Archive for Access
Republicans in the House today gave final approval to a bill we told you about yesterday. The bill seeks to roll back stream access laws in the state. The bill will now go to the Senate.
Republicans should expect a fight in the Senate. Sen. Kendall Van Dyk, who spearheaded the first expansion of stream access rights in 25 years, during the 2009 legislative session, is now in the Senate, and he’s made it clear that he’s not happy about this latest infringement on the rights of Montanans. Van Dyk had this to say about the new GOP measure, “Republican legislators campaigned on supporting hunters and anglers but as soon as they got here they turned their back on them. They are coming down, again, on the side of rich out-of-state Hollywood types who want to buy up what’s left of Montana and lock us out.”
The bill will likely begin to move through Senate committees in the following weeks.
Protecting Stream Access
Posted by:Today, the Republican majority in the Montana House of Representatives gave approval to a bill that would rollback public access to our rivers and streams.
Currently, Montanans enjoy hard fought for access to our rivers in stream. This means we are free to float, fish and recreate in these waters. This right was hard fought for by (now) Sen. Kendall Van Dyk during the last legislative session.
If this bill makes it into law, Montanans would be blocked from accessing hundreds of streams, side-channels and rivers across the state. This would be devastating to our tourism industry, as well as river and fishing guides.
The debate about river and stream access stems from a lawsuit filed by 80s pop star Huey Lewis. Lewis purchased land along Mitchell Slough in Ravalli County, a popular site with anglers. Lewis argued that he could fence off access to Mitchell Slough because someone had put an irrigation device on the stream. The Montana Supreme Court unanimously ruled against Lewis. This bill would undo this ruling, and restrict access for thousands of Montanans.
During floor debate, it was pointed out that Republicans were fighting on behalf of a single Montanan, while restricting access to the rest of us.
"We believe that the current budget, heading to the Senate Floor next week, unnecessarily pits Montanans against, creating winners and losers” 