You have done us all a great service by publishing a very important story about the oak woodland and the sediment dump (HCN, 5/14/12, “Los Angeles Against the Mountains”). I consider myself a member of the “environmental” community in Southern California, and I am an avid HCN reader. It is good to see a piece […]
Letter to the editor
Posted inMay 28, 2012: The Gila Bend Photon Club
Fighting billboards in Missouri
Congratulations on your incredible article “Billboards vs. Democracy” in the Jan. 23, 2012, issue. My neighbor brought me the issue, knowing my dislike for billboards. Your research for the article was amazing — so thorough and comprehensive. The only detail I would add is that digital billboards are energy hogs. Our Kansas City neighborhoods were […]
Posted inMay 28, 2012: The Gila Bend Photon Club
Learning from the opposition
Ed Marston’s tribute to pioneering rancher Doc Hatfield was fitting; Hatfield had a major hand in promoting responsible use of Western rangelands. He helped start a movement of responsible ranchers operating in all corners of the West (HCN, 4/15/12, “Goodbye, Doc”). The less-responsible ranchers are still out there, too, and, from what I see here […]
Posted inMay 28, 2012: The Gila Bend Photon Club
Libro-tempest in a teacup
I live in sight of Tucson Unified School District’s ground zero, and this controversy is a storm in a teacup (HCN, 4/16/12, “The book smugglers”). Tucson is a multi-ethnic community, but this controversy seems to have only two cultural dimensions, Latinos and everybody else, with “everybody else” wearing the bad, black cowboy hat these days. […]
Posted inMay 28, 2012: The Gila Bend Photon Club
Rowing to Yap
Michelle Nijhuis’ essay in the April 30, 2012, issue, “The row to nowhere,” was delightful. I lived on Yap, or more accurately, I spent several weeks there several times. The island is beautiful and traditional. Most amazing is that part of the islanders’ own “rowing history” involves rowing, or, rather, sailing, to the sort-of-nearby island […]
Posted inMay 28, 2012: The Gila Bend Photon Club
Something in the desert water?
While Arizona’s homegrown political traditions tend more toward a conservative Blue Dog Democrat, moderate stance, there has, since Goldwater, arisen in Phoenix and the Valley a somewhat hard-core Republican population of voters (HCN, 4/30/12, “Money talks — and votes”). For some reason, when voters retire and move to Phoenix or Scottsdale from the East Coast, […]
Posted inMay 14, 2012: The sediment dumps of L.A.
Dear HCN: Reader survey responses
Our annual reader surveys have been trickling in, and as always, they’re chock-full of thoughtful criticism, enthusiastic encouragement, and suggestions for widening — or narrowing — our field of view. Here’s a sampling of what’s on your mind. One of the things we appreciated is that HCN is apolitical. I found Tom Zoellner’s “Extreme Arizona” […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Bravo, Bob!
Bravo for Bob Rawlings, the “Water Warrior,” and for the Pueblo Chieftain for their battle to keep their river water in their valley (HCN, 3/19/12). The situation where we are headed is grim. When all the agricultural water is gone to the thirsty, growing cities and agriculture is left high and dry, city people will […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Common ground in a fractured land
I arrived in Teton County, Idaho, as a regional bank president the week after the development moratorium was put in place back in 2007 (HCN, 3/5/12, “The Zombies of Teton County”). I rode the “real estate wave” in from Telluride, Colo., where I had also been a bank president. For me, conspicuous development and wealth […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Doc’s Legacy
Ed Marston’s essay, “Goodbye, Doc,” in the April 16, 2012, issue particularly resonated with me. As co-editor with my partner, Mark Schiller, of northern New Mexico’s journal of environmental and social justice, La Jicarita News, I’ve contributed articles, butted heads with editors, and written letters of complaint to High Country News over the years. We […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Pragmatism is doomed
Setting a target for reducing fossil-fuel dependence without micromanaging how it is met makes sense, though I would like to see energy producers and consumers receive credit for conservation (HCN, 4/16/12, “Solar + wind + nuclear + natural gas = clean energy?”). Nevertheless, passage of Sen. Bingaman’s bill would represent progress, and I would hate […]
Posted inApril 30, 2012: A Mexican rancher struggles to shift from cattle to conservation
Same church, different pew
As a Floridian with a second home in Teton County, Idaho — we bought an existing home — I read your words with interest (HCN, 3/5/12, “The Zombies of Teton County”). In my “real life” in Florida, I am a land-use activist. What does that mean? Our county council members would probably say it means […]
Posted inApril 16, 2012: The Other Bakken Boom
A headstrong hero
It was a great pleasure to read the article in the Feb. 20 edition of High Country News on Martin Litton (“A restless giant”). He is one of the heroes of the American West: passionate, headstrong, principled. The photo of him rowing the dory in the Grand Canyon should one day make its way to […]
Posted inApril 16, 2012: The Other Bakken Boom
A lament for open range
Thanks to Jonathan Thompson for pointing out that there is more nastiness involved in the drilling and production of natural gas than fracking (HCN, 3/19/12, “A fresh focus on frack attacks”). Once-open Western rangelands have been transformed into industrial slums, complete with contaminated water and air. Habitats have been destroyed and wildlife populations displaced or […]
Posted inApril 16, 2012: The Other Bakken Boom
At the boiling point
Thanks for Matt Jenkins’ article on the “water warrior” and the woes of interbasin water transfers that affect so many regions of Colorado and the West (HCN, 3/19/12, “Water Warrior”). It is also time to think about how we are boiling our water away in order to create electricity in the steam-generating plants that dominate […]
Posted inApril 16, 2012: The Other Bakken Boom
Diverters be damned
HCN‘s story about Bob Rawlings is a classic tale of one influential man’s moral conflict and hubris, yet the story is incomplete (HCN, 3/19/12, “Water Warrior”). Like Rawlings, the author disregards the damaging consequences of the original water diversion. Rawlings will be remembered for maintaining a distinct tribal myopia for decades, and perhaps for overlooking […]
Posted inMarch 19, 2012: Water Warrior
What describes us doesn’t define us
Tom Zoellner has some great points about how Arizona fails the mentally ill, but I take issue with his assertion that Tucson neighborhoods are among the “coldest and most distant,” implying that we’re a hollow community and partially to blame for Gabby Giffords’ shooting (HCN, 2/20/12, “Extreme Arizona”). Zoellner says that he can attest to […]
Posted inMarch 19, 2012: Water Warrior
Falling to pieces
I’ve lived in Tucson for more than 30 years and I have mourned the steady erosion of social cohesion, the death of the village that raises the child (HCN, 2/20/12, “Extreme Arizona”). Whether due to a transient population only invested in selfish seasonal pleasure, or to rugged land and a challenging climate, to dry air […]
Posted inMarch 19, 2012: Water Warrior
Limbaugh of the Left?
I read HCN religiously and hold it out to my right-wing friends as a source that can be trusted to present a Western perspective. But this lead story was flabbergasting (HCN, 2/20/12, “Extreme Arizona”). I felt like I was listening to a left-wing version of Rush Limbaugh. As a third-generation native Arizonan who lives two […]
Posted inMarch 19, 2012: Water Warrior
Requiem for Arizona
Better access to mental health care in Arizona is an admirable goal, but it will do little to mitigate the madness of 6.5 million people trying to hustle a living in a nearly waterless state (HCN, 2/20/12, “Extreme Arizona”). I grew up in Arizona in the 1950s, when it was a much more livable place. […]