Dr. Jason Germundson Named Superintendent of Williston Basin School District #7
WILLISTON GRAPHIC STAFF
The Williston Basin School Dis-
1 following the resignation of Dr. Richard Faidley. Before stepping into that role, Germundson was promoted to assistant superintendent in 2024 after more than two decades as and work together with our dedicated staff, students and families to create even more success for our district."
The selection process involved a committee of school
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Contact Us
701.572.4851 PO Box 389 1411 West Dakota Parkway, 2A Williston, ND 58801
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Families Invited to March 29 Gateway to Health Event at Williston Area Rec Center
NORTH DAKOTA HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
Williston area families are invited to participate in a no-cost community Gateway to Health event on Saturday, March 29, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Williston Area Recreation Center.
Co-sponsored by ARC Fitness and North Dakota Health and Human Services, the event is intended to help families connect with community resources supporting health and well-being. Participants will be able to explore interactive booths hosted by local and statewide organizations that highlight tools, programs, services and information supporting these seven dimensions of wellness: men-
tal, physical, social, financial, spiritual, environmental and vocational well-being.
“The goal is to help individuals and families thrive by connecting them to community resources and supports that promote strong, stable families,” said event co-organizer Hayden Kemp of the HHS Community Engagement team.
Displays will be set up in the tennis court area of the ARC and participants will receive an event passport card they can get marked off by vendors. Once completed, it can be used to gain free admission to the rest of the facility during the day of the event.
Attendees can also enter an event drawing with prizes awarded throughout the day.
In addition, a free lunch
will be provided for the first 200 attendees courtesy of Jimmy John’s, O.K. Distributing Company Inc. and Coca-Cola of Williston.
Modeled after a similar successful Gateway to Health event in Bismarck-Mandan, this is an opportunity for Williston-area families to learn, connect and access resources that contribute to a healthier, happier North Dakota.
Voluntary donations of cash or check will be accepted at the event with all the proceeds going to pay off school meal debt for students in the Williston Basin School District #7.
Individuals with questions can contact Michele Moore at Michele@wprd.us
Give Blood, Save Lives at Williston Community Blood Drive
WILLISTON GRAPHIC STAFF
The next Williston Community Blood Drive will be held at the National Guard Armory at 10 Main Street, on April 7 and 8 from noon to 6 p.m. Donors are encouraged to schedule an appointment at www.vitalant.
org or call Heather Leier at 701-720-5909.
Every two seconds, someone in the U.S. needs blood, yet only about 3% of eligible donors give each year. A single donation can save up to three lives, making every contribution vital. Giving blood is a simple act with a life-changing impact. Be a hero—donate today.
Sons of Liberty Rifle Giveaway Draws Hundreds at Williston Gun Show
SONS OF LIBERTY WILLISTON CHAPTER
The Sons of Liberty Williston Chapter made waves at the “Boys of Company B" Grand Williston Gun Show with a rifle giveaway, drawing over 400 entrants.
Mary Schaff of Williston walked away with a brand-new Henry Golden Boy rifle.
“Giving away a gun at the gun show? Now that’s what I call celebrating the Constitution—especially the 2nd Amendment!” said SOL board member Kevin Hunter when presenting Schaff with the prized firearm. “We’re already gearing up for the next gun show in October at the Raymond Center. I think our original founder, Sam Adams, would be proud!”
Want to get in on the action and connect with fellow Patriots?
The Sons of Liberty Williston Chapter meets every other Monday at 7 p.m. at Eagle Ridge Golf Course. Call Kevin Hunter at 701651-5022 for more information.
SOL and McCoy’s Restaurant have combined to provide a voucher to use on a meal for all first-time visitors to an SOL meeting. So if you're looking for a fun night out, great company and a great meal, come check out our meeting—and don’t forget to let us know it’s your first time! See you at the next SOL meeting, and good luck in our next gun giveaway.
This content was provided by the Sons of Liberty..
Districts 1 and 23 Dem-NPL Reorganizational Meeting Planned
The District 1 and 23
Dem-NPL reorganizational meeting will be held on March 29 at 2 p.m. at the “Ready Room,” located on the top floor of Frontier Hall at Williston State College.
Due to redistricting and western North Dakota’s population growth, District 23 is now located within the towns of Trenton, Buford and the north and western parts of Williston.
District 1 encompasses much of the town proper of Williston.
