Public land matters

Defining conservation as a “use” of federal land as part of a new Interior Department proposal threatens oil and gas development and indicates a shift in how large swaths of the West are managed, natural resources lawyers say. “A legal challenge to the rule is almost certain,” said Katie Schroder, partner at Davis Graham & Stubbs LLP in Denver.

As Nevada and other Western states look to spread out across more federal land, environmentalists and advocates of “smart growth” worry about sustainability, sprawl, water and climate change.

At the same time the Biden administration is championing its work with private landowners to promote its conservation goals — working to establish easements on working lands like ranches and farms — this small Nevada site remains a fraught example of the difficulty in balancing the needs of neighboring public and private lands.

Despite new “guidance,” the Forest Service moves to clear-cut mature pines in Montana without a detailed accounting of the cost in carbon emissions.

The California couple building a home on the banks of McDonald Creek in Glacier National Park says a state law requiring an environmental permit for the construction project doesn’t apply to their property, and they’re taking legal steps to dispute a local conservation district’s jurisdictional authority.

Turkiya Lowe, who has been a historian with the NPS for decades, views the job of the agency’s historians as akin to being the nation’s storytellers. With her background as a social historian and a Ph.D. that focused on African-American history and women’s history, she has aimed to resurface some of those histories and emphasizes the communities and everyday people whose stories have been forgotten.

All but one of Idaho’s 44 counties saw population gains, with some of the top percentage increases coming in some of Idaho’s most rural counties while urban areas continue to add thousands.

Flathead once again added the most residents among Montana counties last year, adding 3,089 residents between 2021 and 2022, according to the latest population growth data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Recently released U.S. Census Bureau statistics indicate that 16 of the state's 23 counties experienced a population increase from July 2021 to July 2022.

Denver and other metro area counties are losing residents to other parts of Colorado and out of state, new census estimates show, as pandemic disruptions, rising housing costs and an aging population continue to scramble Colorado’s formerly robust growth patterns.

Alta Ski Area threw in the towel Tuesday morning. It had received 27 inches of snow in 24 hours and 34 inches from the storm that started Monday. Plus, it was still snowing. In total this season, the Little Cottonwood Canyon ski area has received 851 inches of snow. That’s 103 inches more than its previous record, set in 1981-82.

The large lake rise has come before the true snow runoff has begun. With Utah having already surpassed it's all-time snowpack numbers, the runoff could be epic, which would be great news for the lake.

After falling to record lows in 2022, Lake Mead has seen its water levels rise 3 feet above projections after a precipitation-heavy winter. But experts warn it’s only a temporary reprieve without a comprehensive water management plan.

Colorado’s snow season is nearing its typical peak with above-average snowpack, and water officials are beginning to worry about flooding and gauging potential reservoir releases. But in some places, the snow just keeps coming.

Southwest Montana saw a boost to its already above-average snowpack last month, pulling the area further out of drought but also increasing the risk for flooding and avalanches.

Cold conditions and regular snowfall in recent weeks have allowed a winterlike snowpack — rife with poorly bonded weak layers — to persist into spring. That means that avalanche problems and excellent powder skiing, more associated with mid-winter, are still present in the mountains across the region

“In a lot of places, there’s just been so much snow that it’s probably going to really, significantly shorten the length of the fire season this year,” said Matthew Hurteau, a fire and forest ecologist at the University of New Mexico.

Called a “lightning rod issue,” the new ordinance is meant to entice more residents and businesses to build more tiny homes. Will the changes boost affordable housing?

An explosion in evictions and other data on Utah's challenging housing rental market.

Sometimes the ambiguity is intentional. Other times, legal issues arise because lawmakers can’t always predict how their policies will be tested in the real world.

The bill would prohibit local governments from placing a limit on how much rent can be charged for both private and commercial properties. The bill also includes several other sections unrelated to housing limiting what local governments are allowed to do.

