Technical Assistance in Montana
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Under the Safe Drinking Water Circuit Rider Program, NTEC provides technical assistance and training to tribes in 9 states under a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) grant. The Circuit Riders in those states work as close as the tribes need them to, providing the assistance that is requested. Kesner Flores is the Circuit Rider for Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota. Kesner and Ron Thomson (TAT contractor) write about one of their most recent trips to that service area.
The morning we left Lewiston, Montana was cold and two inches of fresh snow had fallen in the early morning after midnight. Before we left town we stopped to get gas and coffee across from the Super 8 Motel we had stayed the night before. As, we made our way out of town, we discussed our perceived needs for the four tribal water systems we would be visiting in Montana over the coming week; Ft Belknap, Fort Peck, Crow Agency and Northern Cheyenne.
Meeting with state operator compliance program officials and USEPA Region 8 staff the day before was helpful. We were able to understand the type of utility systems we would encounter and we were able to coordinate future operator certification training who want to earn education credits and or licenses to demonstrate to the public their proficiency levels.
Arriving at Ft Belknap, we met with Margaret Nicholson (manager) and learned that the tribe had been testing a new water system before they actually brought it online. The system had been undergoing a shake down by many of the contractors who had built the facility. This facility will service approximately 385 customers. Ms. Nicholson spent time explaining to us the needs of the system, the utility board and training goals of the operators. NTEC will coordinate with her and will work to fulfill their training needs.
Fort Peck had much of the same needs as Ft Belknap and the other tribal utilities in Montana expressed the same type of assistance needed. In addition, they are in phase 3 of a construction project to increase and modify the tribes growing drinking water infrastructure needs with the building of a new “State of the Art” treatment facility.
On the fifth day of our site visits to Montana, we also met with Northern Cheyenne. We are scheduling classroom time with the Northern Cheyenne Utility to provide utility board training. The training will be dedicated to working on the Roles and Responsibilities of a Utility Board, and it will be held at Chief Dull Knife Tribal College the first week in June. It will also be broadcasted via satellite. We also met with some of the operators who were taking webinar based training on Wastewater Treatment that has been ongoing for the past several months. We answered questions about continuing education credits students will receive upon successful completion of the course.
Finally, at the end of the long road trip, we arrived at Crow Agency, where we met with two hardworking operators of the Crow Agency systems. We found ourselves talking with two operators who work (as many other operators in Indian Country), tenaciously and always on call and going above and beyond the normal call of duty. Operators like Chris Dillon and Howard Pretty Weasel deserve recognition for the many hours spent taking care of the tribe’s drinking water, wastewater and general water issues. We believe that sometimes when the utility isn’t seen or understood the public may not appreciate on how it operates on a day to day basis. However, it something break down or fails to work as it is supposed to, the buck stops at the operators, like Chris and Howard. They do their best with what they have to insure their communities have safe and affordable water that meets the pressure requirements of the system. Speaking with both of these men was an honor as they do what they do for the Tribe because they really care for the people who are also their neighbors and friends and family. Our work with these men will continue with training on their certification needs and technical support. We will be coordinating future training using the facilities at the Tribe’s college, the Little Big Horn College. We will also have the capability to broadcast the trainings to all tribal colleges in Montana. The training will tentatively begin in August 2010.
NTEC Staff and circuit riders will be following up with technical assistance on the new ground water rules implemented by US EPA, utility management, training and operation and maintenance issues over the next several months.