• Print •  • E-mail Alerts • Search Articles

March 2008

State Roundups
Montana

Timber! There goes the budget

First a decline in timber harvests from national forests cut into county budgets in western Montana. Now forested counties face even deeper cuts if Congress doesn't reauthorize a program that has shielded rural schools and road systems from the financial fallout of less logging. Lincoln County stands to lose $3.6 million, Flathead County about $1.9 million and Missoula County roughly $800,000, according to the Montana Association of Counties. Statewide losses could be as high as $15 million, forcing county governments that have come to depend on the federal money to either raise taxes or reduce services.

Counties that are part of national forests receive 25 percent of the proceeds from logging, mining, grazing and recreation on forestland. Traditionally, the money has supplemented funding for schools and roads. But since the early 1990s, those payments have declined along with the amount of timber sold by the U.S. Forest Service.

Congress enacted the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act in 2000 to offset those revenue losses and renewed it for one year in 2006. The act is set to expire in July; in January county governments in the state received their last checks from the program. Montana's federal lawmakers favor reauthorizing the money, but Congress isn't likely to take up the matter until spring.

Cuba says peas; growers oblige

Fifteen thousand tons of Montana peas and lentils are headed to Cuba. The $7.8 million sale, negotiated after a trade mission last fall by eight farmers and ranchers, gives state legume growers a toehold in a problematic but promising market.

In 2000 Congress relaxed a long-standing embargo on trade with Cuba, opening the door to food and agricultural products. Montana's shipment is a fraction of the 122,000 tons of peas and lentils that Cuba imports annually, and the state is playing catch-up to North Dakota, which has sold over $26 million worth of legumes, or pulse crops, to Cuba since 2002.

But the deal gives Montana growers hope that Cuba will become a steady customer for their peas, lentils and beans. Supply is not likely to be an issue; once a minor producer of legumes, the state today accounts for one-quarter of the U.S. pulse-crop market.

—Phil Davies