Lack of funding buries gravel study

A planned analysis of the cumulative impacts of Flathead County's numerous gravel pits has been quietly shelved less than a year after it was first proposed by state officials.

The study would have examined the environmental effects of the valley's roughly 120 permitted sand and gravel mines.

It also may have outlined additional mitigation requirements for new gravel pits - thereby addressing the kind of broader, regional impacts that typically get overlooked during the permitting process for individual operations.

However, officials with the Montana Department of Environmental Quality always cautioned that no money had been set aside for the project.

That ultimately proved to be its downfall.

"Because of the inability to find funding, we've shelved the study for now," Greg Hallsten, the department's environmental impact study coordinator, said during a telephone interview on Wednesday.

A thorough, comprehensive analysis would probably cost at least $250,000, he said, and possibly much more.

"It would have depended on how many technical studies we needed," Hallsten said.

A frequent complaint during public hearings on new gravel mines in recent months has been that they hurt property values for the surrounding homeowners.

Another major concern is the potential cumulative impacts that gravel pits in the Flathead River corridor might have on water quality.

Specific studies probably would have been needed to examine either of those issues, Hallsten said.

Gravel operators in Flathead County produced about 2.63 million cubic yards of sand and gravel in 2004. More than three-quarters of that amount came from just 10 pits.

When state officials first proposed conducting the study, they essentially acknowledged that the current permitting process is inadequate in the Flathead, given the pace of growth and development here.

"When we permit gravel mines one by one, we probably don't get to the level of analysis needed to address cumulative impacts," Steve Welch, the agency's permitting and compliance division administrator, said last fall.

For example, "we recognize that there could be a potential for water quality and water quantity problems in some areas," Welch said. "We need to look at that on a more regional basis and consider how it could be mitigated."

The state has never done a programmatic environmental analysis specifically for gravel pits, although it has done them for other issues, such as coal-bed methane development in Eastern Montana.

Hallsten said the proposed study could come off the shelf if the Montana Legislature appropriates the necessary funding.

Reporter Bill Spence may be reached at 758-4459 or by e-mail at bspence@dailyinterlake.com