All posts by nfpa

Area residents looking at protection of the Flathead Valley in Southeast BC

Environmental Issues, News, , , , , , ,

From the Tuesday, November 25, 2008 online edition of the Keremeos Review . . .

Seven out of ten Kootenay residents want to protect the Flathead River Valley as a national park, according to new polling results released today by Wildsight and Sierra Club BC. The poll, conducted by McAllister Opinion Research, found that 73 per cent of residents in East Kootenay, Nelson-Creston and Columbia River-Revelstoke favour protecting the Flathead River Valley in southeastern B.C.

The Flathead River Valley is compared to Africa’s Serengeti for its richness of plant species and was recently called “a nursery” for wildlife by Canadian Geographic magazine. The valley is under threat from proposals for coal strip mining, coalbed methane drilling and unbridled mineral extraction.

Read the entire article . . .

Glacier Park seeks wilderness designation

News, , ,

From the Tuesday, November 24, 2008 online edition of the Missoulian . . .

When Glacier National Park celebrates its big birthday in 2010, not a few folk are hoping the 100 candles on the centennial cake will be arranged in the shape of a giant “W.”

That’s capital “W,” as in formal wilderness status, a designation that has eluded these 1 million acres since the early 1970s.

Read the entire article . . .

Note: This was the third in a series of articles the Missoulian published concerning Glacier National Park. The previous articles were “Park turns to private donations” and “Glacier road in funding limbo.“

Grizzly bears fared well this year

Environmental Issues, News, , , ,

From the Thursday, November 20, 2008 online edition of the Hungry Horse News . . .

It’s been a fairly good year for grizzly bears in the greater Glacier Park area. This year 11 bears were killed due to human circumstances, according to figures provided by Chris Servheen, the grizzly bear recovery coordinator for the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem.

Read the entire article . . .

Bull trout spawning strong in North Fork

Environmental Issues, News, ,

From the Wednesday, November 19, 2008 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

An annual survey of bull trout spawning activity has found higher redd counts in the North Fork Flathead Basin, and counts below average in the South Fork Flathead and Swan River drainages.

[…]

This year’s count found that Trail Creek was the biggest producer in the North Fork drainage, with 49 redds. Coal Creek continues to be the drainage’s least productive stream, with only two redds.

Read the entire article . . .

Jackson seeks road solutions

News

Another road article. (Somebody tell a joke or something. This is getting monotonous.)

From the November 16, 2008 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

Sen. Verdell Jackson, R-Kalispell, has been pondering Flathead County’s road problems, and he recently came up with proposed remedies he will pursue in the upcoming legislative session.

He has had a bill drafted that would appropriate $100 million to the Montana Department of Transportation to be distributed to counties exclusively for high-priority county road improvements.

Read the entire article . . .

Yet another dust meeting

Environmental Issues, , , ,

Outgoing Flathead County Commissioner Gary Hall wants to have another meeting on the North Fork Road. This one, apparently, will concentrate on dust mitigation issues. (For background on an earlier, similar meeting, see here and here.) The meeting will be held on November 20th, from 4 to 6pm in the conference room at Freedom Bank in Columbia Falls. Contact him at ghall@flathead.mt.gov or 253-3026 to let him know you are coming.

We’ll post more details here as they become available.

[Update: Corrected Gary hall’s email address.]

Far beneath the Big Sky – Exploring Montana’s deep, dark caves

Travel Articles, , , ,

Missoulian reporter Michael Jamison took a trip to explore a cave “north of Polebridge” recently. The write-up appeared in the October 31, 2008 online edition of the Missoulian . . .

Beneath: a bed of soft sand pressing damp and firm against shoulder blades.

Above: a glittering sky, starry pinpoints against unlimited black, deep as time.

All around: the song of the current, a quiet lullaby of water laughing, tumbling, spilling over stone.

Perfectly still. Deceptively peaceful.

Read the entire article . . .

County Preps New Dust Abatement Program for Next Summer

News, , ,

From the October 28, 2008 online edition of the Flathead Beacon…

With gravel roads at the center of a decade-long controversy in Flathead County, it stands to reason officials would welcome the winter snows that quell dust troubles. But this winter could pose its own set of problems for the roads department and, for a change, Public Works Director Dave Prunty is looking forward to summer.

“It’s the end of road dust season, and I’m already excited for the next one,” Prunty told commissioners recently. “It’s good to feel like we’ll be making new progress.”

There’s cause for Prunty’s optimism: The county commission set aside $100,000 in this fiscal year’s budget for a cost-sharing dust abatement program with county residents. As part of the joint effort, neighboring landowners would band together and pay for half the cost to place magnesium chloride – a dust palliative – on their road. The county then would use its equipment to prepare the road for application and pay the remaining half of the cost for a private company to apply the chemical.

Read the entire article…