Category Archives: News

Group wants wilderness bill for Montana

Environmental Issues, News

From the Friday, March 6, 2009 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

Retired Forest Service brass and other prominent Montana citizens called on Montana’s congressional delegation Thursday to press for the establishment of additional wilderness areas in the state.

The group said it believes that 26 years is too long since any land in the state has been permanently protected as wilderness. During that same period, more than 439 wilderness areas have been designated in other states.

“We believe that what Montana’s wildlands need now, more than ever, is leadership in Washington from Montana’s delegation,” the group said in a letter to Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester and Rep. Denny Rehberg.

Read the entire article . . .

Salazar OKs Wolf Removal From Endangered List

Environmental Issues, News,

From the Friday, March 6, 2009 online edition of the Flathead Beacon . . .

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said Friday he was upholding a decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to remove gray wolves in the Northern Rockies and the western Great Lakes from the federal endangered list.

Salazar said wolves would remain a protected species in Wyoming because its law and management plans were not strong enough. But management of the predator will be turned over to state agencies in Montana and Idaho and parts of Washington, Oregon and Utah, in addition to the Great Lakes states of Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Read the entire article . . .

County needs dust program partners

Environmental Issues, News, , , , , , , ,

As promised, Flathead County has set some money aside for a sort-of dust abatement co-pay plan. Trouble is, there aren’t many takers so far. The deadline is March 27th.

From the March 4, 2009 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

Residents who want to tap into Flathead County’s cost-sharing dust abatement program this summer may want to heed an age-old adage: Speak now or forever hold your peace.

The deadline to sign up for the first-time program is March 27, and to date the county has had little response from rural residents, Public Works Director Dave Prunty said Monday.

Read the entire article . . .

State may get $2 million riverfront property

Environmental Issues, News,

From the Wednesday, February 4, 2009 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is closing in on two waterfront land acquisitions with Bonneville Power Administration funding.

A 245-acre parcel of undeveloped land along Foy’s Bend on the Flathead River south of Kalispell is being purchased for just more than $2 million, plus a 53-acre parcel along Hay Creek in the North Fork Flathead River drainage is being purchased for about $400,000.

Environmental reviews for both projects were amended to clarify terms of conservation easements that will be held on both properties by BPA.

Read the entire article . . .

Bennett fires back with haughty e-mail

Environmental Issues, News, , , , ,

Here’s a curiousity. Just a year ago, Bill Bennett, British Columbia’s mining minister, was forced to resign due to some wildly intemperate remarks regarding opposition to resource development in the Canadian Flathead. Bennett, now Tourism, Culture and Arts Minister, is at it again. This time, he was responding to a Fernie area tourism operator accusing Bennett of being more interested in coalbed methane development than tourism.

From the Thursday, February 5, 2009 online edition of 24 Hours Vancouver . . .

Tourism, Culture and Arts Minister Bill Bennett has described a tourism operator in his riding as having “bigoted” and “ignorant” opinions – accusing Steve Kuijt of writing a “vicious and mean-spirited” e-mail, which “may well be libelous.”

Read the entire article . . .

Groups renew call to expand Waterton into B. C. river valley

Environmental Issues, News, , , , , , , , , , ,

From the Saturday, January 31, 2009 online edition of the Calgary Herald . . .

Conservation groups are renewing calls for Waterton Lakes National Park to be expanded into the Flathead River Valley, despite British Columbia’s decision to close the door to coal bed methane development in the ecologically key area in southeastern B.C.

The Sierra Club, Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, Wildsight and others say the relatively untouched valley is still imperilled.

“Until we have permanent protection for the Flathead River Valley in the form of a national park, it is still threatened by future coal bed methane proposals,” said Sarah Cox, a spokeswoman for Sierra Club B. C. “And it’s under threat from a proposal for strip mining coal and other minerals.”

Read the entire article . . .

“We’re serious about our dust problem”

News, , ,

From the Tuesday, January 27, 2009 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

County officials briefed the county commissioners Monday on last year’s efforts and this year’s plans to deal with vehicles churning up dust on the Flathead’s gravel roads.

“We’ve demonstrated to the [Montana Department of Environmental Quality] and to the state that we’re serious about our dust problem,” Commissioner Chairman Dale Lauman said. “We can’t solve all the dust problems. We never will. But we can mitigate some of the problem.”

Read the entire article . . .

Stalemate, some success, retirement

Environmental Issues, News, , , , , , , ,

From the Sunday, January 11, 2009 online edition of the Missoulian . . .

The coal was here, hidden by a thin skin of wilderness, long before Rich Moy arrived; and it was still here, against all odds, when he left.

That, he considers, is at least some sort of success, although much more work will be required to keep it there, buried beneath what’s wild.

“In many ways, it’s been a stalemate for 30 years,” Moy said. “We haven’t lost much ground, but we haven’t gained any, either. The Canadian Flathead and the wilderness north of Glacier National Park have been and will be a flashpoint of international controversy.”

When Moy arrived on this backcountry battlefield, nearly three decades ago, the then-new controversy centered on a proposed Canadian coal mine to be built just a few miles north of Glacier Park.

When he finally retired last month, on the last day of 2008, the now-old controversy centered on yet another coal mine proposed in the headwaters, and a second coal mine in the river bottom, and a gold mine, and a phosphate mine, and an ongoing search for coalbed methane.

“In all these decades,” he said, “the British Columbia government has never wavered in its desire to industrialize the Flathead.”

Read the entire article . . .

An illegal road home

News, ,

Wouldn’t you know? The end of the year and the beginning of a new one brings yet another road article. This one isn’t about dust or potholes or snow removal, though. It seems that several sections of Flathead County roads, including the North Fork Road, do not actually have easements to cross state lands.

From the December 30, 2008 online edition of the Flathead Beacon . . .

Flathead County hasn’t fulfilled a nearly decade-old state Supreme Court ruling requiring Montana counties to pay full-market value for road easements across state trust lands, meaning the county – and the property owners who live on those roads – don’t have legal access.

In Flathead County, officials from the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation estimate that there are at least 80 different segments of road – all of varying length – with unpaid easements. And hundreds of property owners could be affected.

“Anyone who lives on a road that crosses state trust land before their property, technically does not have legal access,” DNRC area manager Bob Sandman said. He added that it’s “unlikely that many people know” and that most will only find out when they try to sell.

Among the affected roads in Flathead County are frequented areas like Pleasant Valley Road, KM Ranch Road, North Fork Road, LaBrant Road, Jewel Basin Road and nine roads in the Happy Valley area.

Read the entire aricle . . .

County staff shortage affects snowplowing

News, , ,

From the Saturday, December 13, 2008 online edition of the Daily Inter Lake . . .

If you live in the far reaches of Flathead County, don’t hold your breath waiting for the snowplow to come.

The county road department has 8.5 fewer full-time employees to handle the road maintenance load this winter, and no “floaters” to cover those who are sick or on vacation, county Public Works Director Dave Prunty said.

“The more remote the area, the longer it will take,” Prunty said Friday, just hours before the Flathead’s first blizzard of the season was predicted to begin. “If it hits like they say, it will be a slap in the face for us.”

Read the entire article . . .