It may not come as a surprise that many Native Americans living on mostly poor, remote reservations in the American West have come to rely heavily on payday loan companies offering cash at high interest rates when money is tight. Yet as Jonathan Thompson reveals in the current issue of High Country News, some tribes […]
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Border patrol runs roughshod on public lands
In its quest to secure the U.S./Mexico border, the U.S. Border Patrol is running roughshod over huge swaths of desert wilderness with complete immunity from U.S. environmental laws. That’s what Ray Ring, a senior editor at High Country News, discovered on a recent reporting trip to the border for his feature story “Border Out of […]
Posted inJune 9, 2014: Border Out of Control
How mining transforms the West’s ranching communities
Photographs of people and places in flux.
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Will gun control do more harm than good?
As Americans grapple with the best way to stem the tide of mass shootings that have terrorized the country in recent years, one liberal journalist and author is arguing that adding gun control laws could actually do more harm than good in the effort to make Americans safer. In his recent book “Gun Guys: A […]
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The National Park Service’s diversity problem
From Yosemite to Glacier National Park to the Harriet Tubman National Monument in Maryland, the 400 parks that make up the U.S. National Park system are supposed to be the shared heritage of all Americans. Yet as Jodi Peterson reports in the current issue of High Country News, the vast majority of people who visit […]
Posted inApril 28, 2014: Two-Wheel Revolution
Video of epic mule deer migration
Mulies on the move in western Wyoming.
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Listen to HCN readers share horror stories
Sometimes when you set off across the west in search of adventure, you find a bit more than you bargained for. For our recent Travel Issue, High Country News held a “Western Travel Horror Story” contest that prompted more than 50 readers to submit stories about trips in the west that went terribly—and hilariously—wrong. For […]
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Photos of a standoff
Armed militia members join a Nevada rancher to protest a cattle roundup from public land.
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Will the Colorado River reach the Gulf of California once more?
Photographs of the historic water pulses.
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KDNK Radio speaks with Judith Lewis Mernit
California’s 38 million residents need energy, and since they don’t want it from coal plants, communities in the West are trying to seize an opportunity to export their renewable energy California’s way. In this episode of Sounds of the High Country, KDNK’s Eric Skalac spoke to Judith Lewis Mernit who wrote about California’s energy needs […]
Posted inMarch 17, 2014: When California Kicks Coal
Geoduck fishermen switch to urchins off Washington’s coast
China banned West Coast shellfish after finding traces of toxins.
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KDNK Radio speaks with writer Sierra Crane-Murdoch
In the current issue of High Country News, contributing editor Sierra Crane-Murdoch tells a sprawling tale of contamination, cancer and cover up as she tries to unravel the unsolved mystery of the Fallon, Nevada cancer cluster. For the latest edition of KDNK Radio’s Sounds of the High Country, Nelson Harvey spoke with Murdoch about what […]
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KDNK Radio speaks with HCN reporter April Reese
Out in the Gila National Forest, ranchers and environmentalists are working together to protect endangered wolves… while also protecting ranchers’ livelihoods. In the current issue of the High Country News, writer April Reese investigates the surprising new strategy for endangered wildlife protection being tried in New Mexico. Her story is titled “Can a grazing buyout […]
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Two North Dakota kids explain the Bakken boom
A film about their experience near the town of White Earth.
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A city beyond the fog and under one roof
Photographs of isolation and community in Whittier, Alaska.
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
Two Angelenos debate the city’s sustainability efforts
The conversation between Jon Christensen and Emily Green begins at minute 41:29.
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KDNK Radio speaks with HCN reporter Kevin Taylor
The number of community gardens in the U.S. has been growing in recent years as more people take an interest in producing at least some of their own food. Yet in some western communities, a new and radical approach to communal agriculture is taking root: the edible forest garden. KDNK Radio’s Nelson Harvey spoke with […]
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Community responds to a film on its own ill-fated uranium mill
Residents from Montrose County, Colorado’s West End recently gathered for a screening of “Uranium Drive-In,” a documentary that tells the story of the ill-fated Piñon Ridge Uranium Mill, and a tight-knit community desperate for jobs and some hint of a brighter economy. KVNF Radio’s Travis Bubenik was on hand for the screening at the New […]
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Bison roundup at Rocky Mountain Arsenal refuge
At least 20 animals were removed from the herd to let habitat recover.