Like nearly every Colorado ski hill, Winter Park needed big money to help fix its employee housing problem. Enter its deep pocketed operator, Alterra, with a blueprint others can follow.

From mule deer to whitetails, the future looks different for our favorite game. Here's our forecast for wild critters in our changing climate.

New research shows killing wolves changes pack dynamics, and those changes matter.

Scientists compared bull elk bugles in Colorado, Wyoming and Pennsylvania, and found differences in the pitch as well as in how long the bulls bugled based on where they live.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s new director, Jeff Davis, will be making a move from the Puget Sound to the Rocky Mountains.

What two anglers found may have come straight from a parched angler’s dreams: Cases and cases of beer.

In a press release, the coalition announced that it has submitted language to the Colorado Legislative Council to place a ballot measure on the 2024 statewide ballot “to rein in fracking in Colorado.”

State regulators notified six oil and gas operators that they are in violation of the state’s waste rule at 10 different facilities.

The South Korean company CS Wind broke ground on an expansion to its sprawling facility that is expected to boost production to some 10,000 wind tower sections annually and create about 850 jobs.

A $525-million-plus, 393-megawatt windfarm is slated to begin construction in Converse County, Wyo., this August, the start of a 17-month development window to bring the project online.

An expanding solar industry is putting strain on traditional Arizona rangelands, and ranchers are seeking ways to be compensated for their future losses.

Finding ways to reuse the state's existing coal assets could save hundreds of millions of dollars for the emerging industries trying to gain a foothold here.

A lawsuit that Wyoming and other Republican-leaning states filed challenging figures the Biden administration uses to calculate damages from greenhouse gasses was dismissed Wednesday by a federal appeals court.

Alaska’s controversial Willow project has drawn criticism, but a global analysis shows that it’s just one of hundreds of investments approved in the past year or so.

The Brookings Institution is out with a new report that helps explain why Native people are underrepresented or left out entirely in so many federal datasets.

A judge in Montana refused to dismiss a lawsuit Tuesday brought by Native American tribes, parents and students against state education leaders that alleges the state’s unique constitutional requirement to teach students about Native American history and culture has not been upheld.

The Diné Household Water Survey, a first-of-its-kind two-year project led by Johns Hopkins University, aims to accurately quantify the number of households without access to safe drinking water.

Defending his administration’s actions on clean water, President Joe Biden on Thursday vetoed a congressional resolution that would have overturned protections for the nation’s waterways that Republicans have criticized as overly intrusive

A state-backed coalition of conservation groups is launching an unprecedented plan that would pay private landowners to save 3.3 million acres of natural terrain from development.

According to new research published Thursday, the future of forest carbon sequestration varies widely depending on the analysis used. Some scientific models show American forests storing more carbon over the next several decades, while others show greater regional variability or overall losses in carbon storage.

Colorado's Biochar Now explains how smoldering wood into charcoal might take a small bite from climate change.

Green amendments, which establish in state constitutions the fundamental right to clean air, water and soil and other environmental priorities — including a stable climate — are making slow but steady progress around the country. New Mexico is among 15 states where such measures have been considered this year.

The bills propose taxing the litigation activities of Montana nonprofits.

Headwaters Economics and Wild Montana have released a report that explores the opportunities and solutions for reducing the financial, human, and resource costs that wildfires pose to communities throughout Montana.

The measure comes in response to growing wildfire risk across the state. The majority of U.S. states already offer state-run or state-regulated property insurance to people who can’t get covered on the private market.

As Teck Resources plans to distance itself from coal, government records show the mining giant remains a long way from solving the widespread contamination of local rivers and creeks — despite having already invested $1.2 billion in water treatment.

In Utah's rural Coal Country, a dependable shuttle service to a treatment is vital to helping people recover from opioid addiction.

New Mexico places foster teens with serious mental health conditions in shelters that don’t offer psychiatric services. When a crisis erupts, they call 911. “This happens all the time,” said one officer.