“A lot has been taking place
in Bismarck this session, and nationally, that is having a direct impact on the lives of our fellow citizens. If you don’t like what is going on, now is the time to get involved,” said LuAnn Casler.
The organizational meeting will choose its board of officers and will be held at Williston State College on March 29 at 2 p.m.
For more information, please visit www.demnpl. com, District 23 Dem-NPL (D23demnpl) on Facebook or call 701-580-0013.
This content was provided by District 1 & 23 Dem-NPL.
District 1 & 23 Dem-NPL Reorganization Meeting Saturday, March 29, 2025 | 2-4pm
| 4th Floor
KEVIN HUNTER HANDING MARY SCHAFF THE GUN SHE WON AT THE BOYS OF COMPANY B GUN SHOW HELD IN FEBRUARY. | SUBMITTED PHOTO
North Dakota
North Dakota attorney general calls for more prison time; opponents say spend more on police
JEFF BEACH NORTH DAKOTA MONITOR
North Dakota’s attorney general is backing a bill that will increase the time offenders spend behind bars because he says the state criminal justice system is releasing prisoners too quickly.
The head of the state’s Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation says the bill would deny prisoners access to treatment and education and lead to more repeat offenders. He argued spending more money on law enforcement would be a better use of taxes than locking up prisoners for longer periods of time when the state’s jails and prisons are already overcrowded.
Attorney General Drew Wrigley is pushing Senate Bill 2128, which he calls the truth-in-sentencing bill, as a way to reduce crime. The Senate passed the bill 28-18 despite a do-not-pass recommendation from the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The bill has a fiscal note that estimates the bill will cost the state $22.7 million in the 2025-27 biennium and $21.3 million for the following two years.
The House Judiciary Committee listened to nearly three hours of testimony on the bill Monday, beginning with Wrigley, who contends that the use of transition centers, or halfway houses, is essentially releasing prisoners long before their sentences are up.
The bill lists crimes where offenders would have to spend at least 50% of their sentence behind bars before being eligible for a half-
LISTENS MARCH 24, 2025, TO TESTIMONY ON A BILL RELATED TO CRIMINAL SENTENCES. | KYLE MARTIN/FOR THE NORTH DAKOTA MONITOR
way house.
Wrigley said the bill is not about longer sentences. “It’s about the sanctity of a judicial order,” Wrigley said, calling the correction’s department’s policies “misleading.”
He points to statistics from his office indicating 10 straight years of crimes against people rising across North Dakota.
Wrigley said offenders in halfway houses are routinely committing additional offenses and that the bill would not strip the corrections department of its ability to offer treatment and rehabilitation programs.
Braun invoked President Donald Trump, who in 2018, signed into law an act to provide more transition programs at the federal level. He said other states are also looking to North Dakota as a model, and reducing access to rehabilitation programs would be a step backward.
“The federal Bureau of Prisons is learning what we have known for years, that incentivizing behavior and programming while supporting people in their return to society increases public safety,” he said.
He said a third of the treatment programs completed by prisoners were done in a transition facility, which are private facilities that have a contract with the state to provide housing and services. Braun said the prison system does not have space or staff to absorb all the offenders who would not be eligible for a transition center under Wrigley’s bill.
The North Dakota State’s Attorney’s Association has not taken a position on the bill and state’s attorneys on both sides testified Monday.
Dennis Ingold, a Burleigh County assistant state’s attorney, and Ward County State’s attorney Rozanna Larson, were in favor of the bill.
CLUES ACROSS
1. State in southwestern India
4. Pashto
10. Corpuscle count (abbr.)
11. Supervised release from prison
12. Greeting
14. Type of drug
15. __ Sagan, astronomer
16. Every year
18. Nasal cavities
22. Nova __, province
23. In an inactive way
24. Cream-colored root
26. Nervous system disease
27. Guitarist Clapton
28. Three came to see Baby Jesus
30. Lebowski's nickname 31. Play a role 34. Not fresh
36. Where golfers begin
37. Negatives
39. Wild goat
40. Releasing hormone
41. Makes up
42. Fastens
Ingold says he primarily handles drug trafficking cases and is frustrated by seeing a criminal he prosecuted for a Class A felony back out in society after only about a month into a sentence.
Larson said she agreed with previous state policy changes to slow down the number of people going into North Dakota jails and prisons by reducing sentences on low-level crimes. But she said now she doesn’t feel like those changes are working.
