Compact, water use agreement negotiated to protect irrigators
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Editor,
After years of negotiation the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Compact was created. None of the parties at the table got everything they wanted but it was something they could live with. The Water Use Agreement for irrigators was also a hard fought negotiation. In the end the Flathead Joint Board had been part of two long hard negotiations that resulted in the project being turned over to the irrigators and the Water Use Agreement. The past commissioners felt they had done their job and protected our project irrigation water.
Enter Western Montana Water Users and Concerned Citizens of Western Montana. They decided that the Cooperative Management Entity, the CSKT Compact and the Water Use Agreement were all illegal. The unrelenting attacks of those that oppose the tribes that have lead us to where we are now.
So where are we now? The smaller districts have been sued penniless by the Flathead Joint Board of Control and the Western Montana Water Users. The Joint Board no long exists, the BIA has done a full reassumption of the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project. People have lost their jobs, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent on attorney fees, the tribe has filed a suit to clarify who owns the water right to the project, our water for future irrigation is in peril, and a vicious recall is being made for two longtime water commissioners.
Please don’t recall the Mission District Commissioners. They have been commissioners for many years when no one else would take the job. They were part of two hard fought negotiations. They are your neighbors. Their total focus was on protecting water for irrigators, not politics. If you have not been sitting in their shoes for the past 15 years, you may not know what it took to get the job done.
Susan Lake
Ronan
