Your operation is, how do I put this? Incompatible with the direction things are heading. My operation feeds 300 families across this county. Your subdivision feeds property tax revenue and landscaping companies. We can talk about incompatibility if you want, but I don't think you'll enjoy where that conversation ends.
He left without shaking my hand. The Mercedes fishtailed slightly in the gravel on the way out. I took that as a review of his driving skills, not his negotiating ones. The following Tuesday, Brenda organized a protest at the ranch entrance. 23 Elk Ridge residents standing along Bridger Flats Road with printed signs.
Clean air is a human right. Protect our children. Farms don't belong in neighborhoods. My favorite was the one that said, "Smell equals assault. " I didn't know you could file battery charges against a cow.
Brenda had a megaphone. Of course, she did. She'd also called KBZK, the Bozeman TV station. A reporter and cameraman showed up and filmed the whole thing. Brenda gave an interview standing in front of the ranch gate on public road barely and called the operation a public health emergency that the county refuses to address.
The cameraman got a nice shot of my cattle grazing peacefully behind the fence, looking about as menacing as a church picnic. I stayed inside. Wyatt wanted to go out and say something. I told him, "No, let them have their moment. It's the last one they're going to get.
" Earl sat on my back porch drinking coffee and watching the protest through binoculars like it was a wildlife documentary. That one with the smell equals assault sign. She's got the energy of someone who's never smelled anything worse than a scented candle. I told him to put the binoculars down before someone thought he was conducting surveillance. He said, "I am conducting surveillance.
This is quality entertainment. " But Brenda wasn't done. That same week, she filed a formal complaint with the governor's office requesting my removal as state agricultural commissioner. Grounds: conflict of interest using a state position to shield personal business interests from legitimate community oversight. The complaint was five pages, professionally written, probably drafted by the same Bozeman law firm handling the nuisance case.
It triggered a standard ethics review through the state ethics commission. It was a smart move. Not smart enough, but smart. Two days later, Laya Pennington called. Her voice had the barely contained energy of a reporter sitting on something big.