At a packed community hall in Drummond Thursday evening, state and tribal officials pitched irrigators on their plan for local water users. They want to ensure the Clark Fork and Blackfoot Rivers remain high enough to protect fish during the driest parts of the summer.
Seth Makepeace is a Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT) hydrologist. He told the crowd officials won’t arbitrarily cut off irrigation for ranchers and farmers.
"We're looking for community based water solutions. We're not coming here with a formal plan. We're coming here with a framework that's massageable and adaptable."
Under that framework, the state and the tribes can restrict irrigation usage for junior water rights holders when the rivers dip below minimum water levels.
The rancher-heavy crowd expressed concern that would disrupt the area’s preexisting system where water rights are enforced by a local commissioner. Charlie Parke is a cattle rancher in the area.
"What I fear is that this whole thing is, the water users are going to end up with a year-round water master appointed by the state, making a big lot of money and we're going to pay for it," Parke said.
Based on historical streamflow data, officials forecast they’ll need to exercise that right once every four years.
