A reality based independent journal of observation & analysis, serving the Flathead Valley & Montana since 2006. © James Conner.
Yesterday, Montana’s all Republican Public Service Commission petitioned (document, PDF) the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for a rehearing on the transfer of the license for the Salish-Kootenai (Kerr) Dam to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. Kim Briggeman at the Missoulian has the story.
The PSC did not announce it was considering this rehearing request, let alone hold its own hearing on the wisdom of filing such a request:
The PSC’s filing came “out of the blue,” Brian Lipscomb, president and chief executive officer of Energy Keepers, said Thursday evening.
“We’re a little perplexed by it,” Lipscomb said. “Of course we’ll study it and look at it and the issues the Public Service Commission is raising.”
Ambushing the CSKT like that is dirtier than a crackback block administered after the play is dead. And this play has been dead for 30 years:
…[Brian] Lipscomb [CEO of Energy Keepers, the CSKT entity that will manage the dam] said “literally thousands of comments were taken” in 1985, when FERC approved an agreement that included an option for the tribes to take full control of the dam after 30 years with certain stipulations. The tribes, the Department of Interior, the Flathead Irrigation District and the Montana Consumer Counsel were all part of the agreement.
In his Request for Rehearing, the PSC's attorney agreed that much testimony was taken in 1985, but argued that agreeing to the transfer of the license 30 years ago was the problem:
The MPSC noted in its comments that the only opportunity for public input on the conveyance of the Kerr project to CSKT occurred three decades ago during the 1985 Commission relicensing proceeding. The citizens impacted at that time may no longer be alive or may have subsequently moved out of the area. New residents have moved to the area, new businesses have been created, and a completely new set of citizens have interest in this proceeding. Montana residents have concerns that the original intent involving power production and irrigation from the Kerr project is followed with the license transfer and remains consistent with the public interest.
Translation: a deal done 30 years ago is past its use-by date. Why is it past that date? Well, we don’t know. That’s why we need the rehearing: to find the facts that support our conclusion.
This underhanded rehearing request is as amateurish and embarrassing as the daft complaint (PDF) in Keenan v. Bay, the federal lawsuit filed by State Sen. Bob Keenen, former State Sen. Verdell Jackson, and Bill Meyer’s tour boat company, that argued the CSKT are being gulled by a Middle Eastern nation (Turkey) bent on building an Islamic Bomb with stolen American yellowcake.
These are delaying tactics. Yes, the people irredeemably opposed to CSKT ownership of the dam, and to the CSKT water compact, hope they’ll get lucky with Keenan v. Bay, or with the PSC’s rehearing petition, but their ultimate strategy is getting Congress to repeal the Hellgate Treaty and disband the CSKT reservation. They believe that if they can keep the issue and their arguments in play, a tea party controlled Congress and White House will grant their wishes.
That may sound far-fetched, but they’ve gotten legislation they wanted introduced in Congress before:
Senate Bill 630, introduced in early 1999 by U.S. Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., and House Resolution 1158, an identical bill introduced by Rep. Rick Hill, R-Mont., envision transfer of Flathead Indian Irrigation Project management and maintenance duties to the Flathead Joint Board of Control’s (JBC) three water districts, mostly comprised of non-Indians. The project is run by the federal BIA and provides water to about 127,000 acres of farm and ranch land across the 1.2-million-acre reservation.
Garrit Voggesser’s 41-page history of the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project is available online at the Bureau of Reclamation.
For what it’s worth, I think the Salish-Kootenai Dam will be better managed by the CSKT than it ever was by Montana Power, PPL MT, or Northwestern. Those utilities operated the dam as a cash cow for investors in far-away places, varying discharges from the dam in ways that virtually rendered the lower Flathead River a biological desert. Indeed, for the CSKT, environmentally responsible management of the dam was one of the attractions of ownership. Now, at long last, the owners of the dam, the stewards of the lake and river, own and live on the land on which the dam rests and through which the river flows. They’re smart, they have powerful incentives to manage the dam responsibly, and I’m confident they will.