Boise Cascade Corp. in Monmouth, Ore., got a nasty
surprise on Christmas Day, when arson destroyed the timber
company’s regional headquarters. The Earth Liberation Front, which
took credit for a $12 million fire at Vail Resort in Colorado last
year (HCN, 11/9/98), has claimed responsibility. “Boise Cascade has
been very naughty after ravaging the forests of the Pacific
Northwest,” says the group’s statement. “Let this be a lesson to
all greedy multinational corporations who don’t respect their
ecosystems.”
Nevada’s Great Basin National Park
is now cattle-free. A seven-year struggle over grazing rights ended
when The Conservation Fund helped raise $220,000 to buy out the
grazing permits held by three ranchers on over 101,000 acres within
park boundaries (HCN, 4/3/95). “I can’t emphasize enough it was a
win-win deal,” rancher Helen Eldridge told the AP. “It was better
to get anything and get out.”
Treesitter Julia
“Butterfly” Hill descended from her nest on Dec. 19, after living
in an ancient redwood tree near Eureka, Calif., for over two years
(HCN, 3/15/99). Hill and her supporters agreed to pay site-owner
Pacific Lumber Co. $50,000 in exchange for a logging ban on a
200-foot buffer encompassing the tree.
La Plata
County in southwest Colorado may be destined for more drilling
(HCN, 3/15/99). BP Amoco wants to dig 550 more coal-bed gas wells
over the next five to 10 years in a county that already leads the
state in natural-gas production. A company spokesman told The
Denver Post that existing wells don’t adequately drain the gas, but
locals disagree. “They still haven’t figured out how to prevent the
impacts caused by existing wells,” says Gwen Lachelt of the San
Juan Citizens Alliance. BP Amoco will present its plans to the
Colorado Oil and Gas Commission later this
month.
Oregon’s Siskiyou National Forest has
always allowed multiple mining operations to proceed without
environmental analysis, violating its Land Management Plan (HCN,
10/12/98). A federal court recently ruled that the agency must
consider the environmental impacts of mining. “This is a
significant legal victory,” says attorney Lori Cooper of the
Siskiyou Regional Education Project. “The Forest Service can no
longer ignore evidence that in-stream mining is killing our salmon
and steelhead.”
* Rebecca
Clarren
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline The Wayward West.
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