On public lands

As a native of Sanders County, I spent my youth and much of my time even now roaming our beautiful mountains. When I was younger, I did this on my dirt bike. I camped, hiked, fished, mainly in Thompson River, and generally basked in the beauty of the county. These days, I do those things in my battered old pickup.

There is an idea being circulated that we should turn our public lands over to state management, saying Montana would be better at preserving the land than the federal government. Is that true?

Let’s think about this.

The state would have to pay all wildfire costs. The feds currently can pay up to 75% of those costs through the Federal Management Assistance Grant program(FMAG). These monies are for the cost of fighting the fire. Think of what all that entails;helicopters, planes, water trucks, dozers, etc., and wages and food for all. Quite a list. Then there is the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP), which gives money for post fire cleanup, typically for mudslides, road repair; bridge replacement, etc., and wages for those doing the work. Montana’s share this year of just firefighting, not including the cleanup, was $54 million. That’s just for fires, not the day to day costs of wages, vehicles and equipment necessary for proper management.

Now, as a native Montanan, I’ve had issues with the forest service. Think “controlled burns” as just one example. But if the state takes over management of public lands, we as taxpayers would have to assume all those costs annually, year after year. Can the state afford that? What would the result be? Higher taxes, which we here in Montana aren’t generally into and which would cause quite a stir.

So what would the alternative be for the state now burdened with this expense? I fear it would be to start selling off the land to big businesses, developers and the generally rich. Who else could afford it? Our public lands would become “the king’s forest” owned only by the rich with no access for us peons.

Don’t fall for this Montana. It will end up being a land grab. We’ve seen enough of that already.

Jane LaRock,

Trout Creek