Independent Record, Helena, Mont., Open for Business column.(Column)

Byline: John Harrington

Oct. 28--CAPITAL HILL MALL HAS ICE CREAM STORE ONCE MORE: There's ice cream again in the Capital Hill Mall.

Mike Clasby, owner of both Howard's Pizza locations in addition to the mall's Sleeping Giant Bakery, bought the equipment when the owners of the old Baskin-Robbins ice cream parlor on the mall's south side retired last winter.

"Since I was on the food court anyway, we came to an agreement when they wanted to retire that I would buy the equipment from them," he said.

A week ago, Clasby and partner Geng Hui opened the Ice Cream Parlor, borrowing the name of a former downtown Helena icon. "And we're going to recapture as much of the old Ice Cream Parlor menu as possible," Clasby said.

For now, the business offers 43 flavors of Wilcoxson's Ice Cream from Livingston, and Clasby said he hopes to add some of Meadow Gold's popular Montana flavors like huckleberry, in addition to some signature desserts from the old Ice Cream Parlor on Logan Street.

TOUGH HELP: In discussing his various businesses around town, Clasby sang a familiar song about the difficulty in finding employees in the Helena area, and workforce data continues to back up that theory. The unemployment rate in Lewis and Clark County last month was a miniscule 1.9 percent, well below the statewide rate of 2.9 percent, according to the Research & Analysis Bureau of the Department of Labor & Industry.