Jodi Peterson

Associate Editor

The Department of Interior recently proposed a new rule that would make it harder for journalists to report on actions affecting millions of acres of public land. Since 2000, Interior has been collecting fees for commercial movie-making in national parks and refuges, but it had exempted news-gathering.

Now, the Department wants to extend its permit and fee requirements to all commercial filming and recording — except for what it defines as “breaking” or “spot” news. This change will seriously limit a reporter’s ability to, say, take photographs to illustrate a news story, or record an interview with a park official.

About 20 journalism associations wrote to the Department last month to oppose the proposed rule. From the Society of Professional Journalists web site:

While the current proposal is not a drastic shift in policy, it attempts to compromise the work of journalists because it allows representatives from the National Park Service, the Fish & Wildlife Service, and the Bureau of Land Management to determine what is considered newsworthy, and who is considered a journalist. …

“Government agencies and bureaucrats should not be allowed to decide for the public what is and is not worthy of news coverage,” (SPJ President Clint) Brewer added. “What kind of message does it send that the First Amendment rights are being impeded on land owned by the public?”

Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.V., chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, responded to journalists’ concerns by scheduling a hearing for Dec. 12. In a press release, Rahall said, “An environment that allows an open and free press to flourish is essential in maintaining the democratic foundations of this country. Unfortunately, this Administration has gained a well-earned reputation for leaking, distorting, and stonewalling, which undermines the ability of the press to serve as a valuable check on the government. The news media’s concerns over this proposed rule deserve an open forum.”

In the meantime, you may want to let your own representative know that such restrictions on the press don’t serve the public.

Jodi Peterson

Associate Editor

In the “Nature as Economic Engine” category, a new federal report says the nation’s wildlife refuges return $4 in economic benefits for every dollar the government spends on them. Brodie Farquhar reports in the Casper Star-Tribune:

(The “Banking on Nature” report) compiled by Fish and Wildlife Service economists, said nearly 35 million people nationwide visited national wildlife refuges in 2006, supporting almost 27,000 private sector jobs and producing about $543 million in employment income. The national economic benefit is almost four times the $383 million appropriated to the National Wildlife Refuge System in fiscal year 2006. In addition, recreational spending on national wildlife refuges nationwide generated nearly $185.3 million in tax revenue at the local, county, state and federal level.

The report shows the value of healthy wildlife populations — in a way that even a politician can understand. Yet our 548 wildlife refuges remain chronically underfunded and understaffed. Many have been closed. We first wrote about the problem back in 2001 (here) and this spring blogged about a report detailing the dire state of the refuge system.

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

This is a notable combination of two great writers:

Leo Banks, a freelance journalist in Tucson, has tracked down J.P.S. Brown, a 77-year-old border novelist who’s as tough as they come.

Leo, an old friend of mine, writes:

If you ask Brown who he is, he’ll say “cowboy.” He won’t say reporter, Marine, boxer, movie wrangler, stuntman or whiskey smuggler, and he’s been all those things.

If he says writer at all, it won’t be first on the list. But he’s a great writer, probably the best you’ve never heard of.

“People who know literature, and know the Southwest, mention his name right away,” says Bruce Dinges, director of publications at the Arizona Historical Society. “Joe’s the real deal. He’s done what he writes about, and his family has done it for generations. It’s personal to him. He doesn’t write to a market. He writes what’s in him.”

Summation: J.P.S. Brown has had five wives, years in the Mexican Sierra, smuggling escapades, a small plane crash, a poisoning by one wife, heart attacks, a Hollywood movie based on one of his novels — and he’s still writing what he sees.

(Read on …)

Marty Durlin

Online Editor

“How much more unanimous does the public have to be?” asked Brian Bernhardt, with the Campaign to Save Roan Plateau.

According to a story in the Glenwood Springs Post Independent, all but seven of about 42,000 people who commented about the most ecologically sensitive areas of the Roan Plateau believe it should be protected from natural gas drilling.

The Bureau of Land Management issued a final decision for the plateau’s management in June, including a plan to allow oil and gas drilling on the plateau top, where 21,000 acres are classified as areas of critical environmental concern. The BLM accepted additional comments after a protest that the original plan didn’t contain enough detail about the ACECs.

Most of the comments came through the website of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Marc Smith, director of the Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States (IPAMS), asked, “is this reflective of the … tactics of special interest groups who are opposed to oil and gas development, to generate large campaigns against energy development? I don’t know.”

