The League of Conserva-tion Voters congressional
scorecard is out. The only Western senators to score 100 percent on
their voting records are Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, both
Democrats from California. The entire Senate delegations of Idaho,
Texas, Utah and Wyoming scored 0. The League gave 0 scores to 30
senators, all Republicans, and 12 of them from the
West.
A California Superior Court judge has
tentatively rejected a proposed landfill next to Joshua Tree
National Monument near Los Angeles (HCN, 9/29/97). Judge Judith
McConnell’s Dec. 31 ruling called Riverside County’s plan to build
the landfill a threat to wildlife. McConnell is considering the
county’s arguments before making a final decision by the end of the
month. If she sticks to her ruling, says Brian Huse of the National
Parks and Conservation Association, “it will be the greatest day
since the passage of the California Desert Protection Act” in
1994.
Electric utilities are suing the Department
of Energy for missing its deadline to start disposing of spent fuel
from nuclear power plants. The Jan. 31 deadline was included in the
1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. Construction of a dump at Nevada’s
Yucca Mountain has been delayed by technical problems, and
opposition from the state’s congressional delegation will likely
stall a temporary storage site (HCN, 5/26/97). Even if Yucca
Mountain proves “safe enough, it won’t be ready until 2010,” the
DOE’s Lake Barrett told USA Today.
Coyotes on
Oregon’s Hart Mountain Wildlife Refuge (HCN, 11/24/97) are safe
from the guns of the federal Fish and Wildlife Service. On Jan. 28,
after the Predator Defense Institute filed a lawsuit, the agency
canceled a coyote hunt it had ordered to protect antelope herds on
the refuge.
Yellowstone’s bison are under the gun
again. The Montana Department of Livestock has killed 11 animals
this winter, claiming brucellosis-carrying bison threaten the state
livestock industry (HCN, 12/22/97). Sheriff’s deputies arrested
five activists for interfering with the killing. Among them was Dan
Howells of San Francisco, who slowed a slaughterhouse shipment by
locking himself to a trailer containing
bison.
The federal Bureau of Land Management is
reviewing its management plan for Lockhart Basin (HCN, 9/15/97),
near Utah’s Canyonlands National Park. The agency recently
reaffirmed a decision to allow Legacy Energy Corp. of Denver to
sink an exploratory oil well in the basin, drawing protests from
conservation groups. Now, BLM plans a closer look at the basin’s
wildlife resources, says agency spokesman Kent Walter, though
Legacy’s permit to drill still stands.
* Peter
Chilson,
Greg
Hanscom
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline The Wayward West.
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