Inside the quiet meeting rooms of the Livingston Public Library on May 20, 2026, something bigger than a meeting was unfolding. It wasn’t just another organizational gathering. It wasn’t simply a discussion about budgets, parade floats, storage units, or banquet dates.

There are causes we admire from a distance, and then there are the ones woven so tightly into the fabric of our lives that they feel almost like family. CASA — Court Appointed Special Advocates — is one of those for us. So when Built in The WEST Podcast sat down with two remarkable women shepherding this work in Park and Sweetgrass Counties, we knew the conversation belonged in these pages.

Some people find Montana. Others are claimed by it. Bob Crank's story is the latter—a tale of Instagram posts, horseback rides through Paradise Valley, and a dog who picked her owner at a bar in Clyde Park. Now, after nearly 20 years coaching college volleyball and adventures spanning from New Zealand to Hawaii, this Livingston police officer is ready for his next act of service: representing House District 57 in the Montana Legislature.

For the four million pilgrims who descend upon Yellowstone annually, the experience is largely a choreographed ritual: the timed eruption of Old Faithful, the neon steam of Grand Prismatic, and the bumper-to-bumper "people-herding" of the Grand Loop Road. To the uninitiated, the park is a scenic theme park. But for those who understand the logic of the mountain, there is an alternative reality—a wilderness of absolute isolation that begins where the asphalt ends.

On November 19, 2025, Park County, Montana, lost a bright light. Landon Cole Larkin was just 15 years old—a seventh-generation son of the land, an athlete who embraced every challenge, an outdoorsman who loved the wide-open spaces of his family's ranch, and a young man who brought joy to his cousins on the dance floor. He was deeply rooted in his community, tied to his brothers Cody and McKennon, and connected to a legacy that stretched back generations.

Mariachi music represents one of Mexico's most distinctive cultural treasures, dating back to at least the 18th century. Developing in the c