Keeping the Public on Montana Public Land and Water. (Now and Forever!)

The Public Land and Water Association is to heartily congratulated on the victory in the Montana Supreme Court opinion in PLWA v. Madison County.  The precedent-setting decision assures us all of continuing access to Montana’s public waters. They did all the heavy lifting in the case. Montana TU filed an amicus brief in support and Flathead TU would like to thank PLWA for all their hard work on this case. Here is the note from PSWA on the case:

Resounding victory for public access

On January 16, 2014  the Montana Supreme Court overturned a lower court and assured public access to the Ruby River from bridges on land owned by Atlanta media mogul James Cox Kennedy. The decision sets a precedent that validates all Montana stream and bridge access laws. The Court affirmed a previous decision that  two of the county road bridges – Duncan Road and Lewis Lane – have a 60-foot wide public easement intersecting the high water mark of the river. This is the decision that led to the Montana Bridge Access law.

What’s new is  that the court essentially threw out the District Court ruling on the third bridge – a bridge on the Seyler lane  road . The lower court had mistakenly ruled   there was no recreational  access on the bridge because it was on  a road created by prescription or regular public use  and recreational use was not a basis for creation of the prescriptive  right -of- way.

On Seyler Lane, the case was sent back to District Court with instructions to determine the width of the public road right-or-way which had been established by prescriptive use. Significantly, the Court held that once a prescriptive easement is established, access extends to all public uses including recreational use.

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The Court also emphatically upheld Montana’s stream access law, stating “that the State owns all the waters in trust for the People . . . and that a riparian owner takes his property interest subject to a dominant estate in favor of the public. ”

John Gibson, President of PLWA, stated “Today’s ruling from the Montana Supreme Court confirms once again that our streams are public resources, and not the exclusive playgrounds for the select few. The public’s right to wade or float any river or stream in the state has been recognized, as well as the right to access those streams at bridges crossed by public roads. We want to thank Montana Trout Unlimited and the Montana Wildlife Federation as well as our loyal members for their contributions. ”

“We have been involved in this case for over ten years and this decision has justified our efforts,” Gibson says. He went on to say that “Much of our success is due to the great work of the Goetz Law Firm in Bozeman who lead us thru the legal maze surrounding access to the public waters of Montana.”

Resounding Victory indeed! Thanks again to all the good folks at the PLWA.