Of the seven pro-industry comments, three of the seven came from IPAMS.

An energy bill amendment in the U.S. House would protect the top of the Roan from drilling, but the Senate bill lacks the provision and the two versions have not been reconciled. Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter has until mid-December to submit his comments on the Roan.

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

Richard McCullough, of Cheyenne, doesn’t have a college degree. He’s 53 years old, divorced, and his three children live in another state.

Despite his personal difficulties, he shows admirable character as “probably the state’s only full-time outreach worker for the homeless.”

A few excerpts from Jared Miler’s fine story in the Casper Star-Tribune:

McCullough starts his day at 7 a.m. and drives upwards of 60 miles to visit the bridges, tunnels and creek bottoms where the city’s homeless sometimes spend their nights.

He gathers leads on where to find the “hidden” homeless packed into cheap motel rooms and crashed out in area homes.

… He uses street lingo and a little self-taught Spanish to communicate with the transients and regulars who live around Cheyenne.

The trunk of his car is packed with toothbrushes, sleeping bags and food for those in need.

The work can be dangerous: McCullough has been threatened twice by drunken homeless men. But most of the time his clients greet him with a smile and a handshake.

(Read on …)

Jodi Peterson

Associate Editor

A few years ago, the Department of Energy began laying out thousands of miles of “energy corridors” for new electric powerlines and gas and oil pipelines on public lands. Now it’s released a draft of its plans, and public comment is open til Feb. 14, 2008 (see our earlier story here).

Environmentalists believe the DOE has not sufficiently studied the impact of the new corridors, which will cover more than 3 million acres in the 11 Western states. The Salt Lake Tribune reports:

Environmental groups contend the proposed energy corridors:
* Threaten six national wildlife refuges, three national parks, seven national monuments and more than 60 current and proposed wildlife areas.
* Lack thorough consideration of the likely damage to federal and other lands.
* Fail to identify location and sources of energy that will move through the corridors.

According to the Wilderness Society, “the impacted areas include renowned places such as the Havasu National Wildlife Refuge on the Arizona/California border, Grand Staircase National Monument in Utah, New Mexico’s Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge and Arches National Park in Utah.”

Hopefully public comment can rescue the truly sensitive areas from corridor development. And hopefully the new infrastructure will serve up more than just fossil-fuel energy — the agency says that in placing the corridors, it’s accounting for the future transmission of wind, geothermal, and solar energy. The DOE’s public meeting schedule is here.

Marty Durlin

Online Editor

The Aspen Times reports that the BLM and the Forest Service may be less than a month away from authorizing construction of a natural gas pipeline through a roadless area from northwest Gunnison County to the Divide Creek areas south of Silt in Colorado.

The Bull Mountain Pipline would cross about eight miles of roadless areas in the Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre and Gunnsion national forests, following the right of way of a smaller pipeline built in the 1980s.

Environmental groups — including Wilderness Workshop, Western Colorado Congress, the Western Slope Environmental Resource Council and the High Country Citizens Alliance — say the pipeline construction will require building a road with passing lanes. They also contend the pipeline’s 20-inch diameter has the ability to accommodate up to 282 gas wells — far more than the 60 analyzed in the Forest Service study.

The project was begun before a court ruling reinstated the 2001 roadless rule, after the Bush administration had sought to replace it.

See other HCN stories about the roadless rule here and here.

Marty Durlin

Online Editor

Despite the threat of emissions caps, more coal-fired plants are being built in the United States than at any time in the past seven years, according to an article in The Economist.

Around the planet, demand for coal is expected to grow by 2.2 percent until the year 2030 — faster than the demand for oil or natural gas. Why? Coal is cheap. Even though demand has pushed the price of coal upwards, it is still the least expensive of the common fuels for power stations relative to the amount of heat it generates. In India and China, coal is booming and there are no limits on emissions. The biggest exporters of coal, Indonesia and Australia, are strugging to keep up with orders.

Politicians in Europe and the U.S. talk of carbon prices eventually being so high that coal-fired plants will be viable only if they capture their emissions and store them underground. But no such plants yet exist. And in the U.S., most of the proposals for regulations to reduce emissions involve generous handouts to the coal industry.

See related HCN stories: here and here.

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

The Democrats realize, they need to play tough. And it bears on how they’ll act in the current race for president.

