I was very disappointed by Paul Larmer’s dismissive editorial regarding NASA’s plans to send humans to the moon and Mars (HCN, 2/2/04: A plan for Spaceship Earth). Larmer writes, “We’ll travel the galaxy later, when desperation and exploitation are no longer the driving forces.” If Larmer bothered to read more than media tidbits, then he […]
Explore both Earth and space
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Oil and gas drilling could oust elk — and Boy Scouts
NEW MEXICO The Valle Vidal in northern New Mexico, known for its trout streams and trophy elk herd, could soon be known for oil and gas drilling, too. In 1982, Pennzoil Corporation donated the 100,000-acre valley to the Carson National Forest, and for more than 20 years, hunters and hikers have enjoyed the valley and […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Follow-up
Two federal judges are duking it out in Yellowstone’s snowmobile saga. Last December, Judge Emmet Sullivan struck down a National Park Service plan that would have allowed 1,100 snowmobiles daily into the park, and instead re-instated a ban on the machines (HCN, 1/19/04: Yellowstone snowmobilers suffer whiplash). But in early February, Judge Clarence Brimmer blocked […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Heard around the West
NEVADA Better not mess with Nevada: It’s big, and getting bigger. Last year, Nevada gained an average of 6,141 people every month, making it number-one for growth in the nation for the 17th year in a row, reports the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Citing climate and affordability, 70 percent of the newcomers to the state flock […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
My great-grandfather the crow killer
The one time I met my great-grandfather was unexpectedly, at the Grand Canyon. It was on an overcast March day when I was 18. I wasn’t looking for any relatives. I was just trying to take photographs. I’d never visited the national park, and so my grandfather, Frederick, had driven my 11-year-old brother and me […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
We’re bickering with our neighbors while the feds spend our money
As John Kerry was firming up his front-runner status in seven Democratic primaries on Feb. 3, Oregon voters were defeating Measure 30, an $800 million package of income tax surcharges, cigarette tax renewals and minimum corporate-tax increases, which was intended to restore funding that has been cut from education and basic services. “Defeat” isn’t quite […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
The New West collides with open-range laws
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “The Last Open Range.” Kent Knudson picked up a rifle and opened fire, defending his 40 acres in Arizona, and got handcuffed and hauled to jail. John Ward, driving a truckload of hay in Oregon one night, rounded a curve and smashed into 1,300 […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Creating immigrant leaders: Labor organizer Ramon Ramirez
WOODBURN, OREGON — Disoriented, poor and unorganized, Latino immigrant farmworkers traditionally have not had a lot of political power in the United States. They often do the low-wage jobs American-born workers won’t do, working in an industry that largely precludes its workers from bargaining through unions. And because many immigrant farmworkers have entered the United […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Arizona land swap dogged by questions
Yavapai Ranch Land Exchange called a bad deal for public, spur for sprawl
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Old-growth trees to fall in the Sierra
The Forest Service ditches a collaborative forest plan in favor of getting out the cut
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Postscript to a water war
Nearly a decade after an attempted water grab in California’s Imperial Valley, the saga takes a strange new twist
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Dear Friends
Congratulations! The crew at High Country News extends a hearty welcome to the newest member of the clan: Paolo Bacigalupi and his wife, Anjula Jalan, arrived in the world at 3:24 a.m. on Jan. 25 — and has hardly allowed his parents a wink of sleep since. Paolo reports that Arjun set a record a […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
Watt turns history on its head
On a snowy evening in early February, three High Country News staffers made the five-hour drive over three mountain passes and through a blizzard, to Boulder, Colo., to see this paper’s former nemesis: one-time Interior Secretary James Watt. Professors Patricia Nelson Limerick and Charles Wilkinson, of the University of Colorado’s Center of the American West, […]
Posted inMarch 1, 2004: The Last Open Range
The Last Open Range
From Wyoming’s windswept high desert, a question for the West: Do we have to fence it all in?
Posted inWotr
NIMPBY: Not in My Paesano’s Backyard
A recent environmental threat to a small town in southern Italy, and the people’s overwhelming response to it, made me wonder if we Americans have lost our zest for protest. The spontaneous uprising by southern Italians forced the government to reverse a decision that would have designated a rural village as the country’s sole repository […]
Posted inWotr
Surprise: Snowmobiles aren’t completely evil
There’s no question: They stink, they’re noisy, and they scare wildlife. Snowmobiles are truly obnoxious. But while I applaud Yellowstone’s contested ban on snowmobiles, I’ve had to rethink my own stance. For as much as I dislike the smelly machines, snowmobiles have their place. As a cross-country skier, I’ve never really cared for snowmobiling, especially […]
Posted inWotr
You can’t share a trail with an obnoxious machine
Around my hometown, as in so much of this quality-of-life Western landscape, there is strong competition for recreational space, and strident discussions about how to allocate that resource. In the debate, an occasional cry for tolerance is expressed, a call for the equable sharing of trails between practitioners of different forms of recreation. Mostly, the […]
Posted inFebruary 16, 2004: Courting Disaster
Tipping the scales
For four decades, the federal courts have stood up for environmental laws. If George W. Bush has his way, that will soon be ancient history.
Posted inWotr
One national park could tell the truth about the West
The Black Canyon in western Colorado is one of the world’s most splendid examples of the depths to which erosion and uplift can go. A steep gash in ancient granite, nearly 3,000 feet deep and not much wider at its rim, the Black Canyon is the kind of geological anomaly we like to single out […]
Posted inWotr
It’s time for voters to look at the whole picture
As John Kerry was firming up his frontrunner status in seven Democratic primaries Feb. 3, Oregon voters were defeating Measure 30, an $800 million package of income tax surcharges, cigarette tax renewals and minimum corporate-tax increases intended to restore dramatic cuts in education and basic services. “Defeat” isn’t quite the word. We crushed it 3-2, […]