NEWS ROUNDUP

Woman Loses Right Eye In Mountain Lion Attack A 27-year-old Santa Monica woman who was attacked by a mountain lion while hiking in central California was transferred to UCLA Medical Center on Sunday, officials said. Shannon Parker suffered deep lacerations to her right thigh and injuries to both eyes during the attack Saturday, officials with the California Department of Fish and Game said. Parker lost her right eye and underwent reconstructive surgery Sunday morning, said Lt. Nathaniel Arnold of the Fish and Game department....
For Falcons as for People, Life in the Big City Has Its Risks as Well as Its Rewards While missionaries explained the Mormon faith and young brides posed for their wedding pictures in Temple Square, a group set apart by their bright orange vests had another mission entirely - witnessing and abetting one of the most basic coming-of-age rituals in nature. Two peregrine falcons are teaching their two fledglings to fly in the middle of Temple Square, the headquarters of the Mormon Church and the most popular tourist site in Salt Lake City, with a cadre of human volunteers keeping a daylight watch under the nest, prepared to act as a safety net. Peregrine falcons usually nest on high cliffs, but some make their homes on tall buildings and bridges in urban areas....
Candidates Take Aim At Sportsmen's Vote In the next few weeks, the Bush and Kerry camps will be rolling out their campaigns to win over what is often called the "hook and bullet" crowd. Numbering about 50 million strong and living in swing states such as Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and Arkansas, the men and women who hunt and fish in this country have become significant players in the presidential campaign. These voters are attractive for a number of reasons. They tend to be politically active; 93 percent of registered hunters voted in the 2000 presidential election, according to a Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation survey conducted by Roper Starch Worldwide, well above the national average. Although they lean Republican -- 46 percent, according to the CSF -- nearly a third are independent and 18 percent are Democratic, leaving ample room for political appeals....
Editorial: Neglecting national parks THROUGH Republican and Democratic administrations, one part of the federal government that never stops growing is the National Park Service. In the past 10 years, more than 20 parks, historic sites, and monuments have been added to the system, including the World War II Memorial in Washington and a memorial for the Japanese-Americans in the West who were forced into camps during that war. Unfortunately, the operating budget for the park service has not kept pace. According to the National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy group, the service needs $600 million more annually, and that doesn't include a maintenance backlog of $5 billion....
Editorial: Quiet wilderness Snowmobiles are bigger than life in politics and the parks. With the recent rejection by the House of Representatives of a plan to ban their use in Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks, it is useful to examine the symbolism and look at the real issue. Opponents of the ban make impassioned arguments about how the parks belong to everyone, which is true. They say the ban would unfairly restrict access to the parks, which is disingenuous....
Column: California throws down a global warming gauntlet If the Bush administration won't fight global warming, California will. By any means necessary. That's the message of the state's new proposed auto regulations, which would cut greenhouse gases emitted by passenger cars and trucks nearly 30 percent over the next decade. It's a message with bipartisan punch. The climate change plan, made available for public comment on June 14 by the Air Resources Board of the California Environmental Protection Agency, is the result of legislation signed into law by former Democratic Gov. Gray Davis in 2002. But the current Republican governor, Hummer-driving Arnold Schwarzenegger, has also pledged to uphold the new rules and defend them in any potential court battles. The plan has outraged automakers and is setting up what could be another juicy showdown over the environment between the federal government and California....
Saving the farm or saving the stream But state water regulators say there aren’t enough farmers like Schmidt. Too often there are pesticides, sediment, agricultural nutrients or phosphates that flow from farmland into streams and to the ocean, polluting water and harming wildlife. Prompted by changes in state law, the Central Coast Water Quality Control Board is poised to set new sweeping regulations on farmers in the name of water quality. The rules, which will be considered next month, would require farmers to put more checks on agricultural runoff on irrigated lands from Santa Barbara County to southern San Mateo County....
Management Blamed For Depletion of Fish To hear National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration officials tell it, depleted fish stocks from Hawaii to New England are on the rebound. But environmentalists, academics and some lawmakers have a different view. They speak of fish populations that have experienced precipitous declines and are just now struggling to rebuild. They note that out of the 215 stocks the government tracks, one-third, or 76, are being fished faster than they can reproduce. The popular George's Bank cod in New England has sunk 77 percent since 1978, while the West Coast rockfish known as bocaccio has nearly vanished, declining 97 percent since the late 1960s. The debate over how best to manage and preserve America's fisheries has intensified in recent months. A series of independent commissions has called for reform, and last week two House Democrats introduced legislation that would change how the fishery management councils -- the eight groups that control U.S. waters in the Atlantic, Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific -- operate....
