You hear this argument from drillers, miners and loggers nowadays: For every tree we don’t cut here, a forest falls in Siberia. For every proposed regulated mine we don’t dig in the West, a river system is poisoned in China. For every oil or gas well we don’t permit here, a rainforest in Africa is […]
Wotr
Posted inWotr
Guess what’s the most dangerous government job
Think of all the dangerous beats assigned to federal law enforcement officers: tracking illegal arms sales, intercepting drug smugglers, guarding the nation’s borders against foreign terrorists, apprehending kidnappers and fugitives, protecting the lives of potential assassination targets. Now, guess which branch of federal law enforcement is the most dangerous, in terms of the rate at […]
Posted inWotr
Fee demo on our public lands is a rip-off
If there’s a basic flaw in the government’s Recreation Fee Demonstration Program, or “fee demo,” it’s that it represents a form of regressive taxes, or double taxation. We, the people, already pay taxes for the management of public lands, and now, under fee demo, we are required to pay again for their use. That strikes […]
Posted inWotr
You pay your money, you get your recreation
Earlier this month, I told staffers of a U.S. Senate committee about my annual ritual where a woman in a Park Service uniform passes me a map of Yellowstone, brochures on bison safety and my National Parks Pass. I turn over $50 to her, and for the next year I have access to everything from […]
Posted inWotr
Of mice and me, or how I paid a fee and built a better mousetrap
I never planned to improve upon any kind of mousetrap but for some reason it appears I’ve done exactly that. This is how it happened: Every year my wife and I spend a few days avoiding the summer heat of western Colorado by camping high up in the White River National Forest. For the past […]
Posted inWotr
A railroad through Wyoming and South Dakota grasslands is a stab to the heart
If the legal appeals don’t work, two of the nation’s three largest grasslands will become home to the biggest railroad project since Abraham Lincoln was president. Dakota, Minnesota and Eastern Railroad plans to build a 260-mile line through Buffalo Gap National Grassland in South Dakota and Thunder Basin National Grassland in Wyoming. The line would […]
Posted inWotr
A river, a bird and a flock of untruths
Geez, all those punches must sting. In Nebraska and its neighboring Plains states, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists and other employees are again taking shots right and left from critics. It would be one thing if those blows were legitimate – almost all of them, however, hit below the belt. A recent Fish and […]
Posted inWotr
Retiring to work
Every day I’d leave high school about noon, take the subway to 23rd Street, run down to the basement cafeteria for a nutritious company meal, and then sort and deliver mail. My favorite route was the 40th to 30th floors, up there with the higher-flying Manhattan pigeons. The job was my transition to the adult […]
Posted inWotr
Peace of mind is a social contract
When it came time for me to buy a house, I purposely chose the Old Town neighborhood in Pocatello, Idaho, where I live and work. The neighborhood can be described as low-to-moderate income housing with many homes built as long as a century ago. I love the eclectic atmosphere of lived-in houses, each one individually […]
Posted inWotr
Floating past ghosts on the Green River
The White Rim is a strip of manila sandstone on the edge of the Green River canyon. We’ve been following it for three days now, floating this 60-mile flatwater stretch above Cataract Canyon in Utah, one small raft and a kayak; 20 miles yesterday, 15 or so today. Sometimes delicately thin, sometimes robust and thick, […]