Page 25 - Flathead Beacon // 8.17.16

Mike King expressed his support. Under the agreement, the golf course would get $1.35 million for deferred maintenance and improvement projects, an annual operating budget of $250,000 and water rights.
Smelting waste was capped and the Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course built on top of it, with inert slag in the bunkers.
Years of negotiations led to the agree- ment, which includes $500,000 annually for overseeing Superfund issues such as soil removal and lead dust abatement and to maintain other waste-in-place sites and oversee potential development of land that Arco deeded to the county.
HELENA
5. Montana Wheat Farmers Report
Big Yield, Low Prices
Though Montana’s wheat farmers are reporting a large harvest this year, pro- ducers aren’t reaping many pro ts due to low prices.
Winter wheat values dropped as low as $2.16 a bushel this year, meaning many Montana farmers will lose money on grain.
According to gures from the Chicago Board of Trade, for the past two years U.S. wheat prices have been below $5 a bushel and slipped to below $4 a bushel this year, a far cry from the almost $9 a bushel earned between 2011 and 2014.
“From a nancial perspective, the cost of production has not gone down nearly as much as the price of grain,” Adrian Doucette, president of Stockman Bank for northcentral Montana, told the Great Falls Tribune. Stockman Bank is Mon- tana’s largest private agricultural lend- ing institution.
The drop in price comes as wheat pro- duction continues to outpace demands. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that global stocks of wheat will exceed international demand by more than a quarter of a billion tons this year.
In Montana, areas that received good rainfall are seeing huge yields, making up slightly for the low prices. On the High- wood bench in central Montana, farm- ers are cutting as many as 177 bushels an acre.
The 2016 Montana crop may be only the third harvest in a decade to be val- ued at less than $1 billion. Lola Raska, of the Montana Grain Growers Association, said part of that is because farmers don’t have other options. Though Montana’s beer crop saw a 40,000 acre increase, the merger between beer giants AB InBev and SABMiller have reduced the number of barley contracts available.
HELENA
6. U.S. Government Sues Utility to
Recover Fire ghting Costs
The U.S. government, facing rising re ghting costs as blazes rage more fre- quently and with greater intensity across the West, wants Montana’s largest utility to compensate it for a 2010 wild re near Canyon Ferry Lake east of Helena.
Over three days in July 2010, the Lake- side Fire burned nearly 900 acres of fed- eral, state and private land. It destroyed a cabin and two other structures and
forced the evacuation of residents north of the lake. More than 200 people from various agencies and led by the U.S. For- est Service responded to the re.
NorthWestern Energy’s negligence of a power line caused the re, according to the lawsuit led in U.S. District Court. A Forest Service investigation concluded the re was started after the power line malfunctioned, severed and ignited the grass and timber on the ground.
The power line’s poles and insulators had not been properly maintained by NorthWestern Energy, the lawsuit said.
“The Ward Ranch Line would not have malfunctioned, snapped and caused the Lakeside Fire if defendant had exercised reasonable care in the maintenance and operation of the line,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Megan Dishong wrote in the lawsuit.
The government seeks $485,855 — the cost of ghting the re — plus interest and an unspeci ed amount in penalties.
NorthWestern’s attorneys led a response in which the company denies any liability.
LIVINGSTON
7. Hundreds of Fish Killed in
Yellowstone River
Montana wildlife o cials are work- ing to nd out what caused hundreds of white sh to die in the Yellowstone River near Livingston.
The Bozeman Daily Chronicle reports that Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks o cials found 382 dead white sh in the area on Aug. 12, con rming reports of a large-scale sh kill.
The cause of the deaths is unknown at this time. O cials say a sh and disease health lab will analyze samples from the area.
FWP spokeswoman Andrea Jones says white sh can be an early indicator of issues with river health and that the sh play an important role in the river’s ecosystem.
BILLINGS
8. Coal Declines Mean Millions Less in Coal Taxes
Coal industry declines are hurting funding for libraries and other programs. The Billings Gazette reports coal min- ing is down by 7 million tons through June compared with the rst half of last
year.
Montana’s Department of Revenue
says the scal year ended in June with $7.3 million less collected in coal taxes.
Declining coal mine royalties caused Crow Tribe layo s.
Coal taxes contribute about $500,000 annually to the state’s libraries. Losses will be covered by reducing spending on databases.
The U.S. Energy Information Admin- istration says the country’s electricity produced from coal is down to 29 per- cent from over 40 percent eight years ago.
Montana collected $1.75 billion in taxes last year, and coal revenue accounted for a small percentage.
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