Montana
Engineers give Montana a 'C-' in new infrastructure analysis • Daily Montanan
A report released Wednesday by the Montana Section of the American Society of Civil Engineers gave Montana’s infrastructure a “C-,” lower than the “C” grade it got on the same report in 2018, based primarily on a host of aging infrastructure across the large state and being underfunded to perform the upgrades needed on a quick timeline.
The 2024 Report Card for Montana’s Infrastructure showed two categories of infrastructure – drinking water and schools – saw improvements from the 2018 report, though schools still received a “D” grade. Three other categories – bridges, energy, and solid waste – received downgrades.
The report said that $8 billion in federal revenue – primarily the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and 2022 Inflation Reduction Act signed by President Joe Biden – along with $2 billion in private funding and some efforts by the state to fund infrastructure improvements have made a dent in needed upgrades, but likely billions of dollars more would be necessary to get Montana’s infrastructure in a better place.
“We face significant challenges given how spread out our state is and how many environmental threats we encounter across our diverse geography, with minimal revenue sources to pull from due to our small population,” Lexi Leffler, the chair of the 2024 Report Card, said in a statement. “However, Montana’s engineers, agencies or departments, and leadership continue to work to provide an infrastructure network that keeps our residents safe and economy thriving.”
The report recommends the state work to establish dedicated, long-term funding for critical infrastructure like roads, bridges, and dams, saying inconsistent funding has created a backlog of deferred maintenance. It also recommends Montana grow its workforce and educational programs to help bolster the number of workers needed to address the upgrades, and says the state should prioritize climate resilience when deciding which infrastructure to upgrade when, and in what manner that will occur.
“Montana’s diverse geography and extreme weather risks require robust strategies to enhance resilience,” the report says. “Investing in infrastructure capable of withstanding severe conditions, such as improved stormwater systems and wildfire-resistant designs, enhances resiliency and safeguards communities.”
The American Society of Civil Engineers also does a report card for U.S. infrastructure every four years. The last report, issued in 2021, gave the United States a “C-” as well. The next nationwide report will be released next March.
Along with a backlog in many of the categories, the report says Montana needs to look at the future when addressing new construction or fixing and upgrading old infrastructure.
“Montana’s infrastructure must also adapt to risk for extreme weather events, public health imperatives such as removing lead water lines, and new environmental challenges such as ‘forever chemicals’ in water supplies,” the report says.
It also says that funding has lagged for years in Montana and suggests some large increases in money need to go toward addressing certain categories of infrastructure before they fail altogether.
That includes an estimated $4.4 billion over the next decade for bridges, when current funding is anticipated to be around $535 million. The report says the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency forecasts Montana needs about $2.3 billion to address drinking water infrastructure treatment and storage, while it says Montana had been putting around $170 million toward those projects until the recent boost in federal funding upped that to about $250 million a year.
The report says for roads, needs currently outpace revenue by a 3-to-1 ratio, which it says is “jeopardizing the future of Montana’s transportation system.” There are 13,000 miles of state highway and interstates in Montana and more than 63,000 miles of county, municipal and tribal roads.
The report suggests that ensuring a future with good roads in Montana would require increased funding from all levels of government, more preventative maintenance, and more advanced construction technology than is currently being used.
“Without decisive action, the state risks jeopardizing public safety, economic growth, and quality of life,” the report says.
It also said the EPA believes Montana needs about $347 million in wastewater improvements and another $22 million to upgrade the state’s stormwater infrastructure.
Schools and stormwater infrastructure got the worst grades of the 14 categories the report looked at, with a “D” for each. The report says 68% of Montana’s 826 K-12 schools were built before 1970 and that the state’s school maintenance fund had seen falling revenue in the past 14 years.
That has created a backlog for repairs and more modern and energy-efficient upgrades, and compounded with increasing energy costs and declining student enrollment, budgets are tight, according to the report, and schools also need to provide a quality learning environment for their children and may choose that route over funding infrastructure upgrades.
“Addressing these issues requires sustained investment and innovative solutions to modernize facilities and support the long-term success of Montana’s education system,” the report says.
The EPA in October announced a 10-year, $25 million investment in Montana to replace the state’s lead water pipes, including at schools, though the number of them across the state is currently unknown, a state official said at the time.
Stormwater infrastructure received a “D” in part because Montana is so rural and many of those smaller municipalities cannot fund upgrades. The effects of agricultural runoff, which the report says “remains largely unregulated,” poses the largest threat to contamination of stormwater systems and costs to mitigate that contamination could mean even more money is required than estimated by the EPA, according to the report.
Bridges remain a concern, according to the report’s authors, despite $45 million in federal dollars under the Biden administration going toward Montana’s bridges. The 5,200 bridges in Montana are on average at least 50 years old, and about 15% need immediate repairs. Further, the number of load-posted or closed bridges is growing 10% to 20% each year, the report says.
One of the governor’s proposals for the upcoming budget is to put $10 million a year over five years toward fixing 500 bridges across the state.
