As of Friday, July 9, 2021, Montana reports 114,240 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 58 new cases reported in the last day: 19 new cases in Flathead County, 15 new cases in Yellowstone County, 3 new cases in Gallatin County, 3 new cases in Missoula County, and more new cases in 13 more Montana counties. The number of active coronavirus cases in Montana is 440. Currently, 47 people are being treated in Montana hospitals for COVID-19. The most active cases are in Yellowstone, Cascade, Flathead, and Missoula Counties. 1,673 people have died in Montana of COVID-19. Nationwide, more than 606,000 Americans have died of COVID-19. There have been 33,800,000 cases of coronavirus in the US, and counting.

Toyota will stop donating to Republican members of Congress who on Jan. 6 voted against certifying the 2020 presidential election results after the Lincoln Project, a PAC, said it would begin running ads criticizing companies for such donations. Toyota said its decision to donate to those lawmakers after Jan. 6 “troubled some stakeholders, [so] we have decided to stop contributing to those Members of Congress.”

The owner of the property bordering Story Mill Park that once hosted the Bozeman stockyards is making plans to redevelop. Christine Huyser, who ran the Stockyard Cafe and lives in Harrison, has owned the property since the mid-2000s. The Bozeman Zoning Commission at its Monday meeting will decide whether to rezone the property to allow for mixed use with a residential focus in one portion and community business district use in the other.

Zaila (zah-EE-lah) Avant-garde, a 14-year-old African American girl from Harvey, Louisiana, is this year’s Scripps National Spelling Bee Champion. After correctly spelling the winning word, “murraya,” a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees, Zaila leaped with excitement, jumped and twirled with joy, only flinching in surprise when confetti was shot onto the stage.