultures.
My education in what “we the people” truly means began only after I became a teacher. Prior to then, I did…
July 19th, 2017
“…the struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.” – Milan Kundera
“It may seem kind of bleak to say that the future of our planet rests in large part on the consciences of Republican politicians. But it kind of does, at least right now. The thing is, like me, many of my colleagues have grandchildren. And grandchildren can be a powerful motivator, even if they don’t have a Super PAC.”
– Senator Al Franken (D-MN)
It is difficult to have the…
June 28th, 2017
The river lost most of its scenic protection in June, when Gov. Doug Burgum reversed course and joined the members of his State Water Commission in opening the entire river to industrial water development.
In May, Burgum declared upstream areas of the state’s only official State Scenic River—the areas surrounding the three units of Theodore Roosevelt National Park—off limits to industrial water use, and told State Engineer Garland Erbele to “immediately review, modify and make…
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By Winona LaDukewinona@winonaladuke.comIt’s been eight years since the Water Protectors were cleared off the banks of the Cannonball and Missouri Rivers. It was a bitter ending to a battle to protect the water; and for most of us…
By HPR Staff We’re all a part of building strong, healthy and inclusive communities. But the region’s non-profit organizations do a lot of the heavy lifting. Now it’s time for these organizations to step into the spotlight.…
By Faye Seidlerfayeseidler@gmail.com As I write this article, it’s January, and the temperatures in North Dakota are negative. I’m living in a house and our furnace just died a forever death after years of quick fixes. Yet,…
By Ed Raymondfargogadfly@gmail.comWill the Divided States of America Add or Subtract to the Future?In 1937, English writer Aldous Huxley published his novel of the future “Brave New World 632 A.F.” (after Henry Ford), a world…
By Rick Gionrickgion@gmail.com Holiday wine shopping shouldn’t have to be complicated. But unfortunately it can cause unneeded anxiety due to an overabundance of choices. Don’t fret my friends, we once again have you covered…
By Rick Gionrickgion@gmail.com So far in 2025, announcements for new restaurant openings in the metro far outnumber closings. This is good news going into the new year for us hungry folk. In my opinion, the positive trend will…
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By John Showalterjohn.d.showalter@gmail.com Local band Zero Place has been making quite a name for itself locally and regionally in the last few years. Despite getting its start during a time it seemed the whole world was coming to…
By Greg Carlsongregcarlson1@gmail.com For so many of us, the news announcing the death of the brilliant David Keith Lynch — who died just a few days short of his 79th birthday — interrupted beautiful blue skies and golden sunshine…
By Sabrina Hornungsabrina@hpr1.comIn 1974, the Jamestown Arts Center started as a small space above a downtown drugstore. It has grown to host multiple classrooms, a gallery, performance studio, ceramic studio and outdoor art park.…
By John Showalterjohn.d.showalter@gmail.comHigh Plains Reader had the opportunity to interview two mysterious new game show hosts named Milt and Bradley Barker about an upcoming event they will be putting on at Brewhalla. What…
By Annie Prafckeannieprafcke@gmail.com AUSTIN, Texas – As a Chinese-American, connecting to my culture through food is essential, and no dish brings me back to my mother’s kitchen quite like hotdish. Yes, you heard me right –…
By Sabrina Hornungsabrina@hpr1.comNew Jamestown Brewery Serves up Local FlavorThere’s something delicious brewing out here on the prairie and it just so happens to be the newest brewery west of the Red River and east of the…
By Josette Ciceronunapologeticallyanxiousme@gmail.com What does it mean to truly live in a community —or should I say, among community? It’s a question I have been wrestling with since I moved to Fargo-Moorhead in February 2022.…
By Faye Seidlerfayeseidler@gmail.com On Dec 5, the Turning Point USA chapter at North Dakota State University hosted an event called BisonFest. This event featured Chloe Cole, a former trans kid, known for detransitioning and…
By Jim Fugliejimfuglie920@gmail.com A friend of mine, a well-known Bismarck liberal (I have a few of those), came up to me after church the other day and asked, “So, are you moving out of the country?” I knew he was referring…
