Volunteer Agreement

Greetings fellow Back Country Horsemen of Montana. After a ton of work the region wide volunteer agreement is finally signed and ready to go. This has been signed by the Region 1 regional forester Leanne Martin on behalf of the Forest service and by me (Wade Murphy, your state chairman) on behalf of BCHMT. This agreement allows all of the members of BCHMT to be covered while working anywhere on forest service land in region 1. It is still expected that each chapter will meet with their local forest service districts and do all of the local planning and coordination that has been done in the past. That is very important to keep strong local relationships in place. Please read this all carefully and follow all of the instructions.

  1. Print all these documents out. ( the local forest service district may be willing to print it for you if it is a problem.)
  2. ALL MEMBERS MUST SIGN THE VOLUNTEER SIGN UP FORM (301B ) BEFORE THEY DO ANY WORK. This only needs to be signed by each member one time each year.
  3. Once your members have signed the 301B send a copy of the form to . If you have members join later in the year you can send additional signed forms to Kent Wellner. 
  4. One of the attachments is “appendix A, forest service contacts”. We are expected to contact the local forest service contact before we do work in their district. It is a good idea to distribute this list to your members so they know who to contact before they do work.  Please note….. we are still working with the Forest Service legal people to have this agreement cover “incidental work” such as a downed tree that we come across on a pleasure ride. That has yet to be approved. Make sure you let the forest service know you are going out to do work. 
  5. There are 5 RAs attached. These are risk assessments (formerly JHAs- Job hazard analysis.) This is an OSHA requirement that these are discussed before work is done. They need to be signed by all workers. These can be kept by your local BCH chapter. The forest service does not need these sent in unless a local FS district wants them. These are large documents. your local forest service contact may be willing to print them for you. 
  6. All previous safety training is still required. This includes First Aid/ CPR, Defensive Horse safety, and appropriate saw training. 
  7. The “operating principals”  document is what is being sent out internally in the forest service. This might be good to have when you meet with the forest service in case there is any confusion. 
  8. Most importantly… ride and work safe so we don’t need any of this stuff!!

This will all be discussed in depth at the May 14th director meeting. Please bring any and all questions to the meeting. If there is an urgent question let me know. 

Wade Murphy

BCH State Chair

406-431-1717

Documents to Print