NEWS ROUNDUP

Rural Residents Battle Southern Nevada Water Grab Residents of rural Nevada know they face long odds in their effort to thwart a proposed water grab by southern Nevada. Las Vegas has money and political power, but the rural residents think they have the truth on their side, and, so far, they refuse to back down or be bought off. My ancestors were able to live a sustainable lifestyle on the land for quite some time. Las Vegas seems to want to sustain unsustainable growth," Rick Spilsbury, a Western Shoshone blogger, says. Rural residents know that it's only been in the last few years that Las Vegas paid any attention at all to water conservation, and that fountains, lawns, pools, and man-made lakes have multiplied with few restrictions. Now, Las Vegas wants White Pine's water, hundreds of thousands of acres, to allow for even more sprawl. "I don't like the idea of my place drying up for another condo or casino in Las Vegas," Bannon Humphries, a Spring Valley rancher, says. "I think every person up there is against it. I haven't spoken to one person who is even quiet about it," Spilsbury says....
Nevada water hearings continue Advocates of a plan to pump billions of gallons of groundwater from rural Nevada to booming Las Vegas spent hours Thursday trying to discredit reports of an expert fighting the plan - and got a warning from a state hearing panel to move on. Attorneys Paul Taggart and Michael Van Zandt, representing the Southern Nevada Water Authority, grilled hydrologist Tom Meyers at length during the second week of hearings on the SNWA request to draw more than 90,000 acre-feet of groundwater from Spring Valley. The questioning prompted Tracy Taylor, the state water engineer who must make a final decision on the pumping plan, to tell the lawyers to stop "pounding on uncertainties" in Meyers' projections on available water in the valley. Meyers maintains that SNWA's plan would take too much water out of Spring Valley and damage existing groundwater, spring and surface water rights that already total more than 70,000 acre-feet per year. SNWA contends that the perennial yield, or the amount of water that can be safely pumped on an annual basis, from the valley, located in White Pine County, is about 100,000 acre-feet, which is more than what it's seeking....
'Triangle' farmers challenge Legacy Project The Wood River Legacy Project, an ambitious effort to restore flows to 12 miles of the Big Wood River south of Glendale Bridge projected to boost the size of the fishery by 33 percent, has drawn support from a host of city and county governments and local canal companies. But during a public forum in Hailey Tuesday night, the project, which hinges on the revision of Idaho's entrenched water laws, was challenged by a group of farmers south of Bellevue who believe the undertaking will create more harm than good. Every summer since 1920, the Big Wood River, which is among Idaho's most treasured fisheries, has been diverted into canals near Glendale Bridge, leaving scores of trout to die in stagnant pools. Legacy Project Director Rich McIntyre thinks if water right's holders are given an option, many would choose to keep their water in-stream, and the dead stretch of river could be revived. But current Idaho water law is based on a "use it or lose it" policy, meaning water rights' holders must exercise their rights to the precious resource, or lose it all....
Water groups supports H2O provisions of Idaho wilderness bill An Idaho water-rights advocacy group is supporting elements of a bid to create a 550-thousand acre wilderness in the rugged Owyhee canyonlands of southwestern Idaho, saying it includes provisions that protect state water rights. The Idaho Water Users Association, whose members include cities, ranchers and fish farmers, says it's "satisfied that Idaho sovereignty over its waters is fully protected." It also endorsed provisions of the wilderness plan, which is sponsored by Senator Mike Crapo and goes before a Senate subcommitttee on September 27th, that keep water from the Owyhee and Bruneau river basins from being piped out of state. The group says that's an important safeguard for local water users....
A climate of change President Bush's endeavor to give landowners, corporations, local governments, nonprofits and others more say in the management of natural resources has environmentalists and their allies nervous. "We're concerned this will hurt the gains we've made in the last 30 years of environmental law," says Gary L. Graham, executive director of Audubon Colorado. Such concerns arose last week as Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, a former timber industry lobbyist, came to the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs as part of a 24-city national listening tour to solicit suggestions on the president's nebulously dubbed "cooperative conservation" effort. Gun rights activists, farmers and ranchers, four-wheeling groups and oil and natural gas representatives poured into a large campus conference room to praise the initiative. Many of them said government agencies too often stand in the way of their interests, citing a variety of reasons, including petty personality conflicts and officials' incompetence....
