In this issue, the feature examines one Indigenous family’s experience with structural inequities that affect the availability of housing in both rural and urban areas. Inequity is also examined in the Letter from California, on how federal tax policy will exacerbate growing class disparities. And finally, a story of a binational community shows what could be, once we look beyond borders, whether of class or nations.

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Bundy’s ‘Wild West’

Ryan Bundy thinks that he still lives in the Old West of “make your own laws and bring a gun to enforce them” (“Ryan Bundy’s West,” HCN, 12/25/17). Thank goodness we had level-headed people years ago who decided that in order to have a civil society, we needed some boundaries and guidelines. Bundy said the…

by Karen Jaeger

Cases to consider

In addition to the case at point in Gloria Dickie’s article, (“A precedent for species recovery?” HCN, 1/22/18), the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has made two other rulings in the Great Lakes wolf case that deserve mention. First, it ruled that the Fish and Wildlife Service has the authority to delist a distinct population…

by Dave Knibb

Pay to play

While the prospect of higher access fees to public lands — particularly national parks — is a valid concern, as a frequent park visitor, I see the two most pressing concerns as being: (1) The cost of the immense backlog of maintenance to the infrastructure of the parks, and (2) the daily damage being done…

by John W. Thomas

Wrong charge

I understand that the case against the Bundys — or any other defendant, for that matter — can be dismissed for prosecutorial misconduct if the judge determines that prosecutors egregiously violated the rights of the defendants, preventing them from being able to conduct his or her defense, (“Cliven Bundy walks,” HCN, 1/22/18). That is a…

by Scott Finley

Marginalized and houseless in the West

The blood-orange January sun is just dipping below the Uncompaghre Plateau as I pull up to a stoplight in Delta, Colorado. On the shoulder, a bearded man about my age dances a little jig in the cold, holding a cardboard sign that reads: “Homeless, anything will help.” He is one of a half-dozen people I’ve…

by Paul Larmer