Clark Fork Coalition - September 17, 2004
by Ari van Schilfgaarde

     During the time Semester in the West spent in Missoula, we were lucky enough to come into contact with three members of the Clark Fork Coalition. The three women, Tracy Stone-Manning, Susan Brick and Heidi D'Armande were respectively the executive director, staff scientist and the development director (also a "carcass utilization expert"). Started in 1985 as a citizen activist group, the Clark Fork Coalition now specializes in dealing with the restoration of the Clark Fork River, and the surrounding twenty-two thousand square mile watershed. Much of its work is in collaboration with the local landowners along the watershed, many of them active ranchers suspicious of the influx of new money into Montana and the rise of the "hobby ranch". Much of their work stems from the premise that it is possible to "engage ranchers to realize that [ecological] restoration is beneficial" to them. (The benefits can be both ecological and economic in nature.)

     Although much of its work is in collaborative settings, the Clark Fork Coalition still retains an attorney to help work on its advocacy for the Clark Fork River. This includes fighting against a proposed gold mine in the headwaters and dealing with the Superfund designation of much of the Clark Fork.

     Over the past hundred years the intensive copper mining near the headwaters around Butte, MT has badly damaged the river. The tailings from Anaconda Mining Company, later bought out by Arco Corporation, included tailings from the largest open pit copper mine in the world, the Berkeley Pit. The residue pile leeches high concentrations of acid and copper, along with heavy metals and molybdenum during rains. The resulting pollution has killed all life in portions of the Clark Fork, and severely damaged others. The degree of the contamination has caused much of the Clark Fork to be designated a Superfund site. Since Arco Corporation is the responsible party for the mine, it is responsible for mitigation or remediation of the environmental damage caused by its mine. The estimates for the river cleanup run to ten years and roughly $300 million. The Coalition believes that the work that needs to be done includes removing 867 acres of topsoil that is so polluted that it is no longer capable of hosting vegetation. The soil is then placed in the mine pit, and replaced with fresh topsoil so that it can again become ecologically viable.

     The issue of continued ecological and economic viability of the Clark Fork watershed is of central concern to the Coalition. Many of their efforts focus on the issue of livestock grazing. While some environmental groups will only litigate with a rancher, or only function in a collaborative setting, the Coalition tries to offer constructive alternatives to the grazing, only reverting to legal action when collaborative measures have failed. Their efforts include encouraging ranchers to develop a local or niche market for their beef (especially in Missoula). They also try and provide ranchers the ability to use high intensity/low duration grazing by helping to provide electric fencing, and off stream watering in order to keep the cattle from congregating solely or primarily in the riparian zone.

     The group has been fairly successful in achieving their goals. They managed to get the Superfund designation, and recently managed to help arrange for the destruction of the Mill Creek Dam, and the subsequent draining of the polluted reservoir behind it.

     Among the people that we speak to, some are more charismatic and engaging than others, the women of the Clark Fork Coalition were among the most engaging and cohesive of the people we have met. Their main goal in meeting with us was not to convince of the "rightness" of their position as it was with so many others, rather it was to share some of the enthusiasm and joy that they found in their work. As one said "fighting's no fun, how do we stop fighting, because there's fun in success." The three women were just as passionate about their work as any of the advocates that we have met, but in their advocacy their seemed to be the least amount of antagonism, and their collaborations descriptions of the collaborations were the least self-serving. This was the second time that we met a group of people (after Wallowa Resources, that I felt) actively worked to empower their community to become more successful on its own terms than it was currently. The dialogue was humorous, engaging and thoroughly inspiring. We thank the members of Clark Fork Coalition for giving so freely of their time.