The category that got the best grade, a “C+,” was Montana’s rail system. Since about 70% of Montana’s rail track is owned by freight operators, the report says its rail lines play a crucial part of the state and national economy.
But it also says that aging infrastructure, a lack of needed safety guidelines, and vulnerability to climatological events like floods, fires and landslides create “significant” challenges moving forward.
“Federal funding and innovative technologies offer opportunities for modernization, but targeted investment and coordinated planning are essential to meet current and future demands,” the report says.
The report calls Montana’s mix of energy infrastructure “diverse” and says it is fourth in the U.S. for per capita energy consumption, due in part to the cold winters, long drive times, and energy production industries. It also exports about 40% of the power generated here.
But the report says Montana will face increasing energy demands as its population grows and that it needs to modernize its energy grid to include more renewable energy. It recommends Montana seek more federal and private funding to do so.
For the first time, the report looked into Montana’s broadband, which received $275 million in federal dollars from the Legislature in 2021, and which Gov. Greg Gianforte and the state broadband office have been working to make accessible across the state by 2030.
It says Montana still lags behind the rest of the country in terms of the share of its citizens who have access to internet speeds of 100 megabits per second, with about 71% of Montanans having those internet speeds at minimum compared to a national average of 93%.
The report, which was put together by more than 20 infrastructure and engineering professionals, recommends that lawmakers, the executive branch, private interests, and citizens work toward increasing funding some of the infrastructure needs to build what it calls a resilient and sustainable future.
“Addressing these critical infrastructure needs will enhance public safety, boost economic resilience, and improve the quality of life across Big Sky Country,” the report says.
2024-montana-infrastructure-report-card-full-report
The Montana Lottery offers multiple draw games for those aiming to win big.
Here’s a look at May 8, 2026, results for each game:
Winning Mega Millions numbers from May 8 drawing
37-47-49-51-58, Mega Ball: 16
Check Mega Millions payouts and previous drawings here.
Winning Big Sky Bonus numbers from May 8 drawing
09-14-18-20, Bonus: 16
Check Big Sky Bonus payouts and previous drawings here.
Winning Millionaire for Life numbers from May 8 drawing
14-16-21-43-51, Bonus: 03
Check Millionaire for Life payouts and previous drawings here.
Feeling lucky? Explore the latest lottery news & results
When are the Montana Lottery drawings held?
- Powerball: 8:59 p.m. MT on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
- Mega Millions: 9 p.m. MT on Tuesday and Friday.
- Lucky For Life: 8:38 p.m. MT daily.
- Lotto America: 9 p.m. MT on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.
- Big Sky Bonus: 7:30 p.m. MT daily.
- Powerball Double Play: 8:59 p.m. MT on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
- Montana Cash: 8 p.m. MT on Wednesday and Saturday.
- Millionaire for Life: 9:15 p.m. MT daily.
Missed a draw? Peek at the past week’s winning numbers.
This results page was generated automatically using information from TinBu and a template written and reviewed by a Great Falls Tribune editor. You can send feedback using this form.
Mobile home residents in Bozeman, Montana, say they’re being forced to choose between paying rent and paying medical costs.Courtesy of Jered McCafferty
35-year-old Benjamin Moore has lived in Mountain Meadows Mobile Home Park, outside Bozeman, Montana, since he was 17. This month, for the first time, he’s withholding his rent.
On May 1, Moore received a rent bill for $947, up 11 percent from the month before, and the second hike in nine months—the product of the park’s sale to an undisclosed buyer.
Moore hung a sign on his trailer that says “RENT STRIKE.” He and his neighbors in Mountain Meadows and nearby King Arthur Park, organized with the citywide group Bozeman Tenants United, are collectively withholding over $50,000 a month from their landlord.
Historically, trailer parks have been a relatively affordable housing option—a third of trailer park residents in America live below the poverty line. But on average, their cost of living has risen 45 percent over the past decade. By unionizing, the Bozeman trailer park tenants believe they might be able to fight the most recent rent hike—especially given the state of their housing.
For years, tenants say, the maintenance hasn’t been attended to: tree limbs hang perilously over trailers, and water shutoffs are a regular occurrence. “I cannot recall a time in the past 20 years where we had three straight months of water and power working all day, every day,” Moore said.
Shauna Thompson, another resident, calls the water “atrocious…like a Milky Way, like you’re drinking skim milk. It’s very nasty and turned off all the time, without any notice.” And tenants allege that they’ve experienced retribution for maintenance requests, punitive eviction attempts, and unsafe conditions.
“It’s really hard on people here,” Moore said. Some residents are “already paying their entire Social Security check for rent. It’s a very poor neighborhood. We’ve got old folks. We’ve got young families. We’ve got working-class people who can’t afford anything else.”
For the past four decades, a group called Oakland Properties has owned both trailer parks. When they learned about the sale, tenants were scared that their parks would be bulldozed, or that their rent would be increased even further, forcing them to move.
The tenants attempted to buy the parks themselves, but were decisively outbid. The winning bidder demanded an NDA. The transaction should be finalized next month, park owner Gary Oakland said, but residents still don’t know who’s going to own the land they live on.