Conservancy opposes Army plan After getting an earful from donors, the Nature Conservancy is taking a stance against the Army’s proposed expansion of the Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site. The organization, which has worked with the military to preserve ranchland around Fort Carson, says it will have nothing to do with a project that would put ranchers off their land through use of federal land-seizure laws. “We have a strict prohibition in participating in condemnation projects,” Brian McPeek, the organization’s deputy state director, said Thursday. The Army is eyeing outside organizations to help manage a stretch of the training area if Defense Department officials approve adding as much as 418,000 acres to the 235,000-acre site in southeast Colorado. The Army has proposed a “conservation area” covering the Purgatoire River valley adjacent to Piñon Canyon, managed by an outside organization. McPeek said the Army hasn’t discussed its plans with the Nature Conservancy. The group’s unwillingness to participate doesn’t change anything, the Army said. “It has no effect whatsoever,” said Karen Edge, an Army spokeswoman....
Leaders Convene in Helena for Climate Challenge Conference Montanans are feeling the impact of global warming. An eight-year drought in Eastern Montana has been a blow to farmers and ranchers and elsewhere, ski bums and trout fisherman are experiencing shorter recreational seasons. And no one in Montana can fail to notice the increase in forest fires this year. These are some of the concerns bringing together over forty organizations sponsoring the Climate Challenge Conference in Helena this weekend. "We are very gratified by the wide diversity and range of organizations who responded to our call for this conference," said Sterling Miller, Senior Wildlife Biologist for the National Wildlife Federation. Corporations, unions, government agencies, non-profits and individuals concerned with global warming will all be attending the conference. The main goal of the conference is to get the attention of political leaders who are ignoring the issue of global warming, Sterling said. He makes an emphatic exclusion of Governor Brian Schweitzer from the apathetic group. The hope is that the interest groups involvement will help get politicians to take notice....
Suspected wolf on Zumwalt may be vanguard Biologists have not yet been able to positively confirm the presence of a young black wolf on the Zumwalt Prairie of Wallowa County, despite a videotape taken in about mid-July by an archery hunter from Eugene, who was scouting the area. The U.S. Wildlife Service and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife have since received a couple of other possible sightings in the area, one from a fence builder about three weeks who initially suspected that the animal might have been a dog, according to Craig Ely, Northeast Oregon Regional Director based in La Grande. Ely said that biologist spent 10 or 12 days in the evenings looking for the animal with no success, and sent a plane over the prairie in the search after that most recent report. "If it's a wolf, they move around a lot," Ely said, adding that while the animal could be a wolf hybrid, or even a dog gone wild, but it could also be a wolf. "My assessment is that, as an agency, we believe there are wolves in Oregon, we just haven't confirmed it yet…Sooner or later, Oregon will be recolonized with wolves from Idaho."....
Capitol Hill rally helped spotlight timber safety net's importance Last week's blitz on Capitol Hill to draw attention to the plight of counties facing elimination of the federal timber safety net proved valuable, Douglas County Commissioner Doug Robertson said. Speaking at Wednesday's meeting of the county Board of Commissioners, Robertson said the effort spotlighted the importance of the program for counties across the United States that have been hurt by cutbacks in logging on federal forests. More than 200 officials representing counties and schools throughout the nation -- including Robertson and fellow Commissioner Marilyn Kittelman -- descended upon Washington, D.C., to urge Congress to extend the safety net program. "It was an opportunity to re-energize the effort," Robertson said. The safety net, which was signed into law in 2000 by former President Bill Clinton, is set to expire at the end of the federal fiscal year Sept. 30....
Judge OKs Mount Ashland ski area expansion A federal judge has ruled in favor of the Mount Ashland ski area's proposed expansion, but environmental groups that sued to halt more development on the mountain say they may appeal his decision. U.S. District Court Judge Owen Panner issued a summary judgment in favor of the U.S. Forest Service and the Mount Ashland Association, the nonprofit corporation that manages the ski area. He rejected the arguments of three environmental groups that challenged the Forest Service's decision to approve 16 new ski and snowboard trails, two new chairlifts and 200 additional parking spaces on the mountain. "We're elated," said Bill Little, president of the board of directors of the Mount Ashland Association. "We're considering our options," said Tom Dimitre, chairman of the Rogue Group Sierra Club, one of the groups that sued the U.S. Forest Service along with Ashland-based Headwaters and Portland-based Oregon Natural Resources Council....
Federal court: Road to jarbidge stays open A dispute over two miles of dirt road and a threatened fish in a national forest just south of the Idaho line may be over after nearly a decade. A decision signed on Tuesday by U.S. District Court Judge Roger Hunt lifted a stay freezing a 2001 agreement, in which the government had agreed not to contest Elko County’s claim to a right of way on the South Canyon Road. Hunt emphasized that the settlement agreement does not transfer any interest in land. Elko County’s claim will remain dormant and Elko County and the government will work together on the road, he said. “There is a huge gulf between granting someone an interest in land and refusing to argue about whether they have such an interest,’’ Hunt said. The 2001 agreement settled a federal lawsuit that charged Elko County had undertaken illegal repairs in 1998 on washed-out portions of South Canyon Road, which runs alongside a fork in the Jarbidge River. The river’s bull trout were declared threatened in 1999 under the Endangered Species Act....
