Montana sues Yellowstone over bison

A long-simmering battle between Yellowstone National Park officials and the Gianforte administration in Montana came to a head on Tuesday with state officials suing the park in federal court for its bison management plan.

The new case, filed in federal court in Billings, argues that park officials have intentionally cut Montana out of management plans or ignored the park’s own science in an effort to boost Yellowstone National Park bison numbers and skirt vaccinating them against brucellosis, a disease of concern to the state’s cattle-ranching industry.

The court action follows public disputes and disagreements between the Gianforte administration and federal officials, including other members of the Interagency Bison Management Plan.

While park officials manage the herds in Yellowstone National Park, at issue is what happens when the bison inevitably roam across the border of the park, often into Montana. Yearly bison hunting has also generated a fair amount of outrage as advocates for the nation’s official land mammal, the bison, decried what they said was a slaughtering line of hunters lined up on the Montana side of the park’s border to hunt them as they crossed the boundaries.

The heart of the lawsuit, filed by Gianforte’s attorneys as well as attorneys for the Montana Department of Livestock and the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks, contends that Yellowstone officials have unlawfully disregarded a 2000 agreement to keep the Yellowstone National Park bison herds at less than 3,000 animals, as well as a commitment by park officials to vaccinate bison against brucellosis.

Instead, the lawsuit argues that a new environmental impact statement adopted by the National Park Service in 2024 arbitrarily changed those rules to allow an increase in bison numbers and no requirement for vaccination.

State officials allege that Yellowstone National Park also adopted these new rules, saying that they were not materially different than current park practices, which the state of Montana disputes.

“Over the last 20 years, Yellowstone National Park has utterly failed to manage to the specified target population or implement critical elements of its plan,” the lawsuit said.

State officials say they must keep Montana cattle brucellosis free

The state of Montana also claims in the lawsuit that it agreed to expand the areas the bison could wander into, known as “tolerance zones,” especially during the winter months, on the condition that the target herd population be kept at the same level and that officials would take every available opportunity to vaccinate the bison.

They claim that the state’s expansion of area the bison could roam was a “spatial” increase, not permission to increase the bison herd’s target size.

Furthermore, the state of Montana said that allowing more bison roaming could jeopardize its ability to certify that cattle raised within the state’s borders are brucellosis free. State officials claim in the lawsuit that they must protect the state’s cattle industry, and the new rules put that in jeopardy.

State officials also said that the state may reconsider the areas the bison are allowed to roam without being hunted because of the changes made by park officials and the members of the Interagency management partners.

“Montana’s 2015 tolerance expansion was a spatial expansion only, and did not create tolerance for increased population levels,” the lawsuit said. “In fact, the decision notice stated, multiple times, that even though the physical tolerance zone was increasing, the population target would remain unchanged at 3,000.”

But Montana officials demonstrated that park officials and bison managers let the population peak at 5,459 bison in 2017, despite the 2000 target of 3,000 and an actual population of 2,708 then.

“Montana told (the National Park Service) that the (new proposed rules) were all premised on the assumption that Montana’s tolerance zones, expanded in 2011 and 2015, would continue to exist. Montana told Yellowstone National Park this was specious, given each alternative’s commitment to increased population and reduced disease management conflicted with two key purposes for Montana’s expanded tolerance,” the lawsuit said. “The (management plan’s) reliance on Montana’s tolerance zone to sustain populations beyond 3,000 is an incorrect assumption at best, and a deliberately misleading misstatement at worst.”

Montana officials also say they have not been consulted, nor has there been any consensus about raising the number of bison beyond a population of 3,000.

“(The National Park Service) concluded that 3,000 was an appropriate target, as anything above that would likely lead to out-migration,” the lawsuit said, quoting the 2000 record.

The lawsuit also said that without consulting Montana, the new management plans call for no vaccination under any of the scenarios it contemplated during the public comment and review in its most recent 2024 decision.

Montana officials said this runs contrary to the original agreement with the state, which was to include vaccination of all bison to the best degree possible. Now, the lawsuit contends, officials have written out any vaccination.

“After 24 years, the defendants have not only failed to initiate a remote-vaccination program, but now state they have no intention of conducting any bison vaccination, remote or other,” the lawsuit claims.

“Vaccination of bison is reflected in every annual operations plans from 2007-2022. Despite bison vaccination being a clear directive in existing management, each alternative in the Bison Management Plan’s Final Environmental Impact Statement drops vaccination, including the ‘no action’ alternative.”

Montana officials say they haven’t been able to collaborate with Yellowstone’s leaders

Part of the lawsuit details the changes and modifications that have been made since the original record of decision for bison management was adopted in 2000, serving as a sort of legal laundry list of concerns and challenges Montana officials say they’ve had with Yellowstone’s overall management.

It also alleges that park officials intentionally tried to limit Montana’s access to information about the changes it planned, and ignored requests from state officials to meet and collaborate.

In February 2022, the state claims officials started changing management plans and rushed public comment. During that time, Montana said that it had “explained its frustration at not being consulted or included in the National Park Services’ formulation of alternatives, especially given the contentious history surrounding bison management.”

Montana said that it asked National Park leadership to withdraw the slate of bison management plans then so other meetings could be held, but it took Yellowstone Park officials until June 2023 to “finally (meet) with the state’s technical staff to discuss the substance of the alternatives and supporting science, or lack thereof,” according to the lawsuit.

Montana officials said that they were only given 11 days to review a draft of the environmental impact statement and provide comment, evidence the state claims of the park trying to rush the process.

Montana officials said when the final environmental impact statement was prepared, it was only given 24 days to review it and meet with officials, an impossible timeline for the state, according to the lawsuit.

Officials with Yellowstone National Park on Tuesday told the Daily Montanan that they had just become aware of the lawsuit and were still reviewing it.

“The National Park Service has repeatedly and consistently failed to engage with the state in a meaningful and transparent manner as required by law throughout the planning process,” said Gianforte. “The National Park Service has not given us a fair shake and has ignored concerns raised by the state. We will always defend our state from federal overreach.”

Darrell Ehrlick is the editor-in-chief of the Daily Montanan.