Tug of War .. in Montana Over Public Access to Waterway

[struggle4progress]

Tug of War Is On in Montana Over Public Access to Waterway

By JIM ROBBINS
Published: July 26, 2006

VICTOR, Mont. —

... “Definitely it is a ditch, because it’s diverted water for irrigation,” Mr. Lewis said by phone from New York, where he was on tour. “If you watch the water levels go up and down, you know it’s a ditch.”

A state district judge agreed in May that while Mitchell Slough was once part of the nearby Bitterroot River, it had been transformed by the hand of man, by changes including numerous head gates that control flows, and so was exempt from the Montana stream access law.

But an organization called the Bitterroot River Protective Association and the State of Montana appealed the decision to the Montana Supreme Court on July 12, arguing that the waterway belonged to everyone despite the no-trespassing signs and the wire fences crossing it. Lawyers for the state expect a decision within a year.

“There’s fabulous wealth on this 13 miles of stream, and they want to call it an irrigation ditch,” said Michael Howell, a founder of the association and the publisher of The Bitterroot Star, a weekly newspaper ...

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/26/us/26slough.html?ex=1154059200&en=d15780542043cfe1&ei=5087%0A