“It’s not helping with the safety of our communities,” she said.
She said local governments have made big investments in jail space and the state will need to do so, also.
“Long term, we do have to have more space,” she said.
Cass County Assistant State’s Attorney Robert Vallie used to work with Larson in Ward County but was on the opposite side of the issue Monday.
He called Wrigley’s plan to fight crime with more prison time “seductively simplistic.”
He told the committee it was an issue worthy of a legislative study, rather than spending money on the attorney general’s plan with guarantee of success.
Travis Finck, executive director for the North Dakota Commission on Legal Counsel for Indigents, agreed that there is no evidence that longer sentences will work.
“If we’re really worried about crime increasing, … our money is better spent is by sending it to the men and women in uniform rather than building more prisons and bigger jails,” Finck said. “We know that works.”
48. Exists in large numbers
50. A connecting word
51. A phase of the heartbeat
52. Northern Ireland county
53. An independent ruler or chieftain
54. Pacific sea bream
55. Commercial 56. Azure
58. Doctor of Education
59. Protected oneself against loss
60. Car mechanics group
CLUES DOWN
1. Pastes for filling crevices
2. Acquire
3. Heralds
4. News group
5. Exact copies
6. Particles
7. Noted 20th C. performer
Lena
8. Tempted
9. Midway between north and east
Scott Peyton is the director of government affairs for a Virginia-based organization called Prison Fellowship. He testified that the longer prison sentences mandated nationally during the 1980s and ’90s did not have the desired effect.
“The unintended consequences of Senate Bill 2128 risk creating unnecessary barriers to successful reintegration, while failing to meaningfully enhance public safety,” he said.
Rep. Daniel Johnston, R-Kathryn, said it didn’t appear North Dakota’s corrections system was working particularly well and asked Peyton how it could work better.
Peyton referred to the attorney general’s crime statistics that showed a 43% clearance rate for violent crimes and property crimes.
“It’s a flip of the coin, whether you will be caught committing a crime,” Peyton said. “We know that the chance, the likelihood of being caught, is a greater deterrence than even longer sentences.”
Another aspect of the bill includes increasing penalties for people who flee from an officer or assault an officer. There were several uniformed officers attending the hearing.
Beulah Chief of Police Frank Senn said fleeing had become an epidemic in the state. Beulah is in Mercer County, where Sheriff’s Deputy Paul Martin was killed during a high-speed chase in 2023.
The committee did not act on the bill Monday.
This article originally appeared on the North Dakota Monitor website on March 24. Find it at www. northdakotamonitor.com
12. Slotted, hinged metal plate
13. South American hummingbird
17. Neither
19. Walk with confidence
20. Omit when speaking
21. Imperial Chinese currency
25. A bakery specializing in French pastry
29. Talk incessantly
31. Ethnic group of Nigeria
32. Longtime NY Times film critic
33. Beginners
35. Makes a trade
38. Sleep
41. Not moving
43. Popular drink: Pina __
44. Potential benefits
45. A place you can get stuck in
46. Ancient Greek City
47. Chalcedony
49. Rover
56. Digraph
57. Investment vehicle
COLBY BRAUN, CENTER, DIRECTOR OF THE DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS AND REHABILITATION,
Top U.S. Officials Inadvertently Share Yemen Strike Plans with Journalist via Signal App
JEFF BEACH NORTH DAKOTA MONITOR
Senior officials within the Trump administration, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Vice President J.D. Vance, inadvertently included Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, in a Signal app group chat discussing classified military operations in Yemen.
The group chat, labeled "Houthi PC small group," was initiated by National Security Advisor Mike Waltz on March 11. Its purpose was to coordinate planned
military strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen. Due to an error, Goldberg was added to the conversation, granting him access to sensitive operational details, including target information, weapons systems and attack sequencing. These details were discussed in the chat on March 14, with strikes commencing on March 15.
The National Security Council has confirmed the authenticity of the text chain and launched an investigation into the breach. President Donald Trump downplayed the incident, referring to it as a "non-issue," while standing by National Security Advisor Waltz.
The inadvertent disclosure has raised significant concerns regarding operational security and the handling of classified information. The use of the Signal app, which is not approved for transmitting classified government communications, may constitute violations of the Espionage Act and federal records laws. Lawmakers from both parties have called for accountability, emphasizing the potential risks to national security.
