Bitter Creek in national debate

Despite information in a leaked internal memo, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar testified Tuesday that there are no plans to create any national monuments in Montana.

According to a press release Tuesday from the office of Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., Salazar also stated to Tester during a Senate hearing that there are no plans for the government to pursue land purchases along the Missouri River Breaks.

Both of these projects were listed in a Department of the Interior memo labeled “Internal Draft – NOT FOR RELEASE.” The portion of the memo that was made available to the Courier is not dated.

A list of 14 areas in nine Western states was labeled “good candidates for National Monument designation under the Antiquities Act.” The sentence went on to say, “(F)urther evaluations should be completed prior to any final decision, including an assessment of public and Congressional support.”

Something called Montana's Northern Prairie is on this list. Known locally as the Bitter Creek Wilderness Study Area, this large piece of public land in northwestern Valley County, 59,600 acres administered by the Bureau of Land Management, is contiguous with Grasslands National Park just across the Canadian border.

Tester's press release stated that he directly questioned whether the administration has any plans to designate a national monument in northeastern Montana.

“There are no plans that we have to move forward,” Salazar said, adding that there have been “no directions from the White House that we move forward on monument designation.”

Another part of the same Interior memo lists high priority land-rationalization efforts, land consolidation for checker boarded lands in eight states. One of these is the upper Missouri River from Fort Benton downstream to the Fort Peck Dam, which the memo calls “Fort to Fort.” This stretch of the river includes the Upper Missouri National Wild and Scenic River, Missouri Breaks National Monument and the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge.

There are some large privately owned ranches with river frontage on this stretch of the Missouri. The memo estimates the 80,000 acres of inholdings would cost roughly $24 million to acquire.

According to Tester's press release, he told Salazar that some Montanans are “fired up” by “false rumors” of plans to buy land from willing sellers along the Missouri River Breaks.

“Do you know if this is something that's real or is this something that is not real?” Tested asked.

“I am not aware that there is any such plan,” Salazar said. The release says he added that the best way to manage public lands is for members of Congress to pursue legislation based on ideas from local communities.

“That's what we intend to do,” Salazar told Tester.

Rep. Denny Rehberg, R-Mont., and fellow members of the House Western Caucus sent Salazar a letter demanding answers about what a news release called a “land grab.” In the March 2 release, Rehberg, who has opposed similar efforts to put land under federal protection, called the proposal a “naked abuse of power” and “an egregious affront to the will of Montanans.”

In a March 4 statement released by BLM communication officer Craig Leff, Salazar said that he had asked department bureaus to think about what areas might be worth considering for special management or congressional designation.

The statement said, “The preliminary internal discussion draft reflects some brainstorming discussions with BLM, but no decisions have been made about which areas, if any, might merit more serious review and consideration. Secretary Salazar believes new designations and conservation initiatives work best when they build on local efforts to better manage places that are important to nearby communities.”

The first public mention of this possible national monument designation for up to 13 million Western acres was in a Feb. 19 Great Falls Tribune article by Ledyard King of the Tribune Washington Bureau. At that time, the Valley County commissioners said they had not been given any inkling of this proposal for more than 93 square miles of their county.

The 375,000-acre Upper Missouri River Breaks was designated a national monument in one of Bill Clinton's last acts as president. He used the Antiquities Act of 1906, first employed by Teddy Roosevelt to protect Devil's Tower, the Grand Canyon, the Olympic Peninsula and 15 other sites.

Under the Antiquities Act, a president can unilaterally designate certain lands as national monuments, protecting them from many uses, including energy development.

Rehberg introduced legislation March 4 that would exempt Montana from the provisions of the Antiquities Act.

“When it comes to land in Montana, we've got a long-standing tradition of working together to find consensus-based solutions,” he said in a press release. “Circumventing that tradition by unilaterally carving out millions of acres with the stroke of a pen is not the American way. The president is not a king, and we are not his subjects, which is why congressional checks and balances are so important.”

Rehberg's H.R. 3754 would require congressional approval of new national monument designations in Montana. Wyoming already has a similar law.

Sen. Max Baucus' office issued a statement March 4 which said that the senator thinks decisions about land use should come from local communities – not from Washington. Baucus voted for a measure that would have prohibited the establishment of monuments in the areas mentioned in the Department of Interior memo. The amendment did not pass, but his office said he remains committed to ensuring any monument establishments come from grass roots efforts.

“This is simple,” Baucus stated. “Montanans know what's best for Big Sky Country. The decision whether or not to establish a monument anywhere in Montana has got to come from locals, not from D.C.”

Although it is not a well-known natural attraction, even in Valley County, the Bitter Creek has been called “one of the best native mixed-grass prairie ecosystems in Montana and the United States.” Chuck Robbins, in his book “Great Places: Montana,” which is a recreational guide to Montana's public lands, also quotes a joint study by the Montana Natural Heritage Program and the Bureau of Land Management Glasgow Field Office: “Within the Bitter Creek … portion of Montana's Northwestern Glaciated Plains Section, large intact prairie communities can still be found. It is the largest remaining intact grassland north of the Hi-Line in Montana and stands out as one of the most extensive naturally functioning glaciated plains grasslands in North America.”

The Interior memo notes that Montana's Northern Prairie contains some of the largest unplowed areas of grasslands in the world and some of the best habitat regions in all the Great Plains.

“Unfortunately, we are losing our grasslands and northern prairies at alarming rates, and few opportunities exist to conserve grassland ecosystems and their native biota on large scales,” the memo states. “If protected, Montana's Northern Prairie would connect more than 2.5 million acres of protected grasslands bordering the Bitter Creek Wilderness Study Area and Grasslands National Park in Canada. This cross-boundary conservation unit would provide an opportunity to restore prairie wildlife and the possibility of establishing a new national bison range. This landscape conservation opportunity would require conservation easements, willing seller acquisitions and withdrawal from the public domain.”
Janet Guptill, owner and publisher of the Jordan Tribune, contributed to this story.