Rocky Mountain Front: The Most Patient and Stubborn Among Us

Westerners from Sublette County, Wyoming, to Sierra County, New Mexico, are asking the same surprised question: how did Montanans do it? How did Montanans successfully defend the Rocky Mountain Front from oil and gas development?

Their disbelief is understandable in these times. Since 2001, when permitting for oil and gas drilling on federal lands was expedited, a perhaps unprecedented level of oil and gas development took hold of the American West. Last year, 49,375 holes were drilled on public land in five major western regions, which is a 21-year high. Unfortunately, the last and best of the west have not been spared this land rush. Yet, Montanans count themselves uniquely fortunate among westerners, for its crown jewel remains somehow untarnished.

So, how was it done? The short answer is that partisan politics faded into the background for Montana’s seasoned statesmen, Conrad Burns and Max Baucus. In June, Senator Burns announced legislation designed to respect the leaseholder’s pocketbook and the citizens’ favorite place. Then, when the legislation stalled, Senator Baucus picked it up and carried it across the line. But, the long answer is even more inspiring.

Those who make the Front their home have inherited a long history of conservation, and they have honored that legacy time and again. The very first conservation area in Montana was designated here, when the state legislature created the Sun River Game Preserve in 1913. To the west, the Front borders over 1 million acres of Wilderness and to the east lay three Outstanding Natural Areas. Today, over 35,000 acres of private ground under conservation easement offer irreplaceable winter forage for world-renowned big game.

But this conservation patchwork wasn’t sewn together overnight by a handful of visionary environmentalists from Helena, Bozeman, and Missoula. This chain of conservation successes has required a local investment of energy from divergent interests over the long haul. This latest victory is no different.

A quick survey of just a few of the local spokespeople for the Coalition to Protect the Rocky Mountain Front reveals a crosscut of Montanans from all walks of life. There’s a part-time firefighter and taxidermist from Choteau, a schoolteacher and former Peace Corps volunteer from West Virginia, as well as an old-time outfitter and dude-ranch operator in Teton Canyon. Then, there’s the outspoken Vietnam War fighter pilot and former logger-turned-lawyer from Eureka, plus two cattle ranchers along Teton River and Dupuyer Creek. There’s also the Chief of the Blackfoot Tribal Council, multiple County Commissioners, and the 5’ 4’’ sportsmen and marathon backpacker who was once the very first paid environmental advocate in Montana, stumping for the Wilderness Society in the 1960s.

Such a blend of backgrounds has lent the Front more credibility and notoriety. Yet, a victory on this scale runs deeper than a politically correct palate of diverse stakeholders. This struggle also required the right combination of cooperation and creativity. Those who form the ranks of the Coalition, and live along the Rocky Mountain Front, have shown themselves willing to see both sides of the oil and gas argument: profits and place. If this were not the case then the largest leaseholder on the Front, Startech Energy, would never have come to the table.

Still, creativity and cooperation did not immediately win the day. It also took an iron will, and quite frankly, those who make their home along the Front are the most patient and stubborn among us. In 1977, Exxon and Chevron had made known their intent to drill the Front, and by 1981 the Lewis and Clark National Forest had opened all public lands on the Front for leasing. Advocates like Gene Sentz, Roy Jacobs, and Chuck Blixurd attended those first public meetings on oil and gas drilling in 1977, and they never gave up.

Even now, months after President Bush signed legislation withdrawing federal oil and gas leases along the Front, the Coalition is moving ahead. After all, oil and gas is one among many threats to our wild lands, and the quality management of a Wilderness designation remains an unfulfilled need on the Front as in many landscapes across Montana and the American west.

If there’s one thing we can all learn from this past year, it is that those battles most worthy of fighting should be fought by those least likely to be distracted. In the words of Gene Sentz, co-founder of Friends of the Rocky Mountain Front, “It took 30 years of debate and countless public meetings and public comments to achieve this bipartisan legislative protection for a place so special that many call it the “soul” of Montana. And more remains to be done.”