Every week day, we ask Montanan’s a question and like good participants, they respond with some of the best answers. Some sarcastic, but for the most part, the answers are super helpful.

Montanan’s love an abundant of things about their state, but I found the top 5 answers and couldn’t agree more!

Here are the Top 5 Things Montanan’s Love About Fall

Leaves changing throughout the mountains. This is such an incredible site. Especially when driving to Livingston, heading through the pass, it’s hard to focus as you are surrounded by some of the most beautiful views. Your eyes have a hard time not starring in awe of all of the red and orange leaves surrounding you. It’s beautiful to put it mildly.

Football, football, and more football. Our MSU Bobcats are about to kick off the season and that alone makes me think fall is closer than it may seem. Let’s get ready to cheer on our Cats this Saturday!

Pumpkin everything. Now you either love pumpkin spice season or you hate it. I personally love it, but I can see how some people are over it. I mean do we need pumpkin spice toothpaste? No. But once pumpkin spice flavors hit the shelves, we know the leaves are going to start changing.

Bonfires and blankets. There is nothing better than sitting in a circle with a group of your favorite people, listening to the bonfire pop as one log burns down and you look to add another. Making memories, singing along to the music in the background, and telling that one friend we all have, that they don’t need to be that close to the fire and “no we don’t need more wood”.

Fall harvest. The smell of finishing up your crops, the dew on the leaves in the early morning hours, and knowing that you have accomplished another successful farming season is not only an incredible smell, but also an incredible feeling. The smell of the combine pushing through field after field is a smell that brings me home.

Fall is just around the corner and I think I am ready for it, especially after all of these feel good reminders about why it is so perfect.

Special Olympics Montana – Glacier Area invites the community to its annual summer social on Friday, Aug. 23, at Lawrence Park, Kalispell, from 4:30 – 8:30 p.m. 

This event is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate and learn about Special Olympics Montana Glacier Area, meet local athletes and teams, and enjoy a fun-filled evening. The social will feature music by Noisebox Productions, engaging games and resource booths. Attendees can also savor delicious offerings from the Montana Devil Dawgs and Glacier Shaved Ice food trucks. 

For more information, please contact Jacquie Simmons, Special Olympics Montana – Glacier Area outreach coordinator at (425) 478-7657 or email: jsimmons@somt.org. 

Special Olympics Montana is a statewide non-profit organization that provides year-round sports training, athletic competition, and health-related programming for individuals with intellectual disabilities. Special Olympics Montana changes lives through the power of sport by encouraging and empowering people with intellectual disabilities, promoting acceptance for all, and fostering communities of understanding and respect. 

Voters will get to decide in November whether they want to protect the right to an abortion in the constitution of Montana, which on Tuesday became the eighth state to put the issue before the electorate this fall.

The Montana Secretary of State’s Office certified that the general election ballot will include the initiative on abortion rights. All but one of the eight states are seeking to amend their constitutions.

Montana’s measure seeks to enshrine a 1999 Montana Supreme Court ruling that said the constitutional right to privacy protects the right to a pre-viability abortion by a provider of the patient’s choice.

Republican lawmakers in the state passed a law in 2023 saying the right to privacy does not protect the right to an abortion. It has yet to be challenged in court.

Opponents of the initiative made several efforts to try to keep it off the ballot, and supporters took several of the issues to court.

Republican Attorney General Austin Knudsen initially determined that the proposed ballot measure was legally insufficient. After the Montana Supreme Court overruled him, Knudsen rewrote the ballot language to say the proposed amendment would “allow post-viability abortions up to birth,” eliminate “the State’s compelling interest in preserving prenatal life” and potentially “increase the number of taxpayer-funded abortions.”

The high court ended up writing its own initiative language for the petitions used to gather signatures, and signature-gatherers reported that some people tried to intimidate voters into not signing.

The Secretary of State’s Office also changed the rules to say the signatures of inactive voters would not count, reversing nearly 30 years of precedent. The office made computer changes to reject inactive voters’ signatures after they had already been collected and after counties began verifying some of them.

Supporters again had to go to court and received an order, and additional time, for counties to verify the signatures of inactive voters. Inactive voters are people who filled out a universal change-of-address form but did not update their address on their voter registration. If counties sent two pieces of mail to that address without a response, voters are put on an inactive list.

Supporters ended up with more than 81,000 signatures, about 10.5% of registered voters. The campaign needed just over 60,000 signatures and to qualify 40 or more of the 100 state House districts by gathering the signatures of at least 10% of the number of people who voted for governor in 2020 in that district. The initiative qualified in 59 districts.

Republican lawmakers have made several attempts to challenge the state Supreme Court’s 1999 ruling, including asking the state Supreme Court to overturn it. The Republican controlled Legislature also passed several bills in 2021 and 2023 to restrict abortion access, including the one saying the constitutional right to privacy does not protect abortion rights.

Courts have blocked several of the laws, such as an abortion ban past 20 weeks of gestation, a ban on prescription of medication abortions via telehealth services, a 24-hour waiting period for medication abortions and an ultrasound requirement — all citing the Montana Supreme Court’s 1999 ruling.

Last week the state Supreme Court ruled that minors in Montana don’t need parental permission to receive an abortion, overturning a 2013 law.

In 2022, Montana voters rejected a referendum that would have established criminal charges for health care providers who do not take “all medically appropriate and reasonable actions to preserve the life” of an infant born alive, including after an attempted abortion. Health care professionals and other opponents argued that it could have robbed parents of precious time with infants born with incurable medical issues if doctors are forced to attempt treatment.

The legality of abortion was turned back to the states when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022.

Seven states have already put abortion questions before voters since then — California, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, Ohio and Vermont — and in each case abortion supporters won.