In our latest issue, we take a look back on our political history: In 1983, Reagan’s pick to head the environmental Protection agency, Anne Gorsuch, led the charge to slash her own agency’s budget and relax pollution standards. Scott Pruitt, the Trump administration’s new EPA administrator, has staked out an eerily similar path. In our cover story, a Washington man at the center of a timber-poaching gang wanted to help investigators — but he probably didn’t think it would backfire and lead to an investigation that would land him in jail.

Conservation scientist Shiloh Halsey makes his way across the downed logs and abandoned chunks of bigleaf maple in the Slaughterhouse in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, site of a timber theft investigation. Credit: Terray Sylvester

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Urban ecosystems are diminished ecosystems

Being trained in plant ecology, I enjoy HCN’s well-balanced reporting of issues relating to that subject. The inclusion of Emma Marris’ review of Nathanael Johnson’s Unseen City in the Feb. 20 issue is an example. I agree that urban wildlife systems are ecosystems in their own right, and they contain many beautiful wonders, if we…

by Stephen Fischer

Veterans on the land

Regarding the article “River of Healing” in the Feb. 6 issue, as a Forest Service smokejumper and wildland firefighter who runs a veterans’ hiring program, I can attest to the fact that many veterans thrive in pursuits that bring them close to nature and replicate aspects of their military careers, such as teamwork, shared goals…

by Dan Cottrell

Boycott Utah

I applaud and support key recreational industry leaders who have pulled out of the Outdoor Retailer shows in Salt Lake City (“Outdoor rec industry defends public lands,” HCN, 2/20/17). As an individual, I can also play a role in swaying the policy opinions of the Utah delegation regarding protection of public lands. And that role…

by John Scahill

Rehab for profit

Your article “Overdosed” in the Feb. 20 issue was accurate and well-researched, and it is a story that has played out across the nation. As a recently retired general practitioner in Palmer, Alaska, I had 41 years of practice to witness the formation of our addicted, chronic-pain and disability culture. More and more patients require…

by David P. Werner

Remember, we’ve seen this before

Whenever I feel a bit down about the fact that, after electing a billionaire president who campaigned on promises to help the working class, we are now fighting a breathtakingly brazen attempt to enact the agenda of corporate America, I find it helpful to remember that we’ve seen all of this — or at least…

by Paul Larmer