A Lewis and Clark County District Court has ordered the Gianforte Administration to release all records in an ongoing case under Montana’s “bad actor” mining law.
District Court Judge Christopher Abbott says the governor’s office has six weeks to hand over information requested by conservation groups that are questioning the state’s dismissal of a bad actor case.
The law prevents a mining company or executive with a record of not cleaning up previous mining sites or compensating the state for reclamation from getting any new permits to mine.
Montana’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) filed a bad actor enforcement in 2018 against a former leader of the now defunct Pegasus Gold Company who has joined a new group considering mining for silver in the Cabinet Mountains. However DEQ requested the case be dismissed in 2021, citing the election of governor Greg Gianforte.
Conservation groups Montana Environmental Information Center and Earthworks filed a records request for communications between Gianforte and the mining executive and his new company related to the ”bad actor” provision. The Gianforte Administration has not released anything under this request.
The governor's office did not immediately respond to MTPR’s request for comment.
