All Research:
Public Lands and Outdoor Recreation
Romance in the parks
At the annual meeting of the Society for Enviromental Journalists, PERC researcher Holly Fretwell suggested that the national parks would benefit most from earning their own funds from entrance fees rather than depending on politicians to hand over more tax dollars. Meanwhile, the parks continue to deteriorate.
The Yellowstone Bison: Separating fact from fear
Once an icon of the American west, bison are now hazed through costly government-driven efforts and killed in droves around Yellowstone National Park during the winter. Their crime: migrating outside of the park’s borders onto public and private land in Montana, searching for food. Fueling the slaughters is ranchers’ fear of brucellosis, a bacterial diseaseContinue reading “The Yellowstone Bison: Separating fact from fear”
Federal Land Non-Management
In 1962, Congressman Wayne Aspinall wrote to President Kennedy asking him to establish a commission to review public land laws.
Obama pushes TR’s top-down land management style
Obama’s Great Outdoor Initiative is not a bottom-up approach, but once again a top-down effort that will create more government programs and reduce local control.
Reflections on “Saving the Wilderness”
“Saving the Wilderness” explained how the managers of the Rainey Preserve used market relationships to enhance private land management and how they and similar managers could, if allowed, improve the management of government land, too.
Bogus Bidder: One Year Later
Edward Abbey is known for his unorthodox approach to protecting the wilderness of the American southwest. His 1975 novel The Monkey Wrench Gang depicted a gang of misfits that employed the use of sabotage – or “monkey wrenching” – to protest the development of dams, roads, and power lines throughout the West. The vigilante group’sContinue reading “Bogus Bidder: One Year Later”
Picking Sides
By Marty Trillhaase JEERS … to Idaho schools Superintendent Tom Luna. Last week he persuaded the Idaho Land Board to drain an extra $22 million from an endowment reserve account to soften the budget hit on public schools. This week, he derailed pumping more money into it. At issue are the 521 cottage sites IdahoContinue reading “Picking Sides”
Not a walk in the park
By Katharine Herrup Although President Obama recently fulfilled his promise to better fund America’s national parks with a bill he signed Oct. 30 that will add $218 million to the parks budget next year, the small increases his administration is providing are unlikely to be enough to make up for years of neglect. Obama saidContinue reading “Not a walk in the park”
Two Forests Under the Big Sky: Tribal v. Federal Management
In this policy series, Alison Berry contrasts forest management in Montana. In her comparison one forest is operated by the United States Forest Service under the watchful eye of Congress. The other is run by Indian tribes on reservation lands.