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Forests and Rangelands Success Story

BLM and Tribe Collaborate to Achieve Common Goal
Central Montana Fire Zone, Montana
National Fire Plan - Fuels Reduction
2008

Fort Belknap hand crew employee evaluates a tree to be cut down.
Fort Belknap hand crew employee evaluates a tree to be cut down during thinning project. BLM File Photo.

Thinning project area after treatment.
Work completed by the Fort Belknap Tribal hand crew. BLM File Photo.

In January 2008, fire and fuels managers from BLM’s Central Montana Fire Zone (CMFZ) sat down with fire management personnel from the Fort Belknap Reservation to discuss options for completing hazardous fuels reduction projects on the BLM-Fort Belknap Reservation ownership boundary. The Fort Belknap Reservation is located in northcentral Montana, approximately 100 miles northeast of Lewistown, Montana, and encompasses 650,000 acres of plains, grasslands, and timber.

Since 2002, the CMFZ has actively implemented mechanical and prescribed fire fuels reduction projects around the timbered town sites of Landusky and Zortman, which have been designated as Wildland Urban Interface Communities-at-Risk. Since then, BLM fire personnel and contractors have completed hazardous fuels reduction projects on BLM lands within and around Landusky and Zortman. Similarly, the Fort Belknap tribal hand crew has completed numerous fuels reduction projects on tribal lands adjacent to these town sites. Seeing the need to collaborate across the boundary lines, the tribe and BLM decided to partner. BLM and tribal specialists worked closely to identify key hazardous areas along the boundary and laid out a 36-acre thinning unit, regardless of ownership, and got to work using the 20-person tribal hand crew from Fort Belknap. Using a cost-share agreement, the tribe paid for labor and supplies for work done on tribal lands, while the BLM paid the hand crew for work done on BLM lands. The project was nearly completed in late September 2008.

Plans are to continue this effort along the boundary, utilizing the tribal hand crew and further protecting the WUI townsites of Landusky and Zortman.

For more information, please contact Karly Krausz, Fire Mitigation & Education Specialist at 406-538-1977 or email: kkrausz@blm.gov.