This article was written with information sourced from The Atlantic, Politico, The Times and ABC News.
Six, 4 speed lockouts. $1500 or Best Offer. 701-770-8213
The Housing Authority of the City of Williston is now accepting applications for 1 bedroom, 2 bedroom, 3 bedroom, and 4 bedroom units. *Income, eligibility, and admission preferences apply. Applications are available at The Housing Authority of the City of Williston located at 1801 8th Ave West Williston, ND 58801 Monday-Friday 9am - 4pm (701) 572-2006
Spirituality Through a Lutheran Lens
CROSS COUNTRY: WHERE WE MIGHT FIND THE COUNTRY CLUB
PASTOR ZACH HARRIS FIRST LUTHERAN CHURCH
Ideals are a unifying factor amongst human beings. They are the kinds of things that draw people to one another and make a bunch of people into something more. In many ways those groupings are gathered around something as simple as the enjoyment of the same hobby or pastime to something as high and mighty as the same type of faith or worship that brings about ultimate meaning. And, of course, there are gatherings of humans because of the same geographic limitations. But there is also, perhaps, at least one rare example of a peculiar combination of all of that which is so precious to those who are a part of it, that the fear of its loss supersedes that of losing either the very Universe or planet Earth upon which it is situated.
In my weekly concentration on our fears concerning the deaths
that we face, it turned out that the fear of the death of the Universe was so far beyond anyone’s control, it wasn’t much of a concern. I was a little more heartened that most people took more interest in averting the death of the Earth, recognizing there are some very helpful environmental-friendly ways to help stave off things like pollution, global warming and even the threats of nuclear disasters and such—but still, the whole planet is a lot to think that we can take full control of. But, this week, the subject got closer to home with the fear of the death of this entity we call country—and in our case, America.
Now, one of the beautiful things about THIS country is the capacity for our American English to provide the craftiness of the double-entendre. Today’s title could be taken in the sense of all the divisive rhetoric these days. It could be defined as: a “cross country— that is a mean country that is at cross purposes with itself—which
is looking for a “country club”— meaning a mallet of such size and intent to squash down the opposing part of the country. But that would simply miss the point! That would snap us back to 1861 when we WERE fighting with ourselves in a war that was hardly civil. And being the resident Southerner, I can pretty confidently say, thank goodness the traitorous South lost! But, no, that’s not the meaning at all.
You see, that kind of thinking may make the news, but it forgets a few things. For one thing, it forgets the “U” in the USA—United. There are states. They are on the continents of the Americas. But what gives them the zip in the name is the United! That’s the strength. That’s the wonderment. That’s the amazing part for other places where anarchy and dictators reign—because in those places, the fear is not that the country might NOT exist: the fear is baked into existence itself!
Variety is one of the coolest parts of our Country’s club of which you get to be a member, no secret decoder ring or fancy handshake required to go coast-to-coast Cross Country—from sea to shining sea—mountains, deserts, lakes and forests of all kinds in between. You can find almost any kind of
cuisine, all types of religions, cultural innovations that took us to the moon and beyond from roots that still go as far backward as Lutefisk (hey, not everything is everyone’s cup of tea)! And it’s all here because most of the world brought it here in the first place.
So, let’s face it—when we started talking about fearful things that needed to be faced, any fear of losing all of that—well, that’s getting very real! But the ironic thing about it is that the safety valve is built right into what us being “United” was about in the first place. Not that we all would be the same together. But that we would all simply BE in this same place, together—loving the places where we overlap; appreciating the differences that we might learn from; and somewhere in there, trusting that our Creator made us all equal that together we could be more than the sum of the parts for the good of the rest of humanity.
Preeminent American author Mark Twain says in “The Innocents Abroad:” “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime." He, of
course, is speaking in reference to his world travels, but the same sentiment holds true when Americans take advantage of America across the wideness of the amazing gifts that can be shared all across our country. That multi-facetted flexibility is what gives us assurance that when we are concerned about our country's future, there really should be no fear!
Pastor Zach Harris has been an ordained minister for 33 years and currently serves First Lutheran Church in Williston. His column, “Through a Lutheran Lens: A Pastor’s Perspective,” will appear regularly in the Williston Graphic.
Bowling. Dining. Relaxing. VOTED BEST BRICK-OVEN PIZZA IN WILLISTON!