Editorial - Roadless policy needs a path No one's quite sure about the precise impact of this week's "roadless" ruling by a federal judge, which would restore broad protections to about a third of national forest land in the lower 48 states. The ruling was favorably received by those who seek to control development on the West's pristine public lands. But we hope it doesn't undo the work of the state commission that developed a smart set of recommendations to provide appropriate safeguards for public lands while still satisfying a variety of environmental, recreational and commercial interests. U.S. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth D. Laporte of San Francisco threw out the Bush administration's roadless program, saying that Washington failed to conduct necessary environmental studies before giving states permission last year to draft their own management guidelines for roads on forest lands. The court ruling came a week after the Colorado Roadless Areas Review Task Force submitted recommendations to Gov. Bill Owens to preserve most of the 4.4 million acres of roadless areas in Colorado's national forests. We agree with Owens, who said, "The bipartisan, collaborative process we have undertaken in Colorado is the appropriate way to determine our state's position concerning roadless areas." But we think he's off base in saying that Laporte is "unilaterally dictating natural-resource policy for the entire country."....
Guv touts renewed roadless rule Gov. Bill Richardson is praising a decision by a federal judge in California to reinstate the "Roadless Rule," a Clinton-era ban on road construction in nearly a third of national forests. "This is a monumental victory for everyone who enjoys our wild forests," Richardson said Wednesday. "Our roadless forests areas are cherished by hunters, anglers and outdoor enthusiasts. Roadless areas support significant and complex wildlife communities, they create valuable recreation opportunities, and roadless areas help support rural economies." But Republican Sen. Pete Domenici of Albuquerque calls the decision by U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Laporte a step backward for those seeking to empower states and local governments in roadless area management. "For over 40 years, our courts have thrown out national roadless rules like the Clinton-era rule, which was overturned by numerous courts," Domenici said. "Now that we finally have a state-based system, I'd hate to see it derailed." He added that the previous, one-size-fits-all national approach didn't meet the needs of many states, including New Mexico....
Five timber areas sold; four face protests Five U.S. Bureau of Land Management timber sales totalling 20.3 million board feet were sold Thursday in the agency's Medford District. However, all but one has been administratively protested by environmental groups to the Interior Board of Land Appeals in Arlington, Va. It takes about 90 days for an administrative protest to be resolved by the appeals board, according to BLM spokeswoman Patty Burel. Two others sales containing nearly 4 million board feet also offered Thursday were not sold. The district's targeted annual allowable harvest is 57.1 million board feet, although the actual amount fluctuates each year. Only 28.5 million board feet were offered this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, Burel said....
Monumental discoveries Paleontologists are giddy after the fossil frenzy at the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument yielded yet more fruit: two heretofore unknown 75-million-year-old dinosaurs. "It's been a dream summer," beamed Alan Titus, Bureau of Land Management paleontologist for the 1.9 million-acre monument in southern Utah. A 6-foot-long skull of one of the plant-eating creatures - found intact along with about 30 percent of its skeleton - belongs to a beast similar to members of the ceratoid family, but boasts some distinct features. "We realized from its features and characteristics we've never seen it before," Titus said. Those characteristics make it impossible to categorize the creature in the two subfamilies for ceratoid dinosaurs - which, like the triceratops, are known for their facial horns and a shield that fans out from the back of the neck. What makes this dinosaur unique is the mammoth size of the horns over the eyes and the stubby horn over the nose in addition to the shield features, Titus said. The skull was found this summer by a volunteer....
Lease sale in Alaska may be reworked The Interior Department may reverse course and withdraw part of a planned sale of oil-drilling leases on Alaska's North Slope because of environmental concerns, a department official said. The Wednesday sale of leases on about 8 million acres in the National Petroleum Reserve includes about 400,000 acres around Teshekpuk Lake, an area environmental groups consider a critical Arctic wildlife habitat. Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge James Singleton in Anchorage ruled that an environmental impact statement prepared by the department for the entire area failed "to adequately address the cumulative effect" of the drilling. Last week the Bush administration rejected the judge's finding and said the sale would proceed as planned. "If we want to go ahead with the Sept. 27 sale, we're going to have to accommodate what the judge said," Johnnie Burton, director of the department's Minerals Management Service, said Thursday at a news conference in Washington. Asked whether the department might consider withdrawing the 400,000 acres around the lake from the sale, Burton said, "We might." "We haven't made the decision yet," she said....
