By Helena IR Staff

A diverse group of sportsmen, conservationists, loggers and ranchers is encouraging the state's congressional delegation to sponsor an ambitious grass-roots management plan for the Blackfoot and Clearwater drainages.

Considering that the plan appears to have something for almost everyone, it would be difficult for them to refuse.

The Blackfoot Cooperative Landscape Stewardship Pilot Program, in the making for the past two years, would add 87,000 acres to the Scapegoat, Bob Marshall and Mission Mountain wilderness areas, and it would open an additional 2,000 acres to snowmobiles. It calls for a $7 million biomass plant to generate electricity for a timber mill. In addition, it seeks $400,000 a year for 10 years in federal funds for forest thinning projects, mostly on 400,000 acres of the Lolo National Forest, and $350,000 a year for the same period to pay for the planning, management and evaluation of the work.

Like the Blackfoot Challenge, a hugely successful effort aimed at preserving the rural nature but economic health of the area, the Blackfoot Cooperative is a welcome example of former adversaries working together for the common good.

Montana's representatives in Washington, D.C., have praised the group's efforts but are understandably skittish about promising that the Blackfoot Cooperative wish list will be met.

Still, we join the commissioners from the three affected counties, as well as landowners, timber interests and snowmobile clubs, in urging Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester and Rep. Denny Rehberg to get the ball rolling by sponsoring the necessary legislation.

What's happening along and above the Blackfoot River could be a model for similar cooperation throughout the West.