Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Compact
The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes–Montana Compact (CSKT Compact) is a water rights agreement between the State of Montana, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT), and the United States. The Compact resolved CSKT’s reserved water right claims and provides flexibility, local control, and certainty for water users. The CSKT Compact also created a unified state-tribal system for administering water rights on the Flathead Reservation.
Learn About the CSKT Compact
Expand the sections below to learn more about how the CSKT Compact protects existing uses, provides for water right administration on the Flathead Reservation, and settles claims across Montana.
- Limits CSKT’s rights to make call on junior water users. CSKT agreed to relinquish their right to make call against any non-irrigation water user with a priority date:
- Prior to September 17, 2021, on the Flathead Reservation, and in the Bitterroot, Lower Clark Fork, Kootenai, and Flathead basins.
- Prior to April 24, 2015, in the Upper Clark Fork and Blackfoot basins.
- CSKT agreed to further limits to its right to make call as described in Article III, Section G, Paragraphs 1-5 of the Compact.
- Quantifies CSKT’s instream flow rights with conditions that limit the impacts to other water users.
- Recognizes existing tribal uses, including traditional tribal cultural and religious uses.
- Provides funding for improving the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project (FIIP). FIIP infrastructure improvements are needed for more safe, efficient, and manageable operations.
Water rights in Montana are based on the prior appropriation doctrine. Senior users with an earlier priority date are entitled to use the full amount of their water right before a newer “junior” user with a later priority date can use water. This means if a senior user cannot make full use of their water right, the senior can “call” on junior rights to discontinue their use until the senior’s right is fully satisfied.
- Creates a unified system for appropriation and administration of water for both state and tribal water users and a single system of centralized records.
- Enacts the Unitary Administration & Management Ordinance (Ordinance) to provide procedures for permitting new uses of water, changing existing uses, and enforcing water rights. The Montana Legislature and the Tribal Council passed the Ordinance and neither government can change the law unilaterally.
- Establishes the state-tribal Flathead Reservation Water Management Board (FRWMB) to administer water rights in accordance with the Ordinance. The Montana Governor appoints two members to FRWMB in consultation with local county commissioners. The Tribal Council appoints two members to the Board. Those four members select the fifth voting member.
- Limits FRWMB’s jurisdiction to administer water rights to within the external boundaries of the Flathead Reservation.
- Provides staff with expertise in water rights and hydrology to support FRWMB. Both DNRC and CSKT staff provide technical assistance to FRWMB.
- Ensures that FRWMB’s work is consistent with Montana’s right-to-know laws. Residents of the Flathead Reservation enjoy the same benefits of public participation, notice, and records as other Montana residents in water administration.
- Ensures that water rights on the Flathead Reservation are accessible to the public in the DNRC Query System.
- Makes no changes to how water right ownership transfers to the buyer, or is withheld by the seller, in real estate transactions.
- Allows for registration of certain existing water uses on the Flathead Reservation. The FRWMB is currently processing 2,767 applications that were filed with the DNRC between 1999 and 2022.
- Claims
- CSKT and the United States filed 2,188 off-Reservation water right claims across the state, in 51 hydrologic basins. Without the CSKT Compact, all of these claims would be adjudicated by the Water Court, in what would likely be an expensive and lengthy legal process for all parties.
- The CSKT Compact quantifies 97 off-Reservation water rights held by CSKT, 87 of which are co-owned with Montana Fish Wildlife & Parks (FWP). These water rights are used to increase instream flows and benefit fish habitat.
- Click here to read DNRC’s analysis of how off-Reservation water right claims would be adjudicated without the CSKT Compact.
- Water Court Adjudication of the Compact
- The Water Court is reviewing the CSKT Compact through its decree process to ensure it is fair and reasonable. For updated information, visit the CSKT-MT Compact page on the Water Court’s website.
CSKT Compact Quick Links
Access pages related to the CSKT Compact.
