I pasted the whole thing because you have to register to read it on the website.
Town in Montana Wilderness Is Divided Over Drilling Plan
By JIM ROBBINS
Published: March 21, 2004
In Blackleaf Canyon just north of Choteau, Mont., where the rolling prairie turns suddenly into serrated, snow-mottled mountains, a natural gas plant sits shuttered and silent.
It is one of the few signs of industry in the vast, wind-whipped region of Montana known as the Rocky Mountain Front, high plains that extend for 150 miles from the Canadian border to just north of Helena, the capital, an area so wild and rich in wildlife that it draws frequent comparisons to the Serengeti and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Falling gas prices ended the short-lived boom in the area in the 1980's, but now prices are high again, and some residents of Choteau, a tiny town 100 miles north of Helena, are hoping for a new boom. They want to bring back the drilling rigs and reopen the processing plant and pipelines to take to market the natural gas that lies buried at the base of the mountains.
The Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management, the federal agencies that manage some 40,000 acres that would be affected, recently began an environmental study to determine if drilling should resume.
"I'd like to see them drill," said Carl Field, a longtime real estate broker and land manager with a cluttered storefront office on Choteau's quiet main street. Gas production, Mr. Field said, "could help everyone around here, from suppliers to contractors, motels and grocery stores."
For many, however, the prospect of drilling on the Front again is sacrilege. A combination of federal lands and vast private ranches, the Front is undeveloped, and because it is much lower in altitude than the mountains that tower over it, it provides a crucial winter refuge for wildlife.
"How can someone take an area of this magnificence and sell it down the river for a few minutes of natural gas supply?" said Stoney Burk, a real estate lawyer with an office in a log cabin on the other side of Choteau's main thoroughfare. "It has the largest herd of bighorn sheep in the Northwest, the second largest migrating elk herd, the biggest population of grizzlies outside of the parks, as well as eagles, wolves, cougars and other wildlife."
Gloria Flora, the former supervisor of the Lewis and Clark National Forest, who in 1997 placed a moratorium on new oil and gas leases on publicly owned land in the region, agreed. "Full-scale development on the Rocky Mountain Front would be nothing short of a disaster," Ms. Flora said. She now leads a coalition of conservationists trying to stop the new proposals.
Conservationists say the energy bill now stalled in the Senate would greatly speed development on public lands and could override the moratorium.
While estimates of how long the gas along the Front would supply the country vary, some in favor of drilling say it does not matter. "They claim it's only four or five days of gas for the U.S.," said Arnie Gettel, a Teton County commissioner who supports the drilling. "But that could mean 15 years of production for us here."
While standoffs between environmentalists and developers are frequent in the West, this one is different. First, many of those against development in this rock-rib conservative region are Republicans who are angry that, in their view, the Bush administration holds nothing sacred when it comes to the environment. Mr. Burk is one of them.
Second, these battles no longer occur along the same ideological lines they once did. As much of the country has been developed, the lure of the wild has created an economy all its own. These debates are increasingly a clash of two opposing economies: one based on protecting natural resources for the so-called new economy of hunting, recreation and tourism, the other based on consuming them.
"Most of this new economy is amenity driven," said Larry Swanson, a Ph.D. economist with the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West, a research organization in Missoula, Mont., that has studied the emerging economy. "People want to live near mountains and rivers."
This new economy is the future of Montana, Dr. Swanson said. "Natural resources accounts for a declining share of the state's economy," he said. "Eighty to 90 percent of the growth is in urban areas" with access to wild lands for recreation.
That pattern appears to be playing out in Choteau, though more slowly than in other places. Many people have built second homes at the foot of the mountains, including the television talk show host David Letterman, and many more pass through on their way to Glacier National Park. That, some say, is the future.
"Farming and ranching has tanked as far as job creation," said Mary Sexton, a Teton County commissioner, rancher and part owner of the Stage Stop Inn, a new motel. "Most of the downtown businesses tell you that without tourism they'd dry up and blow away."
Mr. Gettel argues that the decline in prices for livestock and farm products is precisely why drilling should be permitted, to revive the economy. "Prices are not good," he said. "It may not be too much longer and my boys won't be farming."
Some argue that living in such a rugged, undeveloped area is part of a heritage that should be preserved. "There is a sense of place on the Front," Ms. Flora said. "People have an attachment to the landscape, from the sacred sites of the Blackfeet to the third-generation elk hunter who wants his son to hunt here."
Still, local sentiment over whether to drill is evenly split, according to a recent poll. The issue is so touchy, said Melody Martinsen, editor of The Choteau Acantha, a weekly newspaper, that "we're probably the only paper in the country that hasn't written an editorial about it."
That is because Ms. Martinsen and her husband, Jeff, are two of the three members of the newspaper's editorial board. While Mr. Martinsen favors development, she is opposed.
"It can be done in an environmentally sound manner," Mr. Martinsen said. "The technology is there to do it."
Ms. Martinsen gently disagrees with her husband. "It's a handful of jobs over a handful of years," she said. The Front "should be down on the list of places we get our natural gas from."
Mr. Burk, the lawyer, takes it further. "There's lots of people like me who have never thought of civil disobedience," he said. "But I am now. And there are other current and former Republicans who are talking about stopping the rape of our last wild places."
