Dear HCN, Jon Margolis’ article on the Teaming With Wildlife initiative (HCN, 12/23/96) was accurate with only one slight error: The states would pay 25 cents, not 30 cents, to get the matching 75 cents of each dollar provided by the initiative. Since snowmobiles and ATVs are not on the list of recreational products to […]
We need the team
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
More digging, less human interest
Dear HCN, I just finished skimming the Escalante article (HCN, 4/14/97) and while I found the stories interesting, it seemed that they were more of what has become common in High Country News – anecdotal reporting without investigation. On page 10, Roger Holland says that the Andalex coal company would only disturb “2.5 million tons […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Nevada ranchers win water rights
Nevada’s attorney general recently upheld a 1995 state law that took away the Bureau of Land Management’s right to hold stock-water rights. The state said the privilege belonged solely to ranchers. Since the agency doesn’t own cattle, said the attorney general, it can’t put a stock-water right to beneficial use. “Water’s a special resource,” explained […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Hopis extend eviction deadline
Hundreds of Navajos braced themselves against the threat of forcible eviction on the eve of April 1. That was the deadline for more than 250 families living on Arizona’s Hopi Partitioned Land either to sign a 75-year lease with the Hopi tribe, or move (HCN 3/31/97). Navajo supporters rallied nationwide, staging protests in San Francisco, […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Coyote vigils
At 3 on a December morning in a high cold mountain valley I am crunching through deep snow on my way to a monastery chapel. It is so cold that the air crackles and burns; the hairs in my nose are icicles, biting me as I breathe. I am swathed in so many layers of […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Heard around the West
Stolid and solid at 1,500 pounds each, beef cows keep getting a bad rap. Fear of mad cow disease is chasing away burger eaters, and doctors have long warned that juicy steaks clog arteries. Now come two researchers who tell us in Conservation Biology magazine that cows cause fires. Joy Belsky and Dana Blumenthal connect […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
States get semi-tough on poachers
A dramatic rise in flagrant cases of wildlife poaching has inspired a batch of new legislation that could truly put the hurt on criminal hunters in the West. Anti-poaching bills with stiffer fines and penalties are advancing in the New Mexico, Montana, Nevada and Idaho legislatures. But lawmakers in Wyoming and Colorado recently rejected efforts […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Forest supervisor shows Congress some dirty pictures
It was billed as a Washington, D.C.-style “barbecue,” but the roastee – Sawtooth National Forest Supervisor Bill Levere – was prepared for the heat. In early April, Idaho Rep. Helen Chenoweth ordered Levere, the manager of the central Idaho forest, to come to the nation’s capitol and defend his tough new penalties for ranchers who […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Southwest Forest Alliance takes a Hitt
New Mexico’s best known environmentalist was ousted from a Southwestern forest protection organization earlier this month following a dispute over the organization’s direction. Sam Hitt, a founding member of Southwest Forest Alliance, which represents 55 conservation groups in New Mexico and Arizona, was voted off the group’s board after he stormed out of a meeting […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Yellowstone mine swap is in a very deep pit
Another deadline passed for the New World Mine swap and the only thing traded was blame and doubt. The Crown Butte mining company turned down the government’s offer of $65 million in cash on April 12 in exchange for its proposed gold mine just outside Yellowstone National Park, saying it doubted that the government could […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Montana train accident derailed a small town
Alberton, Mont. – When sirens pierced the air before dawn last April 11, Lucinda Hodges awoke to find workers in Haz-Mat suits scrambling through the streets in a thick, white fog. Then it hit her. “I’ll never forget that feeling,” she says. “You breathe and there’s no air. You felt like you were suffocating.” In […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Dear Friends
Big Sky, big stress The March 31, 1997, issue of HCN described the litigious nature of Montana’s Big Sky Resort. We’ve gotten interesting responses to the story. Writer Ray Ring, sitting in Bozeman, says he sees signs that the article may have helped shift the tone of the dialogue. After a recent meeting, Gallatin County […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Scriptures
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Montana minister challenges a racist heresy
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Many argue that taxes are too high, or that our government is to a large extent corrupt. That is why, as I have listened to reactions to the Montana Freemen and other extremist groups, I have heard some people sympathizing. The Montana Freemen are […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Evangelicals are coming to the (earth’s) rescue
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Being an “evangelical environmentalist” is much like being an advocate of “sustainable economic development’ – both positions attract the label “oxymoronic.” I drive people up a wall because I am all for all four ideals: sustainable use of resources, economic growth, evangelical theology and […]
Posted inApril 28, 1997: Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
Evangelical Christians preach a green gospel
TROUT LAKE, Wash. – -The Bible is clear about it,” Peter Illyn is saying. “Over and over again, Scripture reveals that God commands us to be the stewards of creation. Now, that doesn’t mean it’s ours to use however we want to – it means that as Christians we are called to protect and preserve […]
Posted inApril 14, 1997: Beauty and the Beast
A tough fighter
Dear HCN, It was with sadness that I read of our loss of Ruth Hutchins, one of the noblest of fighters for a sane Colorado water policy. My first contact with Ruth was a Sunday telephone call to me in my then capacity as a Colorado River Water Conservation District director. She talked at such […]
Posted inApril 14, 1997: Beauty and the Beast
The information dirt road
Instead of booms and busts brought on by fluctuating demand for everything from gold to coal, rural areas believed that the information age would bring economic stability as educated information workers moved to small communities. No longer would small towns be turned into ghost towns when the ore gave out or commodity prices plunged. So […]
Posted inApril 14, 1997: Beauty and the Beast
Here’s looking at tourism
Tourism is as hotly debated in the West as clearcutting. Some see it as salvation for overworked landscapes and faltering economies; others see it as a more vicious form of extraction than mining and logging. All those perspectives as well as a few from the center will be at the “Seeing and Being Seen: Tourism […]
Posted inApril 14, 1997: Beauty and the Beast
Bringing back the small family farm
In their mid-40s and newly married, Bob and Bonnie Gregson dropped out and bought a 13-acre farm near Seattle, Wash. in 1988. When the couple left their corporate jobs and city lives, they dreamed of making a “reasonable, community-oriented, non-exploitive, earth-friendly, and aesthetically pleasing living.” They managed to succeed, after some trial and error, as […]