The Fort Belknap Indian Community is opposing a settlement between the state’s Department of Environmental Quality and mining companies that illegally mined on the tribes’ ancestral homeland, harming crucial water sources for the reservation.
From 2020 to 2022, Blue Arc LLC and Legacy Mining LLC conducted mining activities at the Zortman Mine in the Little Rocky Mountains without permits, licenses, or performance bonds, resulting in damage to ongoing environmental reclamation efforts.
The Zortman-Landusky Mine opened in 1979 and was operated by Pegasus Gold Corp. until it filed for bankruptcy in 1998. Two decades of mining activities caused widespread surface and groundwater contamination, and in 1999, the DEQ and Bureau of Land Management took over the site. In 2001, Luke Ployhar, owner of Blue Arc LLC, bought the land out of the bankruptcy under the condition that the DEQ had ongoing access to conduct reclamation activities.
The two agencies spent approximately $85 million cleaning up the area, according to the consent order. The site needs water treatment in perpetuity, meaning the additional cost to taxpayers could exceed hundreds of millions of dollars.
The illegal mining activities damaged the continuous environmental cleanup and caused contaminated water to flow downstream to the Fort Belknap Indian Community, polluting its water.
In 2022, the state proposed a $516,567 penalty for Blue Arc LLC and Legacy Mining LLC. On Friday, May 22, the DEQ reached a settlement with the companies for $200,000, to be paid over five years. The agreement does not require an admission of wrongdoing.
The Fort Belknap Indian Community intervened in the enforcement action in 2023, arguing that the illegal mining activity in the region exacerbated environmental harm to reservation water sources and in areas of profound cultural significance.
Fort Belknap, made up of the Gros Ventre and Assiniboine tribes, says the settlement is a slap on the wrist, asserting that the agreement lacks accountability and is premature because the full extent of environmental harm caused by the miners remains unknown.
“The Fort Belknap Indian Community Council has continuously monitored the activities near our sacred sites and was forced to take legal action in Luke Ployhar’s and Owen Voigt’s latest effort to mine the area. Their intentional and deliberate disregard of the state’s mining permitting process further shows their bad faith efforts and determination to push their profit-driven agenda. There is no regard for the letter of the law, the environment, or spiritual beliefs,” Fort Belknap Indian Community President Jeffrey Stiffarm said in a press release. “Our Gros Ventre and Assiniboine beliefs and responsibilities are to protect our traditional and spiritual lands and react as good stewards of the land. Even though the current boundaries are drawn by non-Indian laws, our ancestral lands include the mined area, and the pollution created by mining will flow onto Fort Belknap Indian Reservation lands. We, as a Council, are entrusted and charged with the responsibility to protect the land.”
According to Earthjustice, an environmental law nonprofit, Fort Belknap intends to file an official opposition to the settlement.
