MEIC in the News

The Smith River is not a location for another failed mining experiment.

Montana’s Smith River is renowned worldwide for its clean water, rugged canyon scenery, and blue ribbon trout fishery. The Smith is Montana’s only permitted recreational river. The permitted section of the Smith River winds 59 miles through a remote canyon in the Big Belt Mountains. Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks classifies the Smith River’s fishery as high-value, owing to its bountiful population of rainbow, brown, westslope cutthroat, and brook trout. The canyon walls of the Smith also boast some of the best examples of Native American pictographs in Montana.

Urge Montana to protect the Smith.

Montana’s Smith River is an extraordinary resource, and deserves our most rigorous effort to protect it from mine pollution and dewatering. Montana Governor Greg Gianforte and the Department of Environmental Quality Director Chris Dorrington will make critical decisions that will determine the future of the Smith River and the Sheep Creek Mine.

Please contact Governor Gianforte and Director Dorrington. Let them know that the Smith River is an incredibly important place for the people of Montana and across the country and world, and should not be sacrificed for temporary and risky mining activities.

It’s time to make a stand. 

The Smith River and its tributaries provide crucial habitat and spawning grounds for regional trout fisheries. The Sheep Creek drainage accounts for over half of tributary spawning of rainbow trout in the Smith River drainage, and rainbow trout have been known to travel nearly 200 miles round-trip from the Missouri River to spawn!

The Smith River depends on clean cold water from its tributaries to sustain the aquatic life within its banks and the agricultural operations along it. Demands on the river’s waters already often exceed available flows in many years, creating challenges for downstream water users.