Interior Department cuts off state from ‘surplus’ Colorado River water
Matt Jenkins
Posted inDecember 23, 2002: In search of the Glory Days
The Latest Bounce
Cattle rustling is still a problem in the Four Corners, according to the New Mexico Livestock Board. The board has proposed a joint-powers agreement between the Navajo Nation and New Mexico that would prosecute thieves on the 17 million-acre reservation, where stolen cattle are often hidden and then sold on the black market (HCN, 8/19/02: […]
Posted inDecember 23, 2002: In search of the Glory Days
Forest planning gets a facelift
Critics say the new look will turn national forests into lawsuit magnets
Posted inNovember 25, 2002: Planning's poster child grows up
Silver state gets a little wilder
NEVADA For wilderness boosters who’ve spent years trying to convince the rest of the country – and more than a few of their fellow Nevadans – that the desert around Las Vegas is not a wasteland, Nov. 5 brought some good news. President Bush signed the Clark County Public Lands and Natural Resources Act into […]
Posted inNovember 25, 2002: Planning's poster child grows up
A Western water parable
By way of introduction, writer Robert Glennon recounts the tale of Ubar, “the fabled city of ancient Arabia known as ‘the Atlantis of the Sands.’ ” Sometime between 300 and 500 A.D., Ubar’s inhabitants drank dry the aquifer over which their city was built, and the town promptly collapsed into the emptied cavern below. That […]
Posted inOctober 28, 2002: Shadow Creatures
Popular historian passes on
Historian Stephen Ambrose died Oct. 13 at age 66. Although Ambrose was best-known for his popular histories of World War II, he also wrote about the West. Undaunted Courage, the story of the Lewis and Clark expedition, and Nothing Like it in the World, about the building of the transcontinental railroad, were both national best-sellers. […]
Posted inOctober 28, 2002: Shadow Creatures
Forests could lose environmental review
Note: in the print edition of this issue, this article appears as a sidebar to another news article, “Bush undermines bedrock environmental law.” While the Bush administration has focused its efforts to “streamline” environmental reviews on energy and transportation projects, the next big showdown will take place in the national forests. Tweaking the National Environmental […]
Posted inOctober 14, 2002: Democrats kick back: The politics of growth
Native Waters
The era of the Indian land treaty ended more than a century ago, but now the West is in the midst of another treaty era – this time focused on water. So writes Daniel McCool, a longtime scholar of federal Indian policy and the head of the University of Utah’s American West Center, in his […]
Posted inSeptember 30, 2002: Delta Blues
Flow charts for the Golden State
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Even for the state’s water wizards, it can be tough to get a handle on how California’s natural and extremely unnatural water systems fit together. But a series of maps published by the nonprofit Water Education Foundation helps make a normally arcane world accessible […]
Posted inSeptember 16, 2002: The Royal Squeeze
The Latest Bounce
In Wyoming, the Bureau of Land Management is reconsidering its approval of 5,100 coalbed methane leases in the Powder River Basin (HCN, 5/13/02:Land board says, ‘Look before you lease’). The second look follows a federal review board’s ruling earlier this year that the BLM failed to adequately consider the environmental impacts of three other methane […]
Posted inSeptember 16, 2002: The Royal Squeeze
The Royal Squeeze
For nearly a century, the Imperial Valley’s wastewater has kept the Salton Sea alive. Now, the push to make California more watertight may threaten this wildlife haven – and Imperial’s agricultural economy.
Posted inSeptember 2, 2002: Backlash
The Latest Bounce
The Colorado Wildlife Commission has approved plans to release up to 180 more lynx in the state beginning this winter, but there’s a catch. A state spokesman says the Department of Natural Resources is negotiating with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to give the threatened cats less-protective “experimental, nonessential” status, citing concern “that putting […]
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
The Latest Bounce
An emergency spending bill to fund the war on terrorism may bring some relief for the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow (HCN, 7/8/02). The $28.9 billion bill, signed Aug. 2 by President Bush, includes $4 million for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to lease water from Albuquerque to maintain river flows in a crucial stretch […]
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
Blame game sheds little light on fires
It was boring, made-for-C-SPAN stuff, a round of congressional testimony on June 12 by Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth on what his agency has named “The Process Predicament.” The Forest Service has been hobbled, he said, by excessive environmental analysis requirements, management inefficiencies and a breakdown in “collaborative” public involvement. That, said Bosworth, had put […]
Posted inAugust 5, 2002: Land or money?
Yucca heads for the courts
NEVADA With the Senate’s 60-39 approval of a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain on July 9, the congressional fight over what to do with the nation’s spent nuclear fuel is finished. President Bush signed the bill into law July 23. But Nevada officials and politicians say that an array of legal and procedural hurdles […]
Posted inAugust 5, 2002: Land or money?
The Latest Bounce
It’s lights-out for two Idaho power plants that would have tapped the sole source of drinking water for more than 400,000 people in northern Idaho and eastern Washington (HCN, 4/15/02: Water threat inspires a rare alliance). The proposed plants would have pumped 3.8 billion gallons of water out of the aquifer each year and evaporated […]
Posted inJuly 8, 2002: The anatomy of fire
The Latest Bounce
The National Park Service has abandoned its quest to kick snowmobiles out of Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks (HCN, 4/1/02: Move over!). Now, the agency is developing a plan that will reduce the number of snowmobiles in the parks, require four-stroke engines to minimize noise and air pollution, and require the use of licensed […]
Posted inJune 24, 2002: The buzz business
The Latest Bounce
The Department of the Interior has approved the controversial Fence Lake coal mine in New Mexico (HCN, 10/8/01: Salt Woman confronts a coal mine). The Salt River Project will mine 80 million tons of coal to generate electricity for Phoenix, but Indians at the Zuni Pueblo worry that the project could destroy trails and grave […]
Posted inJune 10, 2002: Hatching reform
The Latest Bounce
Boise, Idaho’s efforts to protect open space are gaining ground (HCN, 6/18/01: Surprise! Boise votes for open space). Almost a year after voters approved a $10 million tax to buy open space in the city’s foothills, the city announced its first purchase: a 42-acre parcel in Hulls Gulch originally slated for subdivision development. The city […]