Protecting Montana's Open Landscapes
HUGH & EVELYN BROADUS
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IF THERE'S A DOWNSIDE to the conservation easement on Hugh Broadus’ ranch, he hasn’t found it yet.
“What it’s done for us far outweighed what we give up,” Broadus said in the living room of his ranch home, the house where he was raised about 10 miles north of Lame Deer. “For us, it’s a win-win.”
The easement puts the Broadus family in a partnership with The Montana Land Reliance and was financed in part by a federal program called the Farm and Ranch Lands Protection Program, which puts up cash to compensate landowners who donate conservation easements.
That payment allowed the family to eliminate a nagging debt.
“It wasn’t breaking us but it was haunting us,” Broadus said of the debt. “It was a constant battle to meet the terms of that debt. It was kind of to the point that one stumble and we might have been out of business. And for 15 years we’ll have a tax break that is probably worth more than the cash was.”
Hugh and his wife Evelyn are the third generation in his family to run cattle and wheat operations on the same property, headquartered along Rosebud Creek and stretching far into the Little Wolf Mountains to the west. The easement covers the home property, about 3,000 acres of the sprawling ranch.
THE TERMS OF THE EASEMENT allow farming and ranching to continue, plus outfitting for hunting. Banned activities include oil and gas drilling, mining, and subdivision.
So far, subdivision pressure has remained light in this verdant valley, rimmed with sandstone bluffs crested by slashes of red scoria. But that could change if proposed new coal mines to the south, at Otter Creek, become reality.
“If this coal mine goes in, I’m sure the demand will be very great,” Broadus said.
“Slowly but surely, subdivision is starting to happen in isolated stretches of eastern Montana,” said MLR Managing Director, Rock Ringling.
But they won’t happen on the Broadus Ranch, with its abundant deer and bird populations, the growing elk herd, its mountain lions, and black bears.
THE EASEMENT MEANS the Broadus Ranch won’t change much, no matter what happens around it. And for Hugh, that spells satisfaction. He’s tended the place well and doesn’t want to see that undone.
“When I’m gone 100 years, this place will still be the same,” he said.
With the massive mines and power plants of Colstrip just 10 miles to the north, Rosebud Creek has seen big changes over the years. Back in the 1970s, Broadus turned down offers to cash in.
“We had coal companies after us and we didn’t sell,” he recalled. “You always second guess yourself, of course, but now that I’m a little older, boy, I’d have had a hole in my heart if I’d had to leave here. I don’t know if I’d have survived.”
He and Evelyn flirted with retirement, even went so far as to look at a few houses in Billings. But the notion passed.
“The kids and the grandkids say grandpa needs to quit,” Broadus said, eyes twinkling. “But grandpa don’t want to quit. They’d bury me in a year. I don’t golf. I don’t fish. This is my recreation and my work and I get a big kick out of what I do.”
Creating the easement didn’t come easy. It took meetings with lawyers, accountants, and family members.
“It was very complicated and everybody was involved in it, but the Reliance led us through it,” Broadus said. And eliminating the troublesome debt brought both financial leeway and peace of mind.
“Dealing with your bankers and that kind of stuff, you’ve always got somebody coming out here wanting to know what you’re doing and when you’re going to do it. With the Reliance, they come out here once a year and make sure you’re not tipping it upside down with a coal shovel or building houses all over it. And that’s about the size of it.”
Hugh and Evelyn’s son lives on the ranch and so does their grandson, now a senior in high school. He told his grandpa he wants to spend his life here, so Hugh is training him to become the fifth generation on the same property. The conservation easement makes estate planning a little simpler,
“As far as the day-to-day-operation of the ranch, the Reliance doesn’t interfere with us at all,” Broadus said. “Some of these groups, they want to run you. But the Reliance, they were really nice to work with. They just want to preserve the land.”
