Greg,
Just my two cents here, but since you asked, here are my own personal thoughts. I think the best times to mulch are in the late fall after harvest and mid-spring after crops have started to poke their heads up.
The reason I say this is that the fall mulching tends to protect the ground from cold temperatures and let worms, bacteria and fungi to do their jobs longer than if the soil was bare. Doesn’t hurt that the
compost itself will partially break down and become more inoculated with the decomposers before the winter freeze.
On the other hand spring mulch protects the soil from overheating and drying out while shading pesky weeds all at the same time. To boot, as the mulch breaks down it will add its own fertility to the soil. I personally like to use grass clippings for mulch as they are a great free source of mulch that adds nitrogen as well.
In either case the mulch buffers the soil against temperature extremes. I have been known to mulch a garden bed over winter, pull all the mulch off about a week before planting and then pull the mulch back over after crops have planted. At this time of the year I would think that mulch would just insulate frozen ground and delay warming. Also, given that the ground is frozen, I assume the microbe activity in your beds is little to none. I think a better option is to hold onto your mulch until you have planted and the seedlings start showing their heads. If you are transplanting (such as with tomatoes) then I would pull the mulch over immediately after planting.
Anyways, these are just my thoughts. I see that you are in Idaho so I assume that you have a longer winter than I do in Southern Illinois so I would think you have a longer wait time to plant than I do. I am hoping to at least start some gardening work over spring break (next week), but with the rain and cold, I don’t think I can plant for a while.
Sorry If I rambled too much, but I thought I give you my unabridged thoughts.
Good luck gardening and I hope you can start soon.
Eric