Building what was then the Kerr Dam in the 1930s was dangerous. During its construction, 11 members of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes died.
Taking On a Megadam One of the largest man-made structures in the Pacific North- west is located on the Flathead Indian Reservation in western Montana. These homelands of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes comprises an extensive 1.2 million acres, the northern part of which overlaps Flathead Lake. Near the town of Polson, where the Flathead River connects
to the southern end of this lake, is the hydropower dam formerly known as the Kerr Dam and now called the Se̓ liš Ksanka Ql̓ispe̓ Dam, after the three tribes on the Flathead reservation—the Bit- terroot Salish, Kootenai and Upper Pend d’Oreille. The 200-foot high, 381-foot-long concrete structure has three electricity-gen- erating units. When water is released through the dam, it spins a turbine connected to the generators that then produce electricity. The water returns to the river on the downstream side of the dam. Brian Lipscomb has spent more than 30 years managing
natural resources across the Northwest, including the Seli’š Ksanka Qlispe’ Hydroelectric Project. According to Lipscomb, an enrolled member of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes and the CEO of Energy Keepers, Inc., the company that operates the dam, the megastructure supplies electricity to tens of thousands of homes and could do more. “In the North- west, we use about 11 megawatts per year for an average house- hold.” He estimates that the dam “could power 100,000 homes for a year in the northwestern United States.”
26 SPRING 2022 AMERICAN INDIAN
Ironically, this dam that is so beneficial to the tribe was
originally developed “as a result of federal assimilation policies imposed on the Flathead Indian Reservation,” said Lipscomb. From their treaty with the United States in 1855 until 1930, he said, “we went from 100 percent land ownership to about 20 percent land ownership by the tribe and tribal members.” “The Homestead Act allowed for excess allotments to be homesteaded by nontribal members. The Montana Power Company came on to the scene, working from the perspective that the reservation was going to go away. They convinced the federal government that they should get a license under the Federal Power Act to develop this facility.” In 1930, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued
a 50-year license to the Rocky Mountain Power Company to begin construction. This was then transferred to its subsidiary, the Montana Power Company, when the dam’s construction was completed in 1939. The dam was originally named after Montana Power Company President Frank Kerr. In 1976, the project’s license was up for renewal. The tribes
took advantage of the moment and filed a competing applica- tion. The tribes ultimately ended up as co-licensee on the sub- sequent 50-year license, with the option to acquire the project in 2015. They did so and are now the sole licensee until 2035. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reports that “hydropower is better for the environment than other major sources of
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