Republican conservationists pine for the
days of Roosevelt and Goldwater
‘Green elephants’ abandon Bush
Racetrack
Environmental groups are worried that a proposition on California’s ballot may limit their ability to sue corporations that violate state or federal environmental laws. Proposition 64 would repeal a section of the state’s Unfair Competition Law that allows state or local attorneys or members of the public to sue a business for “unlawful, unfair and […]
Follow-up
New rules that require retailers to label where fish come from have gone into effect — sort of. The new rules, which were mandated under the 2002 Farm Bill, require fish and shellfish to be labeled as “farm-raised” or “wild-caught,” as well as identified by their country of origin (HCN, 3/17/03). The only catch is […]
Heard around the West
COLORADO Mach schnell, little doggies: Thanks to a German TV reality show, five frauleins, age 20 to 61, are riding horses, flinging ropes at calves and fixing fence at a working ranch in New Raymer, in eastern Colorado. Selected from over 1,000 applicants who want to become cowgirls, the women face a daunting prospect, reports […]
Environmental issues disappear into election-season smog
If you care about the environment, and you survived the presidential debates without running out into the backyard to scream at the heavens, you’re a bigger person than I. For those of you who missed them, the three debates included just one question on that “fringe issue” of what’s in the air we breathe, and […]
In presidential politics, the West is a forgotten time zone
The other night, we were channel-surfing and hit upon the Miss America pageant. The contestants were being asked questions, and the one on the screen was “What year did women get the vote in the United States?” The answer, according to the pageant judges, was 1920, when the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was […]
As the town hollows out, one Aspen neighborhood thrives
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Part-Time Paradise.” A few years ago, it was a Superfund site. Now the Smuggler Mobile Home Park is a vibrant neighborhood, whose residents have a wide range of incomes — from police officers and ski instructors to doctors and real estate brokers — in […]
Can Vail find room for its workers?
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Part-Time Paradise.” When suspicious fires swept through a mountaintop restaurant and several chairlifts in October 1998, the resort village of Vail realized it had problems — and not just with the “ecoterrorists” of the Earth Liberation Front, who claimed responsibility for the blazes (HCN, […]
Former Enron CEO took his money and ran
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Part-Time Paradise.” Former Enron CEO Ken Lay made out like a bandit, in a manner of speaking, when he sold his three Aspen houses and a land parcel in the wake of the energy giant’s bankruptcy. Lay sold a six-bedroom, six-bath house on more […]
Second homes, by the numbers
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Part-Time Paradise.” Percentage that Summit County’s population has grown since 1990: 98 Percentage of Summit County homes that are second homes: 67 Percentage of second homes in five Colorado mountain counties occupied from April to June: 12 Percentage of second-home owners in Pitkin County […]
BLM’s crown jewels go begging
National Landscape Conservation System remains underfunded even as visitors increase
Californians take a stand on GE crops
Farmers fear a ballot initiative may takedown a tried-and-true rice variety
Dems stumble in Arizona race
One of the environment’s dirty dozen leads in congressional ‘fair fight’
Election-year environmentalism
The Bush administration throws enviros and hunters some bones
Dear friends
A lesson the First Amendment Writer and naturalist Terry Tempest Williams came to western Colorado in early October for the 24th annual meeting of the Western Colorado Congress. She spoke to a packed auditorium about the “open space of democracy.” Williams, who just published a book by the same name, talked about the differences that […]
Don’t expect Washington to lead the West
It’s election season, and President Bush is using the West as a political game piece. He’s promising to up the timber cut on the national forests and increase oil and gas development, all in the name of jobs and national security. In reality, of course, he’s earning points with his industry supporters, but doing little […]
Part-Time Paradise
Mountain towns echo with construction activity, but the resulting homes lie silent much of the year
The ghost of Richard Butler surfaces in Arizona
It would be foolish to believe that the death of Aryan Nations’ leader Richard Butler means the death of hate in the West. Butler, who sowed ill will for decades in the region, passed away at the age of 86 Sept. 8 in Hayden, Idaho. He died a broken man, his empire of knuckle-draggers that […]
The West has to count on itself
If you care about the environment, and you survived the presidential debates without running out into the backyard to scream at the heavens, you’re a bigger person than I. For those of you who missed them, the three debates included just one question on that “fringe issue” of what’s in the air we breathe and […]
American — and proud of it
Until I traveled to Holland recently, I didn’t know how irreversibly American I am, perhaps not precisely a patriot — the word comes from the Latin for father — but certainly one deeply identified with my native land. In Amsterdam, people eyed me with pity, suspicion or loathing as soon as I opened my mouth […]
