Flathead Valley growth driven by tourism, recreation

…Earlier this year, a Bozeman-based research group, Headwaters Economics, released a report correlating the growth of the state’s economy with its high percentage of federally protected lands.

The report found that between 1970 and 2009 rural western counties with more than 30 percent of the land under federal protection increased jobs at a rate four times greater than rural counties with no federally protected lands.…

Author:
Ben Alexander

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