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A historic deal more than a century in the making requiring the federal government to ensure members of the Fort Belknap Indian Community have water — and ensures water is available to everyone along the Milk River — took another major step forward Thursday. The Fort Belknap Indian Community Water Rights Settlement Act, led by Sens. Jon Tester, D-Mont., and Steve Daines, R-Mont., unanimously was passed by the U.S. Senate as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act, a release from Tester’s office said. The Fort...
An agreement more than a century in the making to settle water rights issues and provide water to Fort Belknap Indian Community — and to people all along the Milk River — Wednesday when the Fort Belknap Indian Community Water Rights Settlement Act passed out of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. The federal doctrine involving tribal water rights — The Winters Doctrine — started in Fort Belknap with the lawsuit Winters vx. United States, in which the U.S, Supreme Court established the doctrine that the federal government...
An agreement to settle water rights issues and provide water to Fort Belknap Indian Community — and to people all along the Milk River — decades in the making took a major step forward this week when the Fort Belknap Indian Community Water Rights Settlement Act was heard in the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. “What this water settlement is going to mean for the people in Fort Belknap and in surrounding communities is clean drinking water, water for the future, like we ta...
Meetings are set to begin planning for the next phase of rehabilitating the system that provides much — almost all in some years — of the water in the Milk River: the St. Mary Diversion and Conveyance Works. The Milk River Joint Board of Control, in partnership with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and Natural Resources Conservation Service, proposes to rehabilitate and modernize the St. Mary Canal and associated infrastructure along its existing alignment to improve agricultural water management. The agencies have set three pu...
Montana Senss Jon Tester, a Democrat, and Steve Daines, a Republican, introduced the Fort Belknap Indian Community Water Rights Settlement Act to the Senate Wednesday, a potentially historic bill that will secure the Fort Belknap Indian Community’s Indian water rights. The bill would invest $1.3 billion in water infrastructure and provide economic opportunity across the Hi-Line as well as help to avoid costly litigation over water rights in the area, a release from Fort Belknap said Wednesday. The bill also includes c...
From MSU News Service The leadership of Montana State University's flagship campus in Bozeman is going on a bus tour of the state June 20-22, with social events planned in Havre and Chester. Today is the deadline to RSVP for the Tuesday, June 20, tour at Northern Agricultural Research Center at Fort Assinniboine south of Havre and the Wednesday, June 21, event at Liberty County Senior Citizens Center in Chester. The event at NARC starts at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday and the social in...
Staff and wire report The road crossing Fresno Dam has been reduced to a single lane of traffic this week, with the restriction running from Tuesday to June 16, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation announced. The lane closure is part of the ongoing Safety of Dams project. Delays should be expected while crossing the dam. Traffic will return to a normal pattern during the weekend, June 10-11. All reservoir boat ramps will remain open and there will be no impact to the reservoir water surface elevations this season due to the...
Donna E. (Cornella) Larson, 95, went to be with the Lord Wednesday, May 31, 2023, at Sweet Nursing Home of natural causes. Her Vigil Service will be at 7:00 p.m., Tuesday, June 6, 2023, at St. Jude Thaddeus Catholic Church. Her funeral service will be held at 11:00 a.m., Wednesday, June 7, 2023, at St. Jude Thaddeus Catholic Church in Havre. Burial will be next to her husband at Highland Cemetery. Memorial donations in Donna's name may be made to St. Jude's in Havre, St. Antho...
Members of the St. Mary's Rehabilitation Working Group discussed at its meeting Tuesday bills in the 2023 legislative session that would provide the project with millions of dollars. House Bill 6 will provide $26 million to the project as a nontraditional loan, which requires repayment of interest but not principal, and House Bill 8 will provide another $26 million as a traditional loan. Members of the group said they were extremely happy about this outcome, but the group's...
Press release Starting Thursday, May 25, 2023, the Bureau of Reclamation’s Hungry Horse Dam Visitor Center will be open seven days a week from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mountain Time. The outdoor, guided walking tours will resume June 16. Exhibits inside the visitor center highlight the dam’s role in flood control and recreation in Flathead County, and hydroelectric generation in the Columbia River System. Displays feature the history of Hungry Horse Dam and its importance to the system. June 16, the outdoor, guided walking tours wil...
St. Mary Rehabilitation Working Group will meet Tuesday, May 23, 2023, from 10 a.m. to noon in the Basement Conference Room of Havre City Hall. The meeting agenda is: 1. Call to Order — Lt. Gov. Kristen Juras, co-chair 2. Comments by Marko Manoukian, co-chair 3. Introductions 4. Review and approve proposed agenda 5. Review and Approve Minutes from June 28, 2022 Meeting 6. Review and approve Minutes from April 13, 2023 Meeting 7. Coordinator update — Dave Peterson 8. Financial update — Bear Paw Development Corp. 9. Triba...
Press release The Bureau of Reclamation is scheduled to host a public meeting Wednesday, May 24, 2023, from 6-8 p.m. at the Chester Community/Senior Center at 618 E. Adams Ave., Chester, to discuss recreation at Tiber Reservoir, Discussion topics will include camping, fishing, boating safety and more. There will be presentations about land and recreation, state of the fisheries, aquatic invasive species, noxious weed management and marina updates. “The public is encouraged to attend this public meeting,” Reclamation Natural R...