Mogul Pledges Billions Against Warming British business mogul Richard Branson said Thursday he would invest about $3 billion to combat global warming over the next decade. Branson, the billionaire behind the multi-platform Virgin brand, said the money would come from 100 percent of the profits generated by his transportation and airline sectors. It will then be invested in efforts to find renewable, sustainable energy sources in an effort to wean the world off of oil and coal. Branson made the announcement on the second day of the Clinton Global Initiative, an annual conference of business, political and nonprofit leaders hosted by former President Clinton. "Our generation has inherited an incredibly beautiful world from our parents and they from their parents," Branson said at a news conference with Clinton at his side. "We must not be the generation responsible for irreversibly damaging the environment."....
Study: Oceans have cooled in recent years Despite the long term warming trend seen around the globe, the oceans have cooled in the last three years, scientists announced today. The temperature drop, a small fraction of the total warming seen in the last 48 years, suggests that global warming trends can sometimes take little dips. "This research suggests global warming isn't always steady, but happens with occasional 'speed bumps,'" said study co-author Josh Willis, a researcher at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "This cooling is probably natural climate variability. The oceans today are still warmer than they were during the 1980s, and most scientists expect the oceans will eventually continue to warm in response to human-induced climate change."....
Hunters must steer clear of rocket launch The New Mexico Economic Development Department is advising hunters to steer clear of public land in Game Management Unit 20 on Sept. 25. A private company will be launching a rocket from temporary facilities near the proposed Spaceport America in southern New Mexico. Hunting seasons for oryx and dove will be open during the time of the launch. New Mexico State Police, county sheriff's departments, the Department of Game and Fish and private security companies will be present at several roadblocks to discourage entry to the area surrounding the launch site. The proposed launch is scheduled for around 7:30 a.m., but delays may extend the time the roadblocks are in place and could last throughout the day. The launch area includes 27 square miles of state trust land and surrounding Bureau of Land Management property west of White Sands Missile Range. The launch is approximately 23 miles east of Caballo Lake....
Ire over plan's ag land proposal A proposal to offset the future loss of Monterey County farmland to development in the proposed county general plan provoked heated protests Wednesday before county planning commissioners. Another proposal to require water-quality tests on new agricultural wells in the draft general plan -- a 20-year growth blueprint for unincorporated areas -- also hit sore points with members of the public and some commissioners. Christopher Bunn Jr., a farm industry spokesman, said the proposal to require farmland developers to preserve twice as much farmland elsewhere in the county "is particularly designed to send a farmer's blood pressure up." He said the industry is "ballistic" about the proposal suggested by a county environmental consultant. County planners said the farmland-protection measure was suggested as a means of mitigating the inevitable loss of important farmland to development during the next 20 years. Commissioners suggested changes that would make the program an option, rather than a requirement, to move ahead with a farmland-conversion project. Still, critics said, the proposal would increase land and housing costs and prove very expensive to developers seeking to acquire farmland conservation easements from a shrinking pool of farmland owners willing to sell development rights....
Column - Activists using Arizona as battlefield Animal-rights militants from Washington, New York and California have brought their political agenda to Arizona, intent on criminalizing humane practices of livestock farmers. If successful, hog farmers and veal ranchers will face fines up to $20,000 and six months in jail. And one day consumers may be forced to buy pork from Mexico and other foreign producers. Proposition 204's out-of-state funders are targeting the way breeding pigs and veal calves are housed. Yet Arizona has no veal farms and ranks just 27th nationally in hog production. Targeting states with minor or non-existent livestock industries and large urban populations of unsuspecting voters shows the true colors of the activists who are using Arizona as a pawn in their national campaign. Their mission is to denigrate law-abiding farmers, whose methods are approved by veterinary professionals and experts, and stir fear in the hearts and minds of voters with malicious claims about the way farmers care for their animals. And the activists won't think twice about breaking the law if that's what it takes, as they did in pushing a similar initiative in Florida in 2002. There, some of the same activists flooded the state with $1 million in illegal campaign contributions. They were charged with 210 violations of election law and paid a $50,000 fine. That initiative granted pigs constitutional rights and forced the state's only two hog farms, both family-owned, out of business....
U.S. government asks court to dismiss case against Cdn cattle by ranchers An appeal by a U.S. ranchers' group attempting to stop some Canadian cattle from crossing the border could be dead before it even begins. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has filed a motion in the Court of Appeals asking it to agree with a lower court's ruling without hearing all the evidence. The motion says that judges at the Appeals Court have already rejected the attempt by the Montana-based lobby group Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund (R-CALF) to keep America's borders firmly closed to Canadian cattle based on the country's cases of mad cow disease. "All of the issues . . . have already been considered and rejected by this Court," it reads. "The rule at issue is unchanged, as are the relevant facts and law."....