This month’s rent hike, Oakland acknowledged, was “part and parcel” of the sale. But for tenants, it’s a catastrophe. On top of the $947 lot rent—more than double the national average—many residents also pay off home loans on their trailers, as well as insurance and utilities costs.
Oakland calls claims of broken utilities “nonsense”: “If it was such a bad place to live, why would the homes be selling for such high dollars?” he said. The rent strike, Oakland points out, is “just a group of people not paying their rent.”
Some people are rationing their medication to make ends meet, Moore said. “There’s one person who canceled Life Alert. It’s either Life Alert or rent, and if you don’t pay rent, they evict you and throw you in the streets.”
Tenant organizers across the nation have found a foothold in recent years organizing against individual landlords, and Bozeman’s tenant union, situated in one of the fastest-growing communities in the state, is no exception. Tenant unions from Los Angeles to Kansas City to New York have organized to win rent freezes, maintenance, and security in their homes.
Mobile home parks—increasingly private-equity-owned and uniquely at-risk in the face of climate disasters—are organizing, too: a group of trailer park residents in Columbia, Missouri, unionized in February. In Montana, as Rebecca Burns recently wrote for In These Times, mobile homes were already once a site of tenant organizing: buoyed by the state’s miners unions, the first Bozeman-area mobile home tenants’ union won an agreement with their landlord in 1978.
Oakland says park residents “have been terrorized by the union,” and plans to evict the strikers. The strikers say they’ve retained a lawyer and will fight to stay in their homes.
“I wish none of this was happening,” Moore said. “Your utilities should work. Your place should be safe. You should be able to get in and out of it. These are the absolute basics, and they just haven’t kept them up. And if you call them on it, they threaten you.”
MISSOULA, Mt. — Karsen Beitz arrived at Montana with no scholarship offers, one remaining walk-on spot and no guarantee that his track career would last.
Now, the former Sentinel High School standout is one of the fastest athletes in Montana history.
Beitz, a Missoula native and junior sprinter for the Grizzlies, has turned an unlikely college opportunity into a record-setting career. He owns Montana’s 100-meter and 200-meter program records and enters next week’s Big Sky Conference Outdoor Championships as one of the top sprinters in the league.
Coming out of high school, Beitz was a football and track athlete without a Division I offer.
“I was upset about it,” Beitz said. “But at the same time, I was fine with just going to college and living a normal college life.”
That changed after conversations between Sentinel coach Dylan Reynolds and Montana coach Doug Fraley.
“You may not think he’s a D-I prospect based on his times,” Reynolds told Fraley, “but I’m just telling you, if he gets in the right program, he’s going to be a D-I runner.”
Fraley had one walk-on spot left on his roster. He brought Beitz into his office, talked with him and decided to take a chance.
“I liked him. We had a good conversation, so I decided to give him the last walk-on spot,” Fraley said. “I’m sure glad I did.”
Beitz became a Division I athlete in his hometown, but his first goal was modest. He wanted to prove he belonged and earn a scholarship.
He did that quickly.
As a freshman, Beitz placed at the Big Sky Outdoor Championships and helped Montana’s 4×100-meter relay reach the podium with a school-record performance.
“There was no doubt he earned that scholarship,” Fraley said.
Beitz continued to climb in 2025. He placed second in the 200 meters at the Big Sky indoor meet, but a hamstring injury kept him out of the outdoor championships.
“It sucked to deal with,” Beitz said. “But I’m young and still had two years left, so I shifted my mindset to how I could come out these next two years.”
He has not looked back.
Beitz won the 200 meters at the 2026 Big Sky indoor championships, the first individual conference title of his track career. His time of 21.09 seconds edged Idaho State’s Alex Conner by one-hundredth of a second.
“I think the best part about it was seeing how happy Doug was,” Beitz said. “He was jumping up and down, gave me a big hug. After last year, I knew what I was capable of, so to go out there and do it was amazing.”
Then came the outdoor season.
In April, Beitz broke Montana’s 58-year-old 200-meter record, running 20.55 seconds at the Pacific Coast Intercollegiate in Long Beach, California. The previous record had stood since 1968.
Two weeks later, he added the school’s wind-legal 100-meter record, running 10.25 seconds at the Bengal Invitational in Pocatello, Idaho. Which broke a 44-year-old program record and gave Beitz both sprint marks.
“He’s a really competitive guy, and he wants to be the best in the Big Sky,” Fraley said.
The records have not left Beitz satisfied. They have made him hungrier.
“You have all these goals and numbers in your mind,” Beitz said. “Then once you hit those numbers, you’re not satisfied. There’s just more numbers to chase.”
The next chase begins at the Big Sky Conference Outdoor Championships, scheduled for May 13-16 in Portland, Oregon.
After college, Beitz hopes to follow his mother’s footsteps and become a pharmacist. Maybe even the world’s fastest pharmacist.
“If I’m running around the hospital talking to doctors,” Beitz said, “I’ll do it pretty fast.”
From a walk-on few people noticed to a conference champion and school-record holder, Beitz has become Montana’s fastest man — and he is not done running.
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