Flathead Reservation Water Management Board (FRWMB) Website
The official website for the Flathead Reservation Water Management Board, which includes forms for applying for a water right on the Flathead Reservation, meeting info, and contact information.
CSKT Compact Website (non-DNRC)
Information updates on Flathead Indian Irrigation Project improvement projects, restoration and mitigation, and dam projects from CSKT.
Compact Implementation Technical Team (CITT)
The CITT is the entity established by the CSKT Compact to plan and advise on operational improvements to the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project, rehabilitation and betterment, and adaptive management. Click for more information on the CITT and their meetings.
CITT Off-Season Stock Water Mitigation Grant Program
Information for Flathead Reservation water users who applied to the Stock Water Mitigation Grant Program. This grant’s application period has closed.
CSKT Compact Reports and Legislation
Click the following links to read technical reports and full legal texts for the CSKT Compact.
Appendix 1 - Hydrologic Basin Maps
Appendix 2 - FIIP Influence Area Map
Appendix 3.1 - (TIFs), Minimum Reservoir Pool Elevations
Appendix 3.2 - River Diversion Allowances (RDAs)
Appendix 3.3 - Historic Farm Deliveries
Appendix 3.4 - Implementation Schedule
Appendix 3.5 - Adaptive Management and CITT
Appendix 3.6 - Rehabilitation and Betterment
Appendix 3.7 - Determination of Wet, Normal and Dry Years
Appendix 4 - Proposed Law of Administration/Ordinance, codified at 85-20-1902, MCA
Appendix 5 - FIIP Abstracts in 76L and 76LJ and Maps
Appendix 6 - Map of Non-FIIP Historic Irrigated Acres Lands Eligible for Registration
Appendix 7 - Bureau of Reclamation Modeling Report
Appendix 8 - State Biological Constraints Evaluation
Appendix 9 - Flathead System Compact Water Abstract and Maps
Appendix 10 - Natural Node Instream Flow Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 11 - FIIP Instream Flow Nodes Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 12 - Other Instream Flow Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 13 - Interim Instream Flows and Interim Reservoir Pool Elevations
Appendix 14 - Interim Instream Flow Protocols
Appendix 15 - FIIP Reservoir Minimum Pool Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 16 - Wetlands Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 17 - High Mountain Lakes Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 18 - Flathead Lake Abstract and Maps
Appendix 19 - Boulder Creek Hydroelectric Project Abstract and Maps
Appendix 20 - Hellroaring Hydroelectric Project Abstract and Maps
Appendix 21 - MTFWP Wetlands Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 22 - MTFWP Claim Number 76L 153988-00 to be Co-Owned by Tribes
Appendix 23 - U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) Wetland Abstracts and Maps
Appendix 24 - USFWS Claims to be Co-Owned by Tribes
Appendix 25 - Kootenai Mainstem Instream Flow Right Abstract
Appendix 26 - Swan Mainstem Instream Flow Right Abstract
Appendix 27 - Lower Clark Fork Mainstem Instream Flow Right Abstract
Appendix 28 - Montana FWP Claims to be Decreed as Part of the Compact
Appendix 29 - Montana FWP Claims Not to be Decreed as Part of the Compact
Appendix 30 - Milltown Water Right Abstracts
Appendix 31 - Former Milltown Dam Instream Flow Enforceable Level Technical Document
Appendix 32 - 2004 DNRC-MTFWP Painted Rocks Contract
Appendix 33 - 1958 Painted Rocks Contract Including Amendment
Appendix 34 - 1994 Montana FWP-Bureau of Reclamation Lake Como Contract
Appendix 35 - Placid Creek Instream Flow Right Abstract and Maps
Appendix 36 - Kootenai River Tributary Instream Flow Abstracts
Appendix 37 - Flathead Reservation Unitary Water Management Board Forms
Appendix 38 - Flathead Proposed Preliminary Decree