Despite the Keystone rejection, keep-it-in-the-ground activism is still a sideshow to the larger climate movement.
Public lands
‘Legal monkey-wrenching’ on Western trails
One man’s guerrilla trail work aims to improve public access to public land.
The beaver whisperer
A biologist figures out how to keep beavers alive on Western landscapes.
The Latest: Supreme Court denies roads rule appeal in Utah
Decision makes it harder for counties to claim roads on public land.
Can drilling and recreation get along in Moab, Utah?
The BLM unveils the unprecedented plan to balance oil and gas with conservation in canyon country.
Drilling proposed in Montana’s Badger-Two Medicine
Tribes and former federal officials fight to cancel energy leases on sacred land.
BLM mulls energy development in sage grouse habitat
Feds may restrict hardrock mining and put oil and gas leases on auction block.
Park Service may strengthen its oil and gas regulations
Current rules give the agency little leverage to protect lands or restore damage once drilling companies pull out.
Fish and Wildlife and integrity, a rental crisis, California homelessness and more.
Hcn.org news in brief.
The Latest: Park Service takes the reins at Valles Caldera
The failed experiment in privatized land management has come to an end.
Will the Land and Water Conservation Fund rise again?
Congress derails the nation’s most successful public access and recreation program.
Jeb Bush outlines plans to limit federal control of Western lands
The presidential hopeful would move Interior Department from Washington to the West.
Public-land transfer proponents may have violated lobbying laws
Colorado puts the American Lands Council on “notice” for ethical missteps.
Congress tries to speed up contentious post-fire logging
New legislation comes despite science showing timber salvage harms essential wildlife habitat
Manifest destiny today, bees and climate, sage grouse legal wrangling on the horizon.
Hcn.org news in brief.
The rise of Lisa Murkowski
Alaska’s pragmatic senator wants to reshape America’s energy policy.
Beyond the energy omnibus: a look at Sen. Murkowski’s hard-to-pass bills
The head of the Senate Energy Committee has crafted a comprehensive energy plan. But she left her most ambitious initiatives to be battled over separately.
Monument designations aren’t land grabs. They’re protection against theft.
Today, some Westerners might call the 1908 presidential proclamation of a Grand Canyon National Monument a “surreptitious land grab.” But it all depends on who’s doing the grabbing, and for what purpose. Utah Republican Rep. Rob Bishop says that such proclamations allow presidents to “lock up” millions of acres of public land “like bandits in […]
A trail runner defends his right to public lands
One September morning, with huckleberry bushes burning a fierce red against a dusting of snow on the banks of the upper Nisqually River, I left Mount Rainier National Park headquarters on a pilgrimage. Twenty-seven hours later, depleted but filled with a near-religious sense of reverence and elation I’ve rarely felt since, I arrived back where […]
Groups sue Wyoming over ‘data trespassing’ law
The laws make it a crime to collect data on open land if the collector lacks certain permissions.
