Pub 9 2021 Issue 1

“What a long strange trip it has been” — those words are the sage words of the Grateful Dead. Those words aptly describe what all of us have gone through this past year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The last nine months of 2020 were one long strange trip.
It goes without saying that nothing was ‘normal’ about the year 2020 with the cancellation of association events, banks’ lobby closures and the advent of huge federal relief programs. But, 2021 has brought us some hope that ’we’ are starting to put the pandemic in the rear-view mirror.

You were recently reelected to the U.S. Senate for another six-year term. What do you hope to accomplish during the coming six years?
It’s an honor to serve Montana in the United States Senate. Heading into a new Congress, my priority is to protect the Montana way of life, which includes defeating the pandemic and getting life back to normal as quickly as possible. This means working to ensure every Montanan who wants a vaccine can get one.

Hopefully, by the time you read this, spring will have sprung, and another ridiculously long Montana winter will be behind us. Thankfully, this year was milder than most. Spring is a time of renewal and a time when bankers can begin to look toward what the remainder of the year will bring.
While we are mired in a very low-interest-rate environment and margins are suffering, there are still abundant opportunities