Column: The rising power of NGOs As these examples suggest, today’s information age has been marked by the growing role of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) on the international stage. This is not entirely new, but modern communications have led to a dramatic increase in scale, with the number of NGOs jumping from 6,000 to approximately 26,000 during the 1990s alone. Nor do numbers tell the whole story, because they represent only formally constituted organisations. Many NGOs claim to act as a ‘global conscience’, representing broad public interests beyond the purview of individual states. They develop new norms by directly pressing governments and businesses to change policies, and indirectly by altering public perceptions of what governments and firms should do. NGOs do not have coercive ‘hard’ power, but they often enjoy considerable ‘soft’ power — the ability to get the outcomes they want through attraction rather than compulsion. Because they attract followers, governments must take them into account both as allies and adversaries....
Judge dismisses motions against Navajo water settlement A state district judge has dismissed three motions filed against the proposed Navajo Nation water rights settlement. San Juan County resident Gary Horner filed the motions earlier this month to forbid the execution of the settlement and for a temporary restraining order against a settlement agreement between the Navajo Nation, the state, and the United States. Horner also filed a motion for an order declaring a confidentiality agreement void, referring to a secret meeting on the settlement held April 1 in Farmington. State District Judge Rozier Sanchez denied the motions Friday because Horner is not a party to the 30-year-old New Mexico State Engineer vs. the United States lawsuit....
Wolcott Reservoir forging ahead Now the proponents - who include Eagle County water users, members of the Denver Water Board, Northern Colorado Water Conservancy, the Colorado Water Conservancy District and the city of Aurora - want to proceed. They jointly funded a $100,000 study for the reservoir. The reservoir will hold between 50,000 acre-feet to 105,000 acre-feet of water and is expected to cost up to $320 million. It will be formed by a dam built immediately north of Interstate 70 and west of Highway 131 and will flood the valley north of the interstate where the 4-Eagle Ranch lies....
Crapo, Craig introduce legislation to implement water deal Idaho's two Republican senators have introduced a bill aimed to allow Congress to implement its part of the Idaho water rights settlement. The deal announced a month ago would resolve water rights claims of the Nez Perce Tribe while improving habitat and flows for salmon and assuring supplies for irrigators and others....
Making deals John Allen isn't betting on the benevolence of oil and gas companies to look after his land if he decides to lease it out for development. The cattle rancher of 30 years with a spread near Great Divide close to the Wyoming border likes his property the way it is. Yet, he'd be willing to strike a deal with some energy companies, if they can agree to uphold certain conditions. To make sure that happens, Allen doesn't talk to representatives of energy companies until his lawyers get involved....
Rattlesnake Roundup James White grabbed three prairie rattlesnakes by the tail, uncoiled them with a light shake and bit down on their tails. He swung the snakes as they dangled from his mouth, then dropped them to the ground. "Boy, they're hot today," the veteran snake handler from Texas said as he worked the snake pit. It was 91 degrees, the hottest day of the year so far in Sharon Springs. The rattlers weren't happy....
Ewe haven't seen a rodeo like this There is a time and place for everything and being named "the best hooker in Powder River" this weekend can get you a belt buckle. The two-day Powder River Sheepherders Fair today and Sunday should go a long ways towards naming the top sheep hooker, roper and lamb tier in Central Wyoming. Glenda Van Patten is an organizer of the event and something of a legend in the annuls of Sheepherder Days history. Van Patten is in her 21st year helping with the fair and is not above participating in the events. She has trophies or belt buckles from winning the cook-off, the overall sheepherder title and the over-40 roping title three times. The Powder River postmistress is so good, she actually defeated her own daughter, Tammy Sell, once in the roping event....
Set your watch to 1876 Perhaps you've been watching "Deadwood," the HBO series. Well, this town of 1,300 in the Black Hills is the genuine thing, where the real Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane hung out. Basking in its new celebrity — and with the series (filmed in Santa Clarita) renewed for 2005 — Deadwood is pumping up efforts to lure visitors, most recently by erecting a $150,000 block of Old West facades downtown, where most 1876-era buildings burned down long ago....
Bill Pickett The first black elected to the Cowboy Hall of Fame, Bill Pickett, was a perennial participant in the Cheyenne Frontier Days rodeo. The events in early rodeo -- saddle bronc riding, steer roping and team roping -- were easily staged, because they were demonstrations of skills involved in the regular routines of cattle ranching. Pickett is credited with introducing the sport of bulldogging, or steer wrestling, to rodeo. He fascinated audiences by pursuing his prey on horseback and wrestling it to the ground by biting down on the animal's upper lip. He had witnessed a 60-pound English bulldog performing the feat and practiced it himself. Hence the name, bulldogging, and hence the sport. The Wyoming Tribune had this to say about his 1904 appearance at Frontier Days: "The event par excellence of the celebration this year is the great feat of Will Pickett, a Negro who hails from Taylor, Texas." The paper described his technique and went on to say, "A trick perhaps, but one of the most startling and sensational exhibitions ever seen at a place where daring and thrilling feats are commonplace." The wonderment over Pickett's skills at the same event were echoed by the Denver Post and Harper's Weekly....