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Vol. 18, No. 52
September 14, 2022
Commissioners amend controversial resolution By Kristi Niemeyer For the Valley Journal
Scholarship pg. 7
RDO pg. 12
Sports pg. 15
RONAN — Just a week after meeting with around 250 disgruntled irrigators Aug. 30 at the Ronan Community Center, Lake County Commissioners convened last Wednesday to reconsider a controversial resolution that would have removed the county from the chore of collecting irrigation fees. The resolution, approved by two of the three commissioners on July 20, enumerates reasons the commissioners believe the county treasurer should not be responsible for billing, collecting and distributing operation and maintenance fees for the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project. The move, which would have wreaked havoc with fee collection for next year’s irrigation season and conceivably led to a shutdown of the irrigation project, was the topic of the Aug. 30 meeting, requested by irrigators. Following the nearly three-hour confab, com-
KRISTI NIEMEYER
It was a full house at the Ronan Community Center Aug. 30 as Lake County Commissioners met with the public to explain their controversial resolution that would have ended the county’s role in billing, collecting and dispersing irrigation fees.
missioner Gale Decker met informally two days later with four irrigation district commissioners. Their conversation led to last Tuesday’s hearing. The process of assessing and collecting irrigation fees is convoluted at best, especially on a vast
irrigation project that encompasses four counties and the Flathead Reservation, and is managed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Complicating matters further, Lake County is home to three irrigation districts: Flathead, Mission and Jocko,
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each with their own elected commissioners and office staff. According to Decker, the process goes this way: the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project’s general manager, who works for the BIA, sets Operation and Maintenance fees,
which are then approved by the districts, who also set administration fees. The BIA sends a statement to the county treasurers that lists all the irrigators, the number of irrigated acres and the O&M assessment. The districts would typically inform the treasurer of the administrative assessment, and the combined amount would appear on irrigators’ tax statements. This year, however, the administrative fee of $2 approved by the districts didn’t find its way to the treasurer in time for her to include it in the tax bill that goes out in mid-October. And that’s just this year’s issue. According to Decker, records the county receives from irrigation districts have been rife with inaccuracies since 2018. Under state statute, he says the Department of Revenue’s local office is supposed to add the irrigation fee assessments to the property tax statements. But the office declined to continue adding fee assessments about four years ago, so the see page 2