General News

Five members have been appointed to the new state Ethics Commission.

A committee made up of Gov. Doug Burgum, Senate Majority Leader Rich Wardner (R-Dickinson) and Senate Minority Leader Joan Heckaman (D-New Rockford) made the appointments.

The committee chose former district judge Ron Goodman of Oakes, tribal college president Cynthia Lindquist of Ft. Totten, former Sanford Health executive Paul Richard of Fargo, former Williston Mayor Ward Koser and former National Guard General David Anderson of Bismarck.

Some big electrical power users in western North Dakota – that are customers of MDU – will see their power bills jump.

Several years ago, those big users signed contracts with the utility for a fixed price on power. But recently, MDU filed for an electric rate increase, and that reopened discussions with those users.

A Montana construction company has been fined $500 for a violation of North Dakota’s “call before you dig” law.

Energy company Kinder-Morgan filed the complaint against Crawford Construction Company, for work being done in the Bowman area. The complaint alleged Crawford failed to renew a location request prior to the expiration of its original request.

As a Legislative Interim committee looks at potential alternatives to special assessments, the President of the Bismarck-Mandan Chamber and CEO of the Bismarck Mandan Development Association has one.

But Brian Ritter said it will take state action to allow local governments to adopt it.

Ritter said this comes from discussion about how to pay for on-going street and road improvements. He said the proposal is to allow local governments to levy a “street utility tax.”