Western legislatures, except California‘s, have finished for 2012. Montana and Nevada didn’t have a lawmaking session this year, but elsewhere, election-year politics, not surprisingly, influenced what happened. In New Mexico, many Republican-favored bills were shot down by a Democrat-controlled Legislature, including a measure to repeal a 2003 law that allows undocumented immigrants to get drivers’ […]
Western legislative roundup
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
The least — and most — American of places: A review of Rez Life
Rez Life: An Indian’s Journey Through Reservation LifeDavid Treuer368 pages, hardcover: $26.Atlantic Monthly Press, 2012. Accomplished novelist David Treuer turns to nonfiction in his latest book, which combines elements of his own life on “the rez” with a historical look at North American Indian life over the past several hundred years. Since “most people will […]
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
The delights of urban wilderness
I spent most of my awkward teenaged years sequestered in subdivisions among manicured lawns and black-topped cul-de-sacs. Fortunately, when after-school TV got too boring, I could leave the house and go exploring — wandering alone through the scruffy patches of woods and fields that edged our orderly neighborhood outside St. Louis, Mo. I remember the […]
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
Matters of life and death: A review of Contents May Have Shifted
Contents May Have ShiftedPam Houston320 pages, hardcover: $25.95.W. W. Norton & Company, 2012. Pam Houston writes somewhat like a modern-day Jane Austen, although rather than merely dance at the ball, Elizabeth Bennet gets to go backpacking with Mr. Darcy in the San Juans (or perhaps take a trip to Tunisia or Bhutan). Beginning with her […]
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
HCNers go to journalism conferences
High Country News‘ hometown of Paonia, Colo., has great food, great people, great access to mountains, rivers and deserts, and a great climate. What it doesn’t have, beyond our little office, is much in the way of opportunities for journalistic cross-pollination or training. So we were thrilled when HCN online editor Stephanie Paige Ogburn won […]
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
Dear HCN: Reader survey responses
Our annual reader surveys have been trickling in, and as always, they’re chock-full of thoughtful criticism, enthusiastic encouragement, and suggestions for widening — or narrowing — our field of view. Here’s a sampling of what’s on your mind. One of the things we appreciated is that HCN is apolitical. I found Tom Zoellner’s “Extreme Arizona” […]
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
Bark beetle kill leads to more severe fires, right? Well, maybe
The lodgepole pine and spruce-fir forests of the Intermountain West are reeling under a one-two punch: more frequent and severe wildfires, and an epidemic of tree-killing bark beetles. Once-green forests are filled with red dying trees and patches of gray dead ones. From a distance, the effect is oddly beautiful. Up close, people often experience […]
Posted inMay 13, 2013: Right-wing Migration
Sierra Crane-Murdoch on Idaho’s political transformation
KDNK, a public radio station in Carbondale, Colo., regularly interviews High Country News writers and editors, in a feature they call “Sounds of the High Country.” Here, KDNK’s Nelson Harvey talk with High Country News correspondent Sierra Crane-Murdoch about Idaho’s political transformation and the (mostly) California migrants behind it. Protest audio courtesy of noisecollector, from freesound.org
Posted inGoat
Friday news roundup: Catch-share cuts and free water
It was hard to keep up with the news this week for this traveling HCN editor; she was lost on a highway somewhere between Utah and Nevada when she heard the sad news about author Maurice Sendak’s death. After that, things went pretty much downhill. The House of Representatives showed disdain for fisheries and ocean […]
Posted inWotr
The teenagers we’re not helping
This winter, events in two Western states gave supporters of same-sex marriage reason to cheer. First, on Feb. 7, the 9th Circuit Court ruled that California Proposition Eight, the 2008 voter-approved ban on gay marriage, violates the U.S. Constitution. The court said the ban’s only purpose was “to lessen the status and human dignity of […]
Posted inWotr
The Pawnee Buttes oversee a changing landscape
Updated 05/11/2012, 4:07 p.m. You don’t go to Pawnee Buttes in northeastern Colorado by chance. Lonely and isolated, they stand several hundred feet above the rolling and sometimes choppy prairie. They’re nearly an hour’s drive away from an interstate highway, either I-80 or I-76, and it’s nearly that far to the nearest gas station. It’s […]
Posted inGoat
Fire wise
In 2002, the Rodeo-Chediski fire burned over 430,000 acres across the Fort Apache Indian Reservation, two national forests and private land in central Arizona. It was a momentous year for wildfire. Over seven million acres burned nationwide. In response, Congress drew up, and President Bush signed, the Healthy Forests Restoration Act. Its stated goal: to […]
Posted inWotr
Selling what’s priceless is the nuttiest idea of all
Of all the nutty ideas floating around the West of late — that Wyoming needs an aircraft carrier to prepare for the coming apocalypse, that Idaho residents should be allowed to lure wolves by using pets as bait, or that Yellowstone bison in Montana are “bio-terrorists” because they might cause brucellosis — none can match […]
Posted inHeard Around the West
Library-loving geese intimidate kids
COLORADOCanada geese may not enjoy reading, but one pair has definitely become territorial about the Harmony Library on the campus of Front Range Community College in Fort Collins, Colo. When library patrons try to enter or exit the main door, the 10-to-14-pound geese hiss and flap their wings — an “intimidating” experience for little kids […]
Posted inRange
Strip mining kitty litter
So there’s this enduring stereotype about English teachers. We like cats. In my experience, it’s mostly true – among my colleagues (the nice ones anyway), a reliable conversation topic is always the latest amusing cat story/photo. There are other stereotypes also: yes, we do Tweet in complete sentences. But for the purposes of this post, […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Balancing fish and farms on a Washington estuary
In late summer last year, a small but enthusiastic crowd gathered in northwest Washington to witness the rebirth of a waterway — the result of years of negotiation, compromise and patience. Those present heard about the project’s importance, not only for Pacific salmon, but also for the local community’s livelihood. It sounds a lot like […]
Posted inGoat
Frack fricasee
If you want evidence that it’s an election year, look no further than this press release from the Department of the Interior. It announces the department’s first-ever regulations (pdf) for certain federal lands covering several aspects of that ever controversial practice, hydraulic fracturing, wherein millions of gallons of water, plus measures of sand and chemicals, […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Note: along with the sidebar at left, a separate editor’s note accompanies this story. At 6:30 on a warm spring morning, a brightly colored summer tanager flits above green cottonwood, willow and sycamore trees. Lower down in the forest, a vermillion flycatcher darts from one mesquite branch to another. A piercing cry — “ke-er” — […]
Posted inGoat
Friday news roundup: educating tramps everywhere
Winter has fully thawed and traveling season is upon you. You’ve spruced up the RV, swept the garage and a cooler full of ice and Shasta is sparkling on your fresh-cut lawn. Now you’re sweating behind the knees and the children are whining with their mouths to the sky, like hungry eaglets. It’s time to […]