Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt seems to be acting like the Chicken Little of the Missouri River. Blunt is asking for an independent review of the use of the Missouri River, a step we ask all the other Missouri River Basin states to block.

However, Blunt's request for an independent review comes from his desire to control the Missouri River, a river that serves 10 states and millions of people. It's the lifeblood of hundreds of communities. It's not Missouri's River, it's the Missouri River.

Blunt is calling for the review because he wants to block the river from providing catastrophic drought relief to North Dakota's Red River valley communities.

Or should precious Missouri River water be used to float barges for a dying navigation industry in Missouri?

Let's look back. More than 50 years ago, the U.S. Congress established the Flood Control Act. It took land from farmers and families to provide dams and reservoirs in Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota to benefit the entire region. In exchange for giving up this prime river bottom land, the government said the system would provide irrigation, flood control, recreation and a high quality, reliable municipal water supply to serve millions of people.

North Dakota and Montana have been battered by nearly eight years of drought. Water intakes that serve entire communities went dry, forcing residents to haul water to survive. Despite the wasting of water downstream to float a handful of barges, the upper basin states have persevered and hoped and prayed for better days. Today, we try to prepare for catastrophic drought that will undoubtedly revisit the Red River Basin.

Lake Sakakawea users are willing to share what amounts to about an inch off the reservoir to make sure our fellow North Dakotans are provided for.

I believe we must use the Missouri River system to meet the needs of as many people as possible - that's people, not barges.

Blunt said earlier this year: "… the federal government is taking from Missourians water that would otherwise flow past Kansas City, Jefferson City and St. Louis."

"Flow past" is the key phrase. North Dakota gave up 500,000 acres of prime river bottom land that is permanently lost in exchange for promises made by the federal government. Even during severe drought, an ample supply of water still flows past Missouri cities. The promise to upper basin states included irrigation, flood control, hydropower, recreation and critical municipal water supply for our future.

Only a fraction of those benefits have been realized, while we supply Missouri's residents with large amounts of hydropower, critical flood control and navigation, which amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars in benefits.

As North Dakota prepares for the future, the Friends of Lake Sakakawea supports the Red River Valley project. The project allows for water to flow from the Missouri River to the communities in the Red River Valley if, and only if, there is a severe drought. The Missouri should be used to support people and communities, not for Missouri's decaying barge industry to stay afloat for six to eight months of the year.

Our organization prides itself on not making knee-jerk responses to uses of our great lake. We believe that by sharing the lake with communities, with people in need, we are doing exactly what the 1944 Flood Control Act was meant to accomplish.

The upper basin states have graciously accepted our fate of a devastating drought over the past eight years, but not anymore.

The Friends of Lake Sakakawea is calling for an independent review of the 1944 Flood Control Act and its current plan for implementation. We ask that Missouri back down on its attempt to block the Red River Valley project.

Join North Dakotans and other states in saying, "It's not Missouri's River." We hope you'll join us in seeking all the benefits that Congress laid out more than 50 years ago.

And ask Blunt: When are people going to become more important than barges? Gov. Blunt, your sky is not falling.

(Terry Fleck of Bismarck is chairman of the Friends of Lake Sakakawea. - Editor)