The International St. Mary and Milk Rivers Study Board will be holding a public town hall meeting May 2, a press release from the International Joint Commission said, adding that all are welcome to attend. The board, launched in November 2021, is looking at water shared between the United States and Canada in a 1921 agreement regulating the sharing of water from the St. Mary and Milk rivers. The study board was created to explore "options to improve access to apportioned...
Representatives of Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation held an open house meeting Wednesday to provide a fisheries update for Fresno Reservoir and information on the work about to start at Fresno Dam this month. BOR Project Manager Steve Darlinton said NW Construction will be mobilizing April 17 to start on the project to address structural issues that could evolve into safety concerns long-term. Darlinton said there are cracks forming in the...
Press release BILLINGS — The contractor selected to complete the Fresno Dam Safety Modifications, NW Construction, plans to begin mobilization activities the week of April 17. The project will be one of the topics at the open house and informational meeting Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks will host Wednesday starting at 6 p.m. at Havre Inn and Suites at 1425 U.S. Highway 2 NW in Havre. In the safety modifications project, initial site activities are anticipated to include mobilization of equipment and materials, i...
Press release Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks will host the annual open house and present information on Fresno Reservoir and the Fresno fishery in Havre April 5 starting at 6 p.m. at the Best Western Plus Inn and Suites “on the hill” at 1425 U.S. Highway 2 NW in Havre. Havre-area FWP fisheries biologist Cody Nagel will provide an update of: • Status of the Fresno fishery, including a review of the 2022 netting results and habitat enhancement projects. • Fish stocking plans for 2023 and a check-in on the recently develop...
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Late winter and early spring is often a difficult time for wildlife. After using fat reserves through most of the winter, along with trying to find what food is available, many animals are at their most vulnerable at this time of year. And as we've all experienced, the winter of 2022-23 has been a tough, long winter with heavy snow and cold temperatures late into the year. That's why Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, along with the Bureau of...
U.S. Sen Jon Tester, D-Mont., announced Tuesday that he today secured $77.56 million through his bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, IIJA, for the Rocky Boy’s/North Central Montana Regional Water System. The funding, which was awarded by the Bureau of Reclamation, will be used for core pipeline construction on segments 7 and 8, and the continued construction of a water treatment plant and segments serving the Havre, Chester and Shelby Hub service areas. “Montanans sent me to the Senate to deliver for our com...
U.S. Bureau of Reclamation The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation will conduct a dive exam of the outlet works intake and stilling basin at Fresno Dam, 15 miles west of Havre, Oct. 17. The outlet works will be closed starting at 9 a.m. and will remain closed until the dive exam is complete, but will not exceed eight hours. Access to the Fresno Dam Tailwater Fishing Access Site will be restricted during the shutdown to just the fishing pier area. Recreators and Municipalities should expect reduced flows in the river during the shutdow...
Fort Belknap Indian Community and three conservation organizations filed a motion to intervene Monday against an attempt to overturn a ruling on a decision about conducting mining exploration in the Little Rocky Mountains south of Fort Belknap Indian Reservation. “There is substantial history establishing the detrimental effects created by previous mining activity in the Little Rockies,” President of the Fort Belknap Indian Community Jeffrey Stiffarm said in a release announcing the intervention . “Environmental impacts are b...
The Bureau of Land Management issued a Public Land Order today to protect more than 2,600 acres at the Zortman-Landusky Mine reclamation area from future mining activities. The BLM administers the site, located in Phillips County, Montana. The 20-year mineral withdrawal of this reclamation area prevents new mining activities and disturbance of the public lands, and provides time to assess and monitor the effectiveness of on-going reclamation activities – https://www.federalreg...
Fresno Chapter of Walleyes Unlimited is taking advantage of what would generally be considered a bad situation at Fresno Reservoir to make some repairs to its boat ramp. Chapter member Craig Buettner said Thursday that the ramp will be closed for seven to 10 days starting Monday when work to repair the ramp begins. He said Walleyes wanted to start work on the ramp before levels start rising again. Walleyes is paying for all of the work being done on the ramp. The dam was...
Editor, Fresno Reservoir, Aug. 23, 2022: The pelicans, herons, plovers, and gulls are mostly gone. The fish are starving, some are dying. The water levels are dropping faster than the clams can move. They die on the shore, far from the receding water’s edge. Fresno is almost 30 feet down and only 15 percent of capacity. Despite the Bureau of Reclamation’s statement to “manage, develop, and protect water in an environmentally and economically sound manner in the interest of the American public,” they have sold almost all of...
A board is looking for public comment on and is holding a virtual webinar this week about a work plan to be submitted to the commission that oversees the waters that flow between the U.S. and Canada about how to apportion waters of the St. Mary and Milk rivers, a release about the study said. The work plan is being written as work progresses to rehabilitate the system that diverts water into the Milk River, the very issue that led to the creation of the International Joint Commission that oversees water on the borders of the...
Montana Department of Environmental Quality has calculated a potential fine, more than $500,000, for a group requesting permission to do mining exploration at a site that already has cost millions in restoration. The fine has been proposed for alleged mining exploration without a permit. A consent order drafted by Montana Department of Environmental Quality states that Blue Arc LLC, Luke Ployhar, Legacy Mining LLC and Owen Voigt will pay the fine, $516,567, for conducting...
