Dear HCN, In your last two issues you featured articles on the snowmobiles in West Yellowstone (HCN, 4/1/02: Move over!) and the dairy farms in Idaho’s Magic Valley (HCN, 4/15/02: Raising a stink). There is a common and infuriating thread: The producers of pollution, be it noise or bad odors, noxious fumes or foul wastes, […]
Infuriating selfishness
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
West Yellowstone a cosmic comedy
Dear HCN, You can imagine how “silly” I felt when I read Glen Loomis’ comments about the snowmobile curfew (“it would be one more of the freedoms in our country whittled away”) (HCN, 4/1/02: Move over!). I felt “silly” as I realized that I must have been too preoccupied with my head being up my […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Four ways to oppose snowmobiles
Dear HCN, Your excellent story on snowmobiles and West Yellowstone (HCN, 4/1/02: Move over!) demonstrates one among several points: After a new, destructive practice has gained a foothold in the local economy, it can be virtually impossible to control, much less dislodge. People who valued tranquility, clean water, kayaking, wildlife and traditional island values decided […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
New hope for abandoned mines
Touch polluted water and it’s yours forever – or at least the liability is. All across the West, well-meaning citizens have shied away from cleaning up abandoned hardrock mines and their polluted streams for fear they could be held responsible under the Clean Water Act. Now, U.S. Reps. Mark Udall, D-Colo., and Bob Schaffer, R-Colo., […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Bush takes a swing at community forestry
When George W. Bush campaigned for president, he stumped in the Northwest as a friend of forgotten rural residents. Now, proposed cuts in Bush’s fiscal year 2003 budget may pull the rug out from under some of those people. Over the last several years, Pacific Northwest timber communities and workers have retooled to perform more […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
The Latest Bounce
Mounting criticism of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ creative cost-benefit analysis has prompted the agency to put 150 projects, such as harbor deepening and beach restoration, on hold. The soundness of the Corps’ criteria for evaluating projects has been questioned by the General Accounting Office and in a recent series in The Oregonian (see […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Bison under the gun – again
MONTANA It was a hard winter for the bison of Yellowstone National Park. Increased herd size and harsh weather prompted many animals to head beyond the park for better feeding grounds in Montana. There, federal and state officials have so far killed 170 bison in an attempt to prevent the spread of brucellosis to cattle […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Dredging up debate
OREGON Keeping the Port of Portland competitive means dredging the Columbia River so bigger ships can float through, at least according to Port officials and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, who want to deepen the river from 40 to 43 feet. They say the extra depth would save the Port from sinking into obscurity, […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Spilling salt into rivers
COLORADO The Southern Ute tribe has turned a spotlight on a plan to dump water from coalbed-methane wells into a southern Colorado river. Tribal leaders recently scolded state officials for failing to consult with them before issuing a permit that will allow two coalbed-methane wells to spill water into the Florida River. Usually, the poor […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Property rights reined in
Urban planning and environmental protection got a shot in the arm on April 23, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that property owners at Lake Tahoe are not entitled to government compensation for a moratorium that prevented them from building on their land (HCN, 2/18/02). Following a series of Supreme Court decisions that bolstered […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Does desert cross cross the line?
CALIFORNIA A white cross cemented atop a rock outcropping in Mojave National Preserve has become the center of a fight over religious freedom on public land. The six-foot cross, made of metal pipes, was erected in 1934 by the Veterans of Foreign Wars and has served as a local gathering point for Easter sunrise services. […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Where free trade is more than an acronym
It’s early when Ana Maria and I arrive at the onion fields, so early that we have to use the lights of a growling tractor to guide us along the rows. I stumble through the mud behind Ana, listening to the sounds of slamming doors and shouted saludos drift through the cold, damp air. When […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Heard around the West
There’s yet another use for duct tape, one more innovative than the last one you might have thought of – such as wrapping up like a bullet for Halloween. Duct tape came in handy at a Montana airport after a botched takeoff knocked “stewardesses on their butts” and busted the lens on a navigational light, […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
New monuments: Planning by numbers
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear, just before and after George W. Bush was inaugurated, when some of his Western supporters spoke openly about nullifying those 11 new national monuments created by the presidential predecessor they hated. Enter reality, both legal and political. It turns out that the […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
The Old West went that-a-way
The East Coast editor wants me to tell her something new. Something nobody knows about the West. Something special. Something secret. I rack my brain. And my ethics. What we have left out here that’s special needs to stay special. Our secrets need to be kept. Here’s the piece I sent her. She turned it […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Dear Friends
The loooooong view One of the joys of working at High Country News is getting caught up in the excitement of ideas. Our interns often tell us that their four-month stint here feels as much like an intensive graduate course in Western issues as it does an introduction to journalism. No one gets more excited […]
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
BITTERROOT VALLEY, Mont. – Remember that scene from Dances with Wolves, when Kevin Costner’s character spins through billowing, thigh-deep yellow grassland, his fingers lightly grazing the seedheads? I’ve spent a good stretch of this radiant summer morning working across a prairie in Montana’s Bitterroot Valley doing the same thing, but without that inspiring light touch. […]
Posted inApril 29, 2002: The Great Salt Lake Mystery
Roslyn development update
Dear HCN, A belated thank you for your coverage of the resort development slated for lands adjacent to our fine town of Roslyn, Wash. (HCN, 3/4/02: Development threatens historic town). Since your report, Trendwest Resorts, Inc., has been sold to the very large hotel and travel company, Cendant Corporation, for $894 million in stock. The […]
Posted inApril 29, 2002: The Great Salt Lake Mystery
Re: ‘Looking for the good’
Dear HCN, I want to belatedly thank you for Barbara Schuster’s fantastic article on silencing LDS trash talk (HCN, 2/4/02: Why the bad rap for Mormons?). I grew up in the Idaho end of Cache Valley and was never a part of the “Salt Lake Society,” thus missing things here in SLC at that time. […]
Posted inApril 29, 2002: The Great Salt Lake Mystery
‘Sense of place’ bought and sold
Dear HCN, A very heartfelt essay by George Sibley (HCN, 3/18/02: How I lost my town). Unfortunately, Colorado is not the only place in the West which is suffering this plight. Before moving to Reno 12 years ago, I was a resident of Truckee, Calif., 30 miles “up valley” to the west. The former railroad/mill […]