The author remembers his early days in a small Colorado mountain town, and ponders the economic and social changes that have slowly turned “Mendicant Mountain” into a bustling, expensive ski resort.
Questions on condors
Dear HCN, Could we go from the general to the specific? How many hunting tags are issued in condor habitat? (HCN, 2/18/02: Condor program laden with lead). How much more does a lead-free bullet cost (how much is the bullet of total cartridge cost?), and how many rounds does the average hunter fire in the…
McKenna misstates facts on wolverine studies
Dear HCN, In the article on snowmobiles by Douglas Schnitzspahn (HCN, 2/4/02: Snowmobilers rev up for roadless riding) there was a glaring error which I felt emboldened to bring to your attention. Pat McKenna is quoted as saying “scientific studies have proven that the paths that snowmobiles create up there (Mount Jefferson, Mont.) disturb wolverines…
Where is the Kingdom of Paonia?
Dear HCN, Dispatch To the Kingdom of Paonia: Without dwelling on the thesis of This Sovereign Land and the view that the federal government must transfer the power over federal lands into local hands, presuming there is some legal, structural and socio-political basis for this action, I would like to submit a comment on Ed…
The Latest Bounce
Eric Schaeffer, a top Environmental Protection Agency official, has resigned over the Bush administration’s failure to enforce new rules aimed at cleaning up power-plant pollution. “We are fighting a White House that seems determined to weaken the rules we are trying to enforce,” he wrote in his resignation letter. His action has prompted Senate hearings…
BLM director forced to resign
IDAHO Martha Hahn has been forced out of her job as the Idaho state director of the Bureau of Land Management in a housecleaning move by J. Steven Griles, deputy secretary of the Interior. Hahn announced on March 7 that she would resign rather than take a position with the National Park Service overseeing New…
Zoning code may squeeze Aspen ranchers
COLORADO In Aspen’s narrow valley, cluttered with enormous homes and virtually devoid of affordable housing, growth management seems a moot point. However, that is just what Pitkin County commissioners hope to accomplish with a bold rezoning plan. The proposed revisions of the county’s land-use code would concentrate growth in already-developed areas and would cap new…
Will the real Gifford Pinchot please stand up
Char Miller has written a book intended to rescue Forest Service founding chief Gifford Pinchot from the battering he has taken over the flooding of Northern California’s Hetch Hetchy Valley. In almost all accounts of that fight, Sierra Club founder John Muir is the defender of the beautiful valley while Pinchot wants to flood it…
Cactus Ed revisited
In the West, few names elicit as much veneration or revilement as that of Edward Abbey. But those of us who weren’t around during Abbey’s heyday, or never got to meet him, can only turn to books. Thirteen years after Abbey’s death, two new books add depth to the story of Cactus Ed. James Cahalan’s…
Bush’s game plan a clear and present danger
Dear HCN, Contrary to your suggestion (HCN, 2/4/02: No game plan for the public lands), the Bush administration has a very clear game plan: Drill, mine and log. Start with the all-out campaign to turn the Arctic Refuge’s coastal plain into a sprawling oil field. The president also has expressed interest in drilling in the…
Looking for another spotted owl
Dear HCN, While Hal Clifford wrote a fairly objective article about the sage grouse brouhaha in the Gunnison Valley (HCN, 2/4/02: Last dance for the sage grouse?), he omitted a couple of points that would give readers a fuller understanding of the political landscape. First, Clifford forgets to mention that Andy Kerr is also executive…
Sage grouse articles mislead
Dear HCN, This is a follow-up to a couple of articles on sage grouse (HCN, 2/4/02: Last dance for the sage grouse?). Sagebrush is an important species and vital to rangeland ecosystems, but there is a limit to how much sagebrush is enough before it begins to bring down the overall condition of rangelands. When…
How I lost my town
The land was ours before we were the land’s …Something we were withholding made us weakUntil we found out that it was ourselvesWe were withholding from our land of living,And forthwith found salvation in surrender. – Robert Frost, “The Gift Outright” I know I’m starting to lose it. My sense of place. It really hit…
Dear Friends
March madness Winter finally arrived in Paonia, March 1. The thermometer at the bank dipped to 5 below zero following a blustery eight-inch snowfall. The moisture was appreciated. Snowpack is well below average in almost every drainage of the state, and ranchers are already wondering how early in the summer their irrigation water will dry…
Can ‘charter forests’ remake an agency?
Experimental program seeks a cure for Forest Service analysis paralysis
Heard around the West
Is there no compassion in Aspen? Maybe not much for Kenneth Lay, former honcho of the bankrupt corporation Enron. The good drinkers at the Woody Creek Tavern recently placed a contribution bowl on the bar to raise money for Lay, a quasi-local and occasional neighbor. Lay owns several properties in Aspen as well as a…
A dusty lake is plumbed halfway back to life
The dry bed of Owens Lake has a primal, wind-wracked sort of gestalt. With the Sierra crest towering almost 11,000 feet to the west and the blazing eye of the sun high overhead, it’s easy to believe you’re standing on the salt-rimmed edge of the sky. Owens Lake hasn’t actually been a lake for three-quarters…
Collaboration may prevent conflagration in Santa Fe
Coalition’s thinning-and-burning plan starts this spring
Alternative livestock searches for a niche
Emu, ostrich, elk and bison industries plummet
In California, no water project is too big
In a state like California, where half the population relies on water that has been pumped hundreds of miles across deserts or thousands of feet over mountains, you might think it difficult to devise a plan nutty enough to draw jeers. Yet an Alaska company has managed to do just that. At first blush, I…
Bush turns BLM into energy machine
In November, quietly and without fanfare, Acting Director of the Bureau of Land Management Nina Rose Hatfield created a National Energy Office to implement President Bush’s energy policy. Its sole purpose, according to BLM documents, is to expedite drilling and mining on public lands. Last May, Bush issued Executive Order 13212, which stresses that it…