El Paso, Texas, is dependent on the underground waters of the Hueco Bolson, but as the population grows and the bolson declines, both the city and its sister across the border, Ciudad Juarez, are turning to the already overtaxed Rio Grande.
Fiddling with FERC
NORTHWEST If you thought renewing your driver’s license was a pain, try being a dam owner. Every 30 to 50 years, privately owned dams must apply for a new operating license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and the process is neither fast nor cheap. On average, the process drags on for about five…
Washington, unplugged
WASHINGTON The Bonneville Power Administration, which supplies almost half of Washington’s electricity, recently announced that it won’t be able to meet demand over the next five years and may be forced to increase its wholesale power rates 60 percent during the same period. Washington Gov. Gary Locke has a plan that could save the day.…
The other Mexico
Certainly the press, other governments and tourists are most aware of the official, elite, corrupt Mexico; the Mexico that won’t allow a poor man a chance; the Mexico behind the sunglasses. I’ve even been told by people, including Mexicans, that this is Mexican culture. But I know that’s not true. There is another Mexico. –…
Keeping ranchers’ options open
Among his fellow New Mexico ranchers, Sid Goodloe is known as a contrarian (HCN, 4/15/96: Raising a ranch from the dead). His newest project, the Southern Rockies Agricultural Land Trust, is keeping that reputation intact. Goodloe hopes to convince his neighbors that conservation easements – voluntary legal agreements that prohibit development of private land –…
Priests preach to the choir: Protect the Columbia
The Roman Catholic Church isn’t traditionally considered the home of radical greens. But 12 bishops from the Pacific Northwest and Canada have jumped into the environmental fray, and in late February, they released a long-awaited and controversial pastoral letter about the Columbia River (HCN, 9/11/00: Holy water). The letter, nourished by three years of discussion…
Water Watch
Boulder, Colo., residents can now check on the health of their watershed by surfing the Web. The Boulder Area Sustainability Information Network (BASIN) Web site publishes water quality indicators and trends in the Boulder Creek watershed, which provides water for the city of Boulder. The site also includes snowpack information, an air-quality index, and information…
State to coyote hunters: Let the games begin
UTAH Those who spent $19.95 on one of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee’s cuddly replicas of “Copper the Coyote,” a mascot for the 2002 Winter Olympics, could have gotten the little guy for free. Or, at least in exchange for gunning down a real coyote and sending its ears to local county officials. The Olympic…
Land Use Conference
Las Vegas Mayor Oscar B. Goodman, Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo., and author John Maclean will speak to planners, attorneys and developers at the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute’s Land Use Conference, April 19-20, at the University of Denver. Thirty panels and 100 presenters will cover topics such as Western wildfires, smart growth and regional planning.…
The latest bounce
Many Western cities and states spent last year’s election season fighting about growth (HCN, 10/23/00: Colorado’s growth amendment rouses voters). Now, a recent study has assessed the damage. The Brookings Institution report says that citizens in 38 states and hundreds of cities, towns and counties voted on 553 growth-related measures, and close to three-quarters of…
Don’t glorify Babbitt
Dear HCN, As a forester for 20-odd years and as a follower of HCN’s coverage of Western resource issues, I still hold out hope for improvements in the effectiveness and acceptability of public resource stewardship, despite the ongoing media and propaganda warfare. Overall, I agree with a minority of HCN’s slants on things, disagree with…
Reborn Interior? That dog won’t hunt
Dear HCN, I read Ed Marston’s article, titled “Bush administration faces a reborn Interior,” and got a funny feeling in my stomach. I believe Ed is way off base believing the Bush administration will not succeed in using the so-called “reborn Interior” as the typical exploiters’ treasure trove. I see no evidence from the choices…
Navajos at odds about marinas
ARIZONA After 30 years of planning, the Navajo Nation’s Antelope Point Marina may become a reality, despite serious concerns among tribal members. The $60 million development, planned for the south shore of Lake Powell, occupies a piece of land that straddles the Navajo Reservation and Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. The project had been bogged…
Bicycles still not OHVs
Dear HCN, In his Bulletin Board story on the BLM’s OHV Strategy (HCN, 1/29/01: Agency will try to track trails), Matt Jenkins wrote that the Strategy “will now include … possibly even human-powered vehicles like mountain bikes.” It’s important to note that BLM chose to not include bicycling in its OHV Strategy. BLM’s decision came…
Back on the bus
ARIZONA Each year, close to 5 million tourists flock to Grand Canyon National Park. Rafting enthusiasts have to wait up to 18 years for a chance to boat the Canyon, and on the Rim, solitude – and even parking spaces – are hard to come by (HCN, 12/21/98: Grand Canyon Gridlock). In an effort to…
Margolis blasts the wrong people
Dear HCN, Jon Margolis has my hackles up again. In his article about weirdness in Washington, D.C. (HCN, 1/29/01: Weirdness abounds in Washington), I expected comments on Clinton paying off like a broken slot machine for “rich” patrons, or the Clintons registering for gifts (before her confirmation) so the payola would beat the ethics deadline…
Wetlands get dumped on
A Supreme Court decision has stripped as much as one-fifth of the nation’s wetlands of federal protection. The January decision, which ended a legal battle between the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and a solid waste agency in Illinois, asserted that the Corps has no authority to regulate “isolated” waters unless they are used in…
Downwinders fight for their due
UTAH A small group of people recently gathered at the Utah Capitol in Salt Lake City to commemorate the 50th anniversary of one of the darkest moments in the history of the West. They also came to demand compensation for a lifetime of health problems – compensation the federal government promised to pay 11 years…
Colorado program axed
COLORADO For 23 years, staffers of the Colorado Natural Areas Program have cataloged the state’s rare plant and animal habitat, notable geologic formations, and fossil-rich lands. But they may be out of work by summer, when CNAP’s state funding is set to dry up. The program negotiates voluntary agreements with landowners and works with public…
In praise of pragmatism
Dear HCN, I thoroughly enjoyed your essay, “Rearranging the grid” (HCN, 1/29/01: Rearranging the grid), as I do most of what you write. I have become a little jaded at the stridence of environmental writing today, the constant inferences that, indeed, the sky is falling. After 77 years, I know better. Your graphic description of…
Last stand for a roadside attraction
Proposed development near Cody’s Old Trail Town sparks outrage
Divided Waters
A water crisis lurks beneath a sprawling border metropolis
Dear Friends
Divided waters Our lead story on the lower Rio Grande started out as a class project. Writer Megan Lardner, a graduate student in journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, traveled to El Paso and Ciudad Juarez as part of her class with freelance writer and radio producer Sandy Tolan. During his semester as a…
Will logging save the spotted owl?
A symbol of conflict struggles to survive
Hung out to dry
When their jobs went south, El Paso’s working people were hung out to dry
Suburban sprawl hits tribal land
Washington’s Tulalip tribes face a reservation ‘full of strangers’
Heard around the West
As far as anyone knows, the dead explorer William Clark did not use a ouija board, or e-mail, or teleport a petition to the White House in the final flurry of Bill Clinton’s presidency. Still, after a couple of centuries, Clark found the president receptive, as did guide Sacajawea and slave York, the first black…
Yellowstone’s last stampede
WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. – Every morning, Kitty Enboe dons her thick, green National Park Service uniform and breathes thick, green National Park Service air. As an entrance station attendant in this town snuggled up to Yellowstone’s western border, Enboe occupies ground zero in the fight over snowmobiles in America’s oldest and finest national park. On…