Cattlemen Support Senate Renewal of Mandatory Price Reporting Members of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) are gratified with the U.S. Senate’s final passage of H.R. 3408, legislation that passed the U.S. House of Representatives last year and will now effectively reauthorize Mandatory Price Reporting (MPR) for four more years, through September 30, 2010. “This reporting process is important to U.S. cattle ranchers, and since the mandatory law expired last fall, we have been working diligently to urge its renewal,” explains NCBA President and Missouri cattle producer Mike John. “Making price reporting practices mandatory by law assures cattle producers are getting the marketing information they need about their beef products.” Mandatory Price Reporting requires meat packers to report to the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) daily price and volume information on negotiated and non-negotiated purchases of cattle and boxed beef sales. In addition, companies are also required to report beef exports and imports. The Mandatory Price Reporting law expired September 30, 2005, after the Senate was initially unable to agree to the bill passed by the House....
New group relives the Wild West The late 1800s in Bay City, with its notorious waterfront saloons and bawdy houses, was akin to dozens of boom towns in the Wild West where cowboys and outlaws, miners and ranchers all mingled. The 16th annual River of Time Living History Encampment, however, brings in a bit of cowboy justice in the form of presentations by the Christian Cowboys, a band of 22 re-enactors who relive the Old West. Tom Brown, the Cowboys' moderator and one of the originators, said the group includes former teachers who want to keep history alive, especially the bits of Americana celebrated in the Wild West shows. Visitors can check the updated daily schedule to be handed out at the park to see when the Cowboys will perform. Brown, a retired teacher of history and social studies at Farwell High School, said the group brings in an entire Western town block of seven false-front buildings stretching about 80 feet. The Cowboys have 22 different skits they practice and can present at various events and festivals throughout the state and beyond, Brown said....
Museum Opens In Pie Town Just in time for the Pie Festival the DanCyn Windmill Museum opened to the public in Pie Town, New Mexico, on Friday, Sept. 8. The museum is an ongoing labor of love for Cyndi and Dan Lee, who conceived the idea after they visited a Windmill Museum in Oklahoma nine years ago. Right now the museum consists of the Old Bennett cabin, built in the early 30s, where the Lee family of five children lived in its two rooms on the Tres Lagunas Ranch. The museum has expansion plans for two outbuildings and, of course, more windmills. Dan and Cyndi Lee purchased the cabin from Miles Choate and it is dedicated to his memory. “We tore it down in 1999 and marked every log with its location and moved it log by log to Pie Town,” Cyndi said. “Two years ago we did the foundation.” According to invitation to the opening, “It’s been our dream to capture the rich heritage of the area in a period authentic log cabin filled with memories of local families, the homesteaders, the ranchers.” And filled it is with donations of furniture, clothing, dishes, bedding, tools, newspapers and magazines, photos, saddles, quirts and quilts – intriguing treasures from the past of the 30s to the early 50s. People viewing the cabin on its opening day could be heard exclaiming with delight, “My grandmother had one of those,” or “We used to have that when I was growing up.”....
'Pavarotti of the Plains' Don Walser dead at 72 There's never been a more special relationship between a musician and his fans in Austin than when rotund National Guardsman Don Walser started over in the music business in 1990 at the now-defunct Henry's Bar on Burnet Road. His improbable rise and signing to Sire Records, the label of Madonna and the Ramones, at age 64 was the feelgood story of the Austin music scene. Dubbed "the Pavarotti of the Plains" for his clear, powerful tenor, Walser was embraced by gray-haired two-steppers and tattooed punk rockers alike, which was the basis of a February 1996 segment on "ABC Primetime Live." Walser passed away about 1:45 p.m. Wednesday after a long illness. He was 72. Slowed by mounting health problems, which forced his retirement from the music business in September 2003, Walser's time in the spotlight was relatively short. He loved to sing and lived to please his fans, but the singer's physical deterioration — he was diagnosed with neuropathy, a disease of the nervous system, in 2001 — caused him to forget lyrics and back down from notes he hit with ease just a few years earlier. In an interview with the American-Statesman in late 2003, Walser could barely lift his hand and his speech was slow and difficult, but his eyes lit up when a favorite memory surfaced, including the standing ovation he received when he opened for Johnny Cash at the Erwin Center in 1996 and making his debut at the Grand Ol' Opry in 1999. The next year he was honored with the National Heritage Award in Washington, D.C....