Joint Board of Control forming multiple battle lines
Hey savvy news reader! Thanks for choosing local.
You are now reading
1 of 3 free articles.
ST. IGNATIUS — The Flathead Joint Board of Control began 2015 by amassing forces and funds for multiple legal and legislative battles the group plans to fight this year.
A draft budget released Dec. 14 shows the board plans to spend as much as $354,000 on attorney and consulting fees in the next year. That is more than the board’s entire budget for 2013.
“I don’t want to spend any of this money,” Commissioner Shane Orien said. “This is the irrigators’ money. But I’ve heard (Gene Erb) say there are millions and millions and millions of dollars that may have been misdirected. We’re going to find it.”
Most of the money is being funneled into legal and lobbying efforts to oppose the proposed Confederated Salish and Kootenai Water Compact, to pursue a lawsuit meant to turn control of the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project to irrigators, and to fight another lawsuit that would declare ownership of the water running through the project for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.
Additionally, commissioners last week approved working with hydrologist Catherine Vandemoer and former state legislator Verdell Jackson in examining the board’s possible entitlement in regards to the Federal Energy Regulatory Committee’s licensing of management of Kerr Dam to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. The Tribes take over the dam in 2015. Vandemoer did not set a fee for the project, and is currently working pro bono.
Attorneys for the Bureau of Indian Affairs told Vandemoer in a November irrigator meeting that she was wrong in her theories about there being millions of dollars from the Kerr Dam misappropriated, but she and Jackson are pursuing it nonetheless.
Some irrigators have been pleased with the increased cost of hiring the experts.
“I was at a meeting the other night in Helena, Montana and I was impressed with your attorney, your lobbyist,” irrigator Gene Erb told the commissioners. “She stood right up amongst a bunch of those pachyderms who are thieves and she stood right up to them and went to talking.”
Gene Erb was originally vehemently opposed to hiring lobbyist Abigail St. Lawrence for $15,000 per month.
“I didn’t like spending that kind of money,” Gene Erb said. “I still don’t. But I want results and I think we’re getting there.”
But others wondered if some of the work the experts were doing was duplicative.
Irrigator Dick Erb said some of the duties being allocated to Vandemoer seemed like something the staff’s general attorney would do.
Commissioner Ted Hein acted as a frugal watchdog on the expenses, telling Vandemoer to keep costly phone calls with attorneys to a minimum. He also called for more stringent reporting to the board by the experts and lobbyists that are highly paid.
“I think it is very important each board member knows exactly what we are trusting them to do,” Hein said.
Hein said previous commissioners should have been more vigilant in keeping a watch over irrigators’ funds.
The board’s budget is separate from operations and maintenance assessments sent to the Bureau of Indian Affairs for payment of water delivery. The Bureau of Indian Affairs is the entity that can shut off water delivery if operations and maintenance assessments aren’t paid.
On Jan. 14, the board voted to pay the next six months of water delivery costs.
