Environment

A group of hunting and conservation organizations say a proposed land swap and new trail in the Crazy Mountains falls short of protecting access to some of the best public land in Montana.

Environmental groups on Aug. 27 sued the Trump Administration for allegedly breaking federal law when it finalized management plans for coal rich land in eastern Montana and northern Wyoming.

The environmental groups in their lawsuit say the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to explore alternatives to strip mining or the impacts of fossil fuel combustion when it approved management plans covering the Powder River Basin.

The State of Montana this week greenlit the first phase of construction of an underground copper mine in the central part of the state.

The Montana Department of Environmental Quality on Aug. 14 issued Tintina Montana, Inc. a permit to begin surface preparation for the proposed 311 acre Black Butte Copper Mine north of White Sulphur Springs.

DEQ spokesperson Rebecca Harbage says the permit allows the company to get started in the area.

"It doesn’t involve drilling into the ground. It’s preparation of the surface area itself," Harbage said.

Montana’s Republican Sen. Steve Daines Aug. 11 met with conservation and public lands groups in Gardiner to celebrate the recent passage of the bipartisan Great American Outdoors Act.

With the Roosevelt Arch at Yellowstone National Park in the background, Daines said it was public land that brought a divided Washington, D.C. together.