By Heather Hansen, Red Lodge Clearing House In a narrow canyon, not far above where I live in Boulder, is the old, abandoned Captain Jack Mill. In its heyday in the late 19th century, gold and silver were processed there, after being blasted from their hiding places in several area mines. Nowadays, contaminants from those efforts, including […]
Out of their mines
Posted inWotr
Why the Southwest is burning
No big thing happens for just one reason. This season’s fires, cutting broad swaths across the Southwest, result from the convergence of three powerful forces: climatic drought, institutional tunnel vision, and old-fashioned human frailty. On the face of it, the drought is simple: There hasn’t been much rain or snow across much of the region, […]
Posted inWotr
The adolescent West
Logan, Utah, isn’t too anything. It’s not too big or too small, but it’s also not just right. Like many Western towns and small cities of about 50,000 people, it’s as confused as a hormonally challenged adolescent. Policy moods swing wildly between pro-development mayors and ones that want to go back to family-friendly neighborhoods. We want […]
Posted inRange
SEC Loosening of Rule Let Natural Gas Firms Recalculate Reserves, Potential Profits
Marian Wang, ProPublica Editor’s note: This blog post was originally published at ProPublica, an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest. Natural gas has been widely promoted across the political spectrum as a key to solving U.S. energy problems. “The potential for natural gas is enormous,” President Obama said recently, referencing […]
Posted inHeard Around the West
Mule versus machine
THE WORLD The U.S. military would love to send sure-footed robots to Afghanistan so that machines — and not soldiers — can hump bulky equipment straight up mountains. Boston Dynamics has worked since 2004 on what it calls its “Big Dog cargo ‘bot,” yet the robot is still too big, too noisy and too expensive […]
Posted inRange
With Heavy Government Help, Solar Continues Expansion in West
By Michael Beall, Guest Writer at NewWest.net ABOUT THIS SERIES: Students from The University of Montana School of Journalism, with the help of American Public Media’s Public Insight Network, reported and wrote stories for New West on the energy economy of the Rocky Mountain region. The project originated as part of the Green Thread initiative […]
Posted inGoat
The crow knows your nose
Cross-posted from The Last Word on Nothing. Crow diving at a masked researcher in Seattle. Photo by Keith Brust I have a running joke with my husband’s cousin, Roger. At family reunions, I tell him how much I like crows. He tells me how much he likes to shoot them. Hilarious, right? Here’s the satisfying […]
Posted inWotr
Bullies get their way in New Mexico’s wolf recovery program
There’s a sign near my house that reads, “Don’t just stand there, Stop Bullying!” I remember being teased by the cool girls in middle school during the 1980s. Having survived adolescence, I naively assumed that pint-sized tormenters mature before reaching adulthood. But not always: Adult bullies employing the tactics of gossip, misinformation and fear have […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
The ‘Utah solution’ to immigration
Utah State Rep. Bill Wright is conservative to the bone. The Republican seems flabbergasted by the immigration debate that’s flared up since the passage of Arizona’s SB1070 last spring. Critics say the law — tied up in federal courts over its questionable constitutionality — legitimizes racial profiling in order to ferret out undocumented residents. But […]
Posted inGoat
New Mexico wildfire poses a double threat
Although I don’t live in New Mexico, I worked as a journalist in Colorado’s part of the Four Corners region for a while, and spent a fair bit of time in the northern part of the Land of Enchantment. This connection is perhaps one reason why, on Monday, I became obsessed with the Las Conchas […]
Posted inGoat
The wacky world of immigration
I love the printed word, love having something informative and solid and paper at ready in my hands when I recline on my patio with a nice IPA. But as a magazine writer, I have to say: There are serious drawbacks to being constrained by a tight print schedule. Sometimes, right after your story goes […]
Posted inRange
Throw away the old playbook
Idaho’s Bannock County is considering an ordinance that would create an “overlay” zoning district on the Fort Hall Indian Reservation. The idea is that the county would “serve” non-Indians who live on the reservation, while the tribes would then be limited to zoning its own members. This is a script from an old playbook. Basically, […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
Wildfires burn big in Arizona and New Mexico
In the Southwest, this summer’s fire season looks like the worst since 2002. Years of severe drought and fire suppression have left Arizona and New Mexico forests loaded with fuel and drier than diner toast, and this winter’s La Niña weather pattern parched them even more. The massive Wallow Fire has surpassed the 2002 Rodeo-Chediski […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
Significant — and nutty — quotable moments in the state legislatures
Closing budget gaps and cutting spending — often steeply and painfully — dominated most Western legislative sessions, except in Wyoming, which is bolstered by oil, gas and mineral taxes. Colorado merged its parks and wildlife agencies; Nevada’s new public employees won’t enjoy health insurance in retirement; and Washington universities will hike tuition by more than […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
See you in July
This will be the last issue you receive for a month; we skip an issue four times a year. Look for the next HCN to hit your mailbox around July 25, and in the meantime, visit our website, hcn.org, for fresh blog posts, new Writers on the Range columns and other exciting content. Summer visitorsBen […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
River Town
I came to Flagstaff, Ariz., to run her river. The river. Flagstaff is a river town, although you’d never know it at first glance. The closest stream that flows year-round is Oak Creek, 30 miles to the south near Sedona. As the crow flies, Flagstaff is 75 miles and 5,000 vertical feet from the Colorado […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
It’s not just a job, it’s an adventure: A review of Permanent Vacation
Permanent Vacation: Twenty Writers on Work and Life in Our National Parks Volume 1: The WestEdited by Kim Wyatt and Erin Bechtol 205 pages, softcover: $15.Bona Fide Books, 2011. In Permanent Vacation, editors Kim Wyatt and Erin Bechtol have assembled an eclectic collection of essays by cooks, river guides, maids, backcountry rangers and horse wranglers […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
Abrahm Lustgarten on fracking
Since 2008, Abrahm Lustgarten has reported for ProPublica on the environmental threats posed by gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing in communities nationwide. He won the George Polk Award for his coverage in 2010, one of the most prestigious prizes in environmental journalism. In this episode of High Country Views, Cally Carswell talks with Lustgarten about […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
Hydrofracked: One man’s quest for answers about natural gas drilling
Pavillion, Wyoming There are few things a family needs more than fresh drinking water. And Louis Meeks, a burly Vietnam War veteran with deep roots in the central Wyoming grasslands, had abundant water on his 40-acre alfalfa farm, which is speckled with apple and plum trees, on a rural dirt road five miles from the […]
Posted inJune 27, 2011: Hydrofracked?
A lonely crusade
In many ways, it’s a sad story: The groundwater a Wyoming couple relies on to sustain their little farm suddenly turns foul. So Louis Meeks embarks on a six-year crusade to discover how it happened, suspecting that nearby natural gas wells are somehow involved. He battles corporations and governments and alienates many of his neighbors, […]