But conservationists say the legislation the Montana Republican introduced last week gives away the farm. Irrigators counter that the bill just affirms access they were guaranteed when the area was set aside as wilderness decades ago.
Burns' legislation would provide, at no cost, rights of way of up to 60 feet along trails leading into the dams and up to 500 feet in areas adjacent to the structures. Under the bill, dam owners would be able to drive and operate motorized equipment inside the wilderness on those rights of way.
Burns said the access is needed to perform maintenance, ensure the safety of people living downstream and conduct normal dam operations.
“With this legislation, water rights are protected, agriculture operations are sustained with a stable irrigation source, and the environment is improved,” Burns said in a news release. “It's a win for all Montanans.”
When the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness was proposed, irrigators said they were assured of reasonable access to maintain the dams, most of which were built around the turn of the century.
“This isn't something that we just came up with out of the blue,” said Tex Marsolek of Darby. “This is something we were promised.”
Marsolek anticipates Burns' legislation will be tweaked a bit before it's finalized.
“There aren't going to be 100 miles of new road built,” he said. “Some of the claims about what this would do have totally mushroomed out of control.”
If the bill is passed, Marsolek said dam owners would likely use the access corridors “infrequently.” Under “very specific circumstances,” they'd use the corridors to move heavy equipment to work on the dams, he said.
Dam operators have a two-month window each year to get maintenance work accomplished and that sometimes requires the use of motorized equipment, he said.
Wayne Olson, president of the Bitterroot Valley Water Cooperative, which asked for the legislation, said it's unreasonable to ask dam operators to rely on primitive means to get the maintenance work accomplished.
“It's not possible to get this kind of work accomplished with the kinds of tools you might use in the garden,” said Olson.
He said Bitterroot ranchers and farmers care about the wilderness, too.
“We're environmentalists or we wouldn't be farmers and ranchers,” said Olson. “We want to take care of the land, too. I think we've done a pretty good job. In the days of Lewis and Clark, they couldn't even find forage down here in the valley for their horses.”
Still, conservation groups interested in maintaining wilderness traits in the Selway-Bitterroot say the legislation is all wet.
“This is absolutely the dumbest idea since James Watt tried to ‘Bomb the Bob' Marshall Wilderness two decades ago,” George Nickas of the Missoula-based Wilderness Watch said. “Fortunately, Montanans rose up and Congress stopped Watt. Once again, the citizens of Montana need to send a message loud and clear to Senator Burns to withdraw this destructive bill.”
Bill Worf, a retired Forest Service official who once ran the agency's national wilderness program, said the bill is unnecessary for continued maintenance of the dams.
“They were built with traditional hand tools and horse power 100 years ago, and were maintained the same way ever since,” said Worf. “The Forest Service promised Congress that's the way it would be when the wilderness bill passed. If the dam owners don't want dams in the wilderness, then they should breach the damn things and leave the people's wilderness alone.”
John Gatchell of the Montana Wilderness Association said the bill literally gives away a portion of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness to the owners of the dam.
“It's an overreaction and unwarranted,” said Gatchell.
Of the 16 dams located inside the wilderness, only three store more than 2,000 acre feet of water, said Kirk Thompson, a retired Forest Service engineer now living in Stevensville. Ten store less then 200 acre feet.
“The total importance of those dams for the valley is quite small today based on their relative storage,” he said. “Irrigators have been able to successfully maintain those dams for over a century without owning a right of way ... when problems have occurred, the Forest Service has been willing to work with them.”
“This bill gives away the public land within those rights of way ... they could sell it to anyone,” he said.
Burns' proposal would affect over 60 percent of the trails going into the wilderness, Thompson said.
“There's about 100 miles of trail that would be impacted,” he said.
Even the remaining 60 miles of trail could change if water users are able to successfully petition the courts to restore water rights lost when dams were breached years ago. A recent example was Tom Maclay's successful 1999 effort to restore water rights from Little Carlton Lake, despite the fact the dam there had been breached in the 1950s, said Thompson.
Maclay is currently involved in a lawsuit with the Forest Service over his efforts to rebuild the road into that lake. Thompson said Burns' legislation potentially would allow Maclay access to that road.
“I think this legislation is just an attack on the wilderness concept,” Thompson said.
Reporter Perry Backus can be reached at 523-5259 or at pbackus@missoulian.com.
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