Paying the Price for Neglecting a Lifeline

— February 6, 2025 —

In June 2024, the Milk River Project siphons experienced a catastrophic failure, halting water flow to municipalities and agricultural producers along the Hi-Line.

Over the past century, this engineering marvel has been the only reason the Milk River runs every year, serving as a lifeline to the drylands of northern Montana. The Milk River Irrigation project infrastructure built an agricultural industry that hardworking Montanans on the Hi-Line sustain and grow.

We are paying the price for neglecting this lifeline. We are facing a summer without water.

What does this mean for our farmers, ranchers, and municipalities? The cities of Havre, Chinook, and Harlem have a reserve in Fresno Reservoir that can remain at low flow and keep the nearly 20,000 people on the Hi-Line supplied with drinking water.

The real trouble will be with irrigation.

On the Hi-Line, irrigation means hay, and hay means you can feed your cows over the winter. If farmers don't produce hay, they have to buy it. Low supply will only make prices go up.

Farmers and ranchers are sitting at their kitchen counters this winter trying to weigh the risk of keeping their replacement heifers or buying new equipment. Should they downsize again after just starting to rebuild from the drought of 2021? Do they bank on a wet spring or summer rains?

Agricultural producers are known for their adaptability. You can't control the weather and by and large, you can't predict seasons in advance. What they’ll experience this summer, however, has nothing to do with Mother Nature.

The federal government neglected the essential infrastructure that brings life and sustenance to Montanans and ultimately the world.

If I were a farmer or rancher on the Hi-Line, I’d be furious. Producers cover 74% of system costs, yet the feds ignore it until disaster strikes.

Our Montana delegation has rushed to their aid during the catastrophic failures of the last five years but where were they before that, when the Bureau of Reclamation, the Joint Board of Control and everyone and their cousin were telling them it was only a matter of time before the siphons blew?

After the siphons are replaced, these same politicians will cut ribbons on the repairs while the Hi-Line will be left crossing its fingers as canals erode and silt builds in Fresno.

This reactive leadership is unacceptable and offensive. The people and producers of the Hi-Line deserve leadership that makes sustainable plans for the the Milk River Project and enough noise in Washington, D.C., to get funding in place for the next century.

I am that leader and I’m ready to take action. Let’s get to work.