The AP has the story:

Sen. John Kerry, whose 2004 presidential campaign was torpedoed by critics of his Vietnam War record, said Friday he has personally accepted a Texas oilman’s offer to pay $1 million to anyone who can disprove even a single charge of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

… Kerry, a Navy veteran and former prosecutor, said he was willing to present his case directly to (T. Boone Pickens), who provided $3 million to bankroll the group during Kerry’s race against President Bush.

… First in the book “Unfit for Command,” and then in a series of television commercials, Kerry’s critics challenged the circumstances for his military awards, accused him of doctoring reports and argued he never traveled into Cambodia as claimed.

While fellow veterans and reporters disproved many of the group’s claims at the time, Kerry refused to air ads responding to the criticism. His own response was muted for fear of legitimizing his critics’ attacks. The senator conceded after losing to Bush that his lackluster response likely cost him the election.

Ever since, Kerry has worked to lay the criticisms to rest.

(Read on …)

Marty Durlin

Online Editor

In the next three hours, another species will go extinct. That’s eight species per day, and the rate is accelerating.

Why should we care? Humankind may be ravaged by war, disease and starvation, but we’re multiplying: 6.6 billion and counting, currently at a clip of about 80 million people a year.

But consider that recent research is underscoring the fact that ecosystems are one: interconnected and inseparable species living in harmony, or at least balance. There’s been some attention on animal species and what happens when a “keystone” species is threatened. Now we learn that when a critical number of unique plant species die off, half their living plant biomass dies too. And because plants are the only source of oxygen on Earth, the supply of oxygen is decreased by about half in that ecosystem.

And lest we forget…plants on land and phytoplankton in the oceans are absorbing about 40 percent of human emissions of CO2. The rest is in the air, causing global warming. As less CO2 is removed from the atmosphere, the warming increases.

And so on…

An unprecedented four-year research project called the 2006 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment predicts that up to 30 percent of all species on Earth could vanish by 2050 due to unsustainable human activities. Some of the findings of this “meta-analysis” were published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. See article by Stephen Leahy of IPS here.

The biggest single threat to species is loss of habitat due to deforestation, followed by expansion of agricultural areas and cities.

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo wants to ride a single issue — immigration — into the presidency. Now his far-right Republican campaign has a new TV ad that shows a bad guy in a hooded sweatshirt leaving a bomb in a shopping mall.

To watch the ad video, go here.

In the LA Times story, critics call the ad shameless “fear-mongering.”

The ad’s message is: Only Tancredo can protect us.

The question here is: Who’ll protect us from Tancredo?

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

Two tourists from Michigan were driving Highway 150 in Washington state, when suddenly it happened … and then, the NewsBiz clicked into warp drive, reporting it — via TV, newspapers, websites, you name it — to people as far away as Australia, and the Drudge Report. The original stories are here (with photos) and here.

Pretty funny for everyone — except the cow, which, by the way, was reported to be a “600-pound heifer named Michelle.”

Ray Ring

Senior Editor

The latest stats show that many big dailies are still losing readers. Compared to a year ago, for instance, The New York Times daily circulation is down 4.51%, while Sunday circulation has plunged 7.59%.

The Washington Post is also shrinking in circulation, as is the Wall Street Journal.

In the West, the Los Angeles Times Sunday edition is down 5.1%. The San Francisco Chronicle, Denver Post, Rocky Mountain News and Arizona Republic are also down, compared to a year ago.

It’s a bad trend. For previous posts about it, go here and here.

The declines show in other ways. The Spokesman-Review, a fine daily based in Spokane, just laid off at least 14 newsroom staffers, out of a newsroom total of 137. In the Spokesman-Review story about its cuts, publisher W. Stacey Cowles says “it’s heartbreaking.” Editor Steve Smith says the layoffs will trim the news budget from $9 million to $8 million a year, and that “the employees who are losing their jobs are top-flight professionals.”

Meanwhile, Dean Singleton, whose MediaNews Group owns the Denver Post and the Salt Lake Tribune and other dailies, isn’t helping his reputation. Singleton reportedly went ballistic over a modest pro-union move by Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter — it seems Singleton ordered a front-page Denver Post editorial that blasted the governor as “a toady to labor bosses … a bag man for unions and special interests …” The alarmist editorial warned, “this may be the beginning of the end of Ritter as governor.”

(Read on …)