(The following story by Diane Cochran appeared on The Billings Gazette website on May 12, 2010.)
BILLINGS, Mont. — Property owners on the Crow Indian Reservation say BNSF Railway Co. has perpetually neglected fences that keep livestock off its tracks, putting cattle and people who drive on an adjacent highway at risk.
But the railroad says repairs to the barbed-wire barriers have been adequate, and it can’t replace a fence simply because it is old.
“It is BNSF’s standard in Montana to maintain and repair fences along our rights of way,” said company spokesman Gus Melonas in Seattle. “In the Lodge Grass area, we have sent fencers out and have fixed areas that were problematic.”
A crew did recently work on fences near Lodge Grass, said Lyle Neal, a brand inspector who fields calls from ranchers when cows get loose. But the workers were not experienced fencers and did not fix the problem, Neal said.
“They put a Band-Aid on heart surgery,” he said. “You can’t call it even beginning to be fixed.”
Montana law requires railroads to build and maintain fences along their tracks and cattle guards at their crossings. If livestock slip through and are hurt or killed by trains, the railroad must pay fair market value for the animals.
Glenn Elhard, a rancher near Dunmore, said he is still waiting for BNSF to pay him for a 3-year-old cow that was killed on the tracks last November.
Elhard didn’t wait for the railroad to send someone to fix the fence.
“I fixed it,” he said. “By the time they got around to it, your whole herd could be in jeopardy.”
Elhard and other landowners say the fencing dates to at least the 1920s, when their grandparents moved into the area. The wire is brittle and snaps when it is stretched, and in places it sags between posts that are 25 feet apart.
“If I built a fence like that when I was a kid, my dad would have blistered my bottom all the way across town,” said Bob Bond, whose property near Lodge Grass abuts the railroad tracks.
Lost livestock is not the only risk posed by subpar fences, Neal said. Cattle that get onto the tracks are steps away from the highway, where they endanger motorists.
Bill Redfield gave up on BNSF after a letter from the Public Service Commission failed to produce results. He complained about the fence along his property to the PSC, which is charged with enforcing the state’s railroad fencing law.
“I have built a fence 100 to 150 yards back from their fence on my property,” Redfield said. “I had to do something.”