Town in Montana Wilderness Is Divided Over Drilling Plan
By JIM ROBBINS
Published: March 21, 2004
In Blackleaf Canyon just north of Choteau, Mont., where the rolling prairie turns suddenly into serrated, snow-mottled mountains, a natural gas plant sits shuttered and silent.
It is one of the few signs of industry in the vast, wind-whipped region of Montana known as the Rocky Mountain Front, high plains that extend for 150 miles from the Canadian border to just north of Helena, the capital, an area so wild and rich in wildlife that it draws frequent comparisons to the Serengeti and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Falling gas prices ended the short-lived boom in the area in the 1980's, but now prices are high again, and some residents of Choteau, a tiny town 100 miles north of Helena, are hoping for a new boom. They want to bring back the drilling rigs and reopen the processing plant and pipelines to take to market the natural gas that lies buried at the base of the mountains.
The Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management, the federal agencies that manage some 40,000 acres that would be affected, recently began an environmental study to determine if drilling should resume.
"I'd like to see them drill," said Carl Field, a longtime real estate broker and land manager with a cluttered storefront office on Choteau's quiet main street. Gas production, Mr. Field said, "could help everyone around here, from suppliers to contractors, motels and grocery stores."
For many, however, the prospect of drilling on the Front again is sacrilege. A combination of federal lands and vast private ranches, the Front is undeveloped, and because it is much lower in altitude than the mountains that tower over it, it provides a crucial winter refuge for wildlife.
"How can someone take an area of this magnificence and sell it down the river for a few minutes of natural gas supply?" said Stoney Burk, a real estate lawyer with an office in a log cabin on the other side of Choteau's main thoroughfare. "It has the largest herd of bighorn sheep in the Northwest, the second largest migrating elk herd, the biggest population of grizzlies outside of the parks, as well as eagles, wolves, cougars and other wildlife."
Gloria Flora, the former supervisor of the Lewis and Clark National Forest, who in 1997 placed a moratorium on new oil and gas leases on publicly owned land in the region, agreed. "Full-scale development on the Rocky Mountain Front would be nothing short of a disaster," Ms. Flora said. She now leads a coalition of conservationists trying to stop the new proposals.
Conservationists say the energy bill now stalled in the Senate would greatly speed development on public lands and could override the moratorium.
While estimates of how long the gas along the Front would supply the country vary, some in favor of drilling say it does not matter. "They claim it's only four or five days of gas for the U.S.," said Arnie Gettel, a Teton County commissioner who supports the drilling. "But that could mean 15 years of production for us here."
While standoffs between environmentalists and developers are frequent in the West, this one is different. First, many of those against development in this rock-rib conservative region are Republicans who are angry that, in their view, the Bush administration holds nothing sacred when it comes to the environment. Mr. Burk is one of them.
Second, these battles no longer occur along the same ideological lines they once did. As much of the country has been developed, the lure of the wild has created an economy all its own. These debates are increasingly a clash of two opposing economies: one based on protecting natural resources for the so-called new economy of hunting, recreation and tourism, the other based on consuming them.
"Most of this new economy is amenity driven," said Larry Swanson, a Ph.D. economist with the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West, a research organization in Missoula, Mont., that has studied the emerging economy. "People want to live near mountains and rivers."
This new economy is the future of Montana, Dr. Swanson said. "Natural resources accounts for a declining share of the state's economy," he said. "Eighty to 90 percent of the growth is in urban areas" with access to wild lands for recreation.
That pattern appears to be playing out in Choteau, though more slowly than in other places. Many people have built second homes at the foot of the mountains, including the television talk show host David Letterman, and many more pass through on their way to Glacier National Park. That, some say, is the future.
"Farming and ranching has tanked as far as job creation," said Mary Sexton, a Teton County commissioner, rancher and part owner of the Stage Stop Inn, a new motel. "Most of the downtown businesses tell you that without tourism they'd dry up and blow away."
Mr. Gettel argues that the decline in prices for livestock and farm products is precisely why drilling should be permitted, to revive the economy. "Prices are not good," he said. "It may not be too much longer and my boys won't be farming."
Some argue that living in such a rugged, undeveloped area is part of a heritage that should be preserved. "There is a sense of place on the Front," Ms. Flora said. "People have an attachment to the landscape, from the sacred sites of the Blackfeet to the third-generation elk hunter who wants his son to hunt here."
Still, local sentiment over whether to drill is evenly split, according to a recent poll. The issue is so touchy, said Melody Martinsen, editor of The Choteau Acantha, a weekly newspaper, that "we're probably the only paper in the country that hasn't written an editorial about it."
That is because Ms. Martinsen and her husband, Jeff, are two of the three members of the newspaper's editorial board. While Mr. Martinsen favors development, she is opposed.
"It can be done in an environmentally sound manner," Mr. Martinsen said. "The technology is there to do it."
Ms. Martinsen gently disagrees with her husband. "It's a handful of jobs over a handful of years," she said. The Front "should be down on the list of places we get our natural gas from."
Mr. Burk, the lawyer, takes it further. "There's lots of people like me who have never thought of civil disobedience," he said. "But I am now. And there are other current and former Republicans who are talking about stopping the rape of our last wild places."
