Who:

Bureau of Land Management & MRCDC

Bob Abbey, BLM Director

Jamie Connell, Montana State BLM Director

Stan Benes, BLM Central MT District Manager

Mark Albers, BLM HiLine District Manager

Gary Slagel, BLM Missouri Breaks Natl Monument Manager

Nick Schultz, MRCDC Chair, Petroleum County CD Manager

Dean Rogge, MRCDC Vice Chair, Garfield County CD

Rick Anderson, MRCDC Member, Choteau County CD

Dick Iversen, MRCDC Member, Richland County CD

Jeff Tiberi, MRCDC Member, MT Assn Conservation Districts

Laurie Riley, MRCDC Coordinator

Steve Hedstrom, National Assn Conservation Districts & MT Assn Conservation Districts

What:

The Council was invited to meet with the National BLM Director, Bob Abbey, and Montana State Director, Jamie Connell.

Where:

Grand Union Hotel in Fort Benton.

When:

Sunday , September 18, 2011

Why:

Bob Abbey visited the area on a 3-day listening trip to hear from diverse interests on a variety of topics involving BLM-managed lands in the state. In addition to pointing out what MT conservation districts are doing on the land to promote natural resource conservation (greater sage grouse, weed management, cottonwood regeneration, range management, irrigation water management)

and highlighting our cooperative arrangements with BLM (Central MT BLM RAC, CMR Community Working Group, Cottonwood Working Group), the Council discussed a number of issues of concern including:

• Monument designation & wilderness

• State lands exchanges / sales

• Scoria - mineral leases and back royalties

• Greater sage grouse

• Abandoned mine clean-up

• Riparian Assessment Team (BLM / NRCS)

• Bison

• Wild horses and burros

Accomplished:

Bob Abbey explained that the BLM administers 245 million acres of land of which 8.6 million is in MT. BLM wants to leave a legacy of life being better for having been here and believes we as people interested in land management have more in common than not.

• Scoria - land is not well marked for ownership, trespass is an issue and BLM understands that it is not intentional. Scoria is classified as a sellable mineral. They don't want to shut down scoria mining as it is needed for roads. They are working on getting the area mapped and scoria areas identified. They want to get more people and funds to work on the problem. 50% of BLM royalties stay in the area and 50% go to the general fund. Up until now mining scoria for own use has been