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"Montana prairie (#0306)" by DB's travels is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Conservation Easements are Big Business

(Liberty Matters News Service) Syndicated conservation easements have once again turned up on the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) 2021 “Dirty Dozen” tax scam list. They were first added to the list of schemes the IRS finds are the most fraudulent in 2019. The syndicated conservation easement practice the IRS is targeting is when it is used as an investment tool, instead of a legitimate charity “gift.” Investors purchase property they can place in a conservation easement, and then divide the property among its clients. The conservation easement on the property is contracted through a willing land trust, and the charitable tax-deduction is split among the client owners. What has caught the IRS’s attention is that many of these syndicated conservation easements have substantially increased...

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"Found Photo - US MT Cows in Montana 1969.tif" by David Pirmann is licensed under CC BY 2.0

APR’s ranch buying spree has negative impact on Montana taxpayers

The ink is dry on another historic cattle ranch in the Upper Missouri River Breaks consumed by the non-profit organization American Prairie Reserve (APR). With a deal to acquire the 73 Ranch, another piece of Montana’s history and leading industry has been gobbled up by the billionaires that fund APR, at the expense of Montana taxpayers. Non-profits claiming to be conservationists rob taxpayers in a couple of different ways. Donations to APR to purchase ranch property come with lucrative tax deductions. With their privileged tax status, every dollar APR receives leaves our government coffers with less than they otherwise would have.

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Updated elk population counts underscore importance of improving management

The most recent elk population counts show a disturbing trend of Montana’s elk herd increasing to crisis levels in many areas of the state. Three quarters of Montana’s hunting districts have an elk population above the sustainable population objective set by the Montana Fish & Game Commission, with over thirty districts at more than double the objective number. “This has been the trend for years—the elk population continues to grow far beyond what the biologists estimate as a healthy, sustainable level,” said Chuck Denowh, the policy director of United Property Owners of Montana. “Today we are at nearly double the number of elk that we should have in Montana.”

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Mabee Road case a victory for landowners, but at what price?

The Mabee Road case is a cautionary tale for all Montana landowners. This saga started in 2007 when Mark Robbins gated a road on his property to stop trespassers. That action caught the attention of the Public Land Water Access Association, a nonprofit that exists to sue landowners to take their property. PLWA first attempted to pressure the Fergus County commission to declare the road public. The commission asked their attorney to examine the matter—he concluded the road was private. Next, PLWA sued the Robbins’s with the objective of taking the road for public use—the district court concluded the road was private. So PLWA appealed to the Montana Supreme Court, which in a unanimous decision affirmed that the road was private. It sounds like this result is a resounding win for...

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"Bison Family in Montana" by USFWS Mountain Prairie is licensed under CC BY 2.0

UPOM wins bison lawsuit—documents obtained from FWP detail high degree of coordination with APR

We’re pleased to announce that FWP has agreed to settle our lawsuit against them regarding their bison management plan. They’ve agreed to scrap the bison plan and will not undertake a new EIS for bison management for at least ten years. You can read the settlement agreement here. As part of the litigation against FWP to challenge their bison management plan, UPOM requested all communications from FWP related to the bison management plan. We received over 2500 pages of documents. Through that discovery, we learned that FWP was in deep negotiations with APR to establish a herd of free-roaming bison on the CMR wildlife refuge. This despite repeated claims by FWP that they were not considering any specific relocation sites as part of their bison EIS. Due to the damning...

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How we Stop APR from abusing Montana’s tax code

By Rep. Dan Bartel In central Montana the American Prairie Reserve has amassed 420,000 acres of prime ranch land. This is a fraction of their ultimate objective: to control 3.2 million acres. The land they acquire will eventually be taken out of agricultural production and “re-wilded.” The thriving ranching communities in and around APR’s 5,000 square mile target area will be wiped off the map. If you’re a Montana taxpayer, you’re helping APR pay for their radical plan.

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