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José Mourinho
Information about this person was last updated on Wednesday, November 5, 2014.
José Mourinho (Eu,vi)
Jose Mourinho (Eu,tr)
Жозе Моуриньо (bg,ru)
جوزيه مورينيو (ar)
Josè Mourinho (de,no)
Joseja Mourinha (sl)
Жозе Моуринью (ru)
ژوزه مورینیو (fa)
خوزيه مورينيو (ar)
José Morinho (da,hu)
Jose Murinho (es,sl)
José Mourinho (Eu,fr)
Жозе Мауриньо (bg)
Жозе Мауринью (ru)
Jose Morinho (de,tr)
خوسيه مورينهو (ar)
José Murinho (es,sv)
José Maurinho (de,nl)
Jose Maurinho (es,tr)
Jese Mourinho (tr)
Josè Morinho (it)
Моурінью Жозе (uk)
Josè Murinho (it)
ジョゼ・モウリーニョ (ja)
주제 무리뉴 (ko)
Jóse Mourinho (de)
ז'וזה מוריניו (he)
خوزيه مورينهو (ar)
Жозе Мoуриньо (bg)
若泽·穆里尼奥 (zh)
Key Titles and Phrases
trainer (de,nl - 335)
manager (da,sv - 254)
coach (de,nl - 175)
portugués (es - 76)
boss (en - 85)
técnico português (pt - 32)
teammanager (de - 26)
português (pt - 52)
treinador português (pt - 20)
treinador (pt - 30)
técnico (pt - 27)
trainers (de,nl - 16)
portugiesen (de - 7)
portuguese manager (en - 4)
entraîneur (fr - 12)
portugais (fr - 7)
managers (en,nl - 6)
tränaren (sv - 11)
managern (sv - 6)
tränare (sv - 7)
portugisiske (da - 3)
départ de (fr - 6)
direktörü (tr - 7)
former boss (en - 3)
portuguese coach (en - 2)
meister-trainer (de - 2)
portugees (nl - 3)
inglês (pt - 3)
direktör (tr - 3)
External resources
Image obtained automaticallyfrom Wikipedia
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Associated People
Tim Rolls (1.1)
Petr Cech (0.9)
Chelsea Teknik (0.9)
Andre Schürrle V (0.8)
Mark Schwarzer (0.8)
John Terry (0.8)
Em Stamford Bridge (0.7)
Mario Baslera (0.7)
Yani Drogba (0.7)
Scott Arfield (0.7)
Nathan Ake (0.6)
Stanford Bridge (0.6)
Mike Dean (0.6)
Cris Foy (0.6)
David Camba (0.6)
Satış Müdürü David Camba (0.6)
Eden Hazard (0.6)
Nemanja Matic (0.6)
Peter Crouchs (0.6)
Tima Cahilla Didier Drogba (0.6)
Dominic Solanke (0.6)
Andrew Mangan (0.6)
Jermaine Grandison (0.6)
Rui Faria (0.6)
Henrique Hilario (0.6)
Fernando Torres (0.5)
César Azpilicueta (0.5)
Daniel Georgievski (0.5)
Mike Riley (0.5)
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Latest Clusters - English
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bbc 02-NOV-14
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Quotes from - English
[ said]: This is not, for me, just a job. It it more than that, because it's Chelsea,
independent 04-NOV-14
[pointed out:]: I rotate. Ivanovic, Terry, Hazard, Matic, Cesc did not play Shrewsbury.
themirror 04-NOV-14
[ agreed]: The normal tendency is that the big guns go to the last 16,
[-said]: I don't think we played a very complete game like we normally do,
taipeitimes 02-NOV-14
[ said]: I had people like Petr Cech and Mikel people with lots of years at the club, who would prefer to start the game at Old Trafford,
onlinenigeria 30-OCT-14
[said:]: Without any further complications, Diego Costa and Ramires will be fit to face QPR at the weekend.
nst 30-OCT-14
[-said]: I expect players to give me problems. I love problems. But a lot of them didn't and they've made it easy to choose my team for Saturday,
ibtimes 29-OCT-14
[ added]: After that there are the young boys and they have to follow the spirit and the professionalism of the others,
hurriyetdailynews 29-OCT-14
[ said]: I expect players to give me problems. I love problems. But a lot of them didn't and they've made it easy to choose my team for Saturday,
dailyindependentnig 29-OCT-14
[ added]: I was worried when they equalised [through Andy Mangan] but we go through and Didier played a massive part in that,
bbc 29-OCT-14
[ said]: I expect people that have not been playing a lot to raise their level and create problems,
[-added]: I don´t say relieved with the result. I am happy with my players´ approach. You´re playing a World Cup final because that is what it is for Shrewsbury,
pakobserver 29-OCT-14
[-told]: His character is bigger than his body,
[added:]: The people from Shrewsbury enjoyed a match that happens once in a lifetime for them. I praise our opponents who gave us a match until the last seconds.
themirror 29-OCT-14
[replied:]: Yes.
[-said]: Without any further complications, Diego Costa and Ramires will be fit to face QPR at the weekend,
[-said]: My team played a fantastic game,
joongangdaily 28-OCT-14
[-said]: Every game is important. Shrewsbury is not a friendly. We have to play matches with respect and the best way to respect Shrewsbury is to go there with a good team,
ibtimes 28-OCT-14
[replied:]: But he still has (to play for) the national team in November!
irishsun 28-OCT-14
[ said]: I think so. QPR, one week more, I hope so,
[ said]: Chelsea was fantastic and even in these circumstances then even more credit for my players. The result is not the result we came for. 'We came to win and we showed that from the first minute. The performance is always fantastic, the result not so good, but acceptable,
GulfDailyNews 28-OCT-14
[-said]: I'm very happy,
rediff 27-OCT-14
[ said]: We came to win and we showed that from the first minute. The performance is always fantastic, the result not so good, but acceptable,
nst 27-OCT-14
[ said]: I did five interviews and in all five, the first question was my comments on the referee,
japantimes 27-OCT-14
[-said]: I'm very happy,
timesofmalta 27-OCT-14
[ said]: Every game is important,
themirror 27-OCT-14
[said:]: He is a very, very good coach, he'll be great for Manchester United. We are both great coaches. It's what we were born to do. Louis was the best coach in the World Cup and he is a good friend — really, a friend for life. I have deep respect for this man.
japantimes 26-OCT-14
[-said]: Of course I prefer to be in front,
guardian 26-OCT-14
[-told]: The red card, I was seeing it coming. If I have to speak about the second yellow [for Ivanovic] I have to speak about lots of things – the penalty that Ivanovic should have been given [under the challenge of Chris Smalling], the accumulation of yellow cards, the throw-ins. I know I speak always with my heart and get in trouble,
dailypost 26-OCT-14
[said:]: You know I cannot speak.
independent 26-OCT-14
[ said]: We are playing well, we are getting good results,
thepeninsulaqatar 25-OCT-14
[-told]: I'm leaving,
[-said]: Try (for) the best result as always,
herald 25-OCT-14
[ said]: Loic has a muscular injury. I don't know the dimension and I'm not worried. When a player is injured, play another one,
[insisted:]: There will always be a fantastic relationship between us. I like him a lot and I know he likes me a lot too.
[-said]: Diego has a little chance,
independent 24-OCT-14
[said:]: I don't play against Louis.
herald 24-OCT-14
[-decline]: He knows what I feel about him. The world knows, because I never hide. What can I add? I have nothing to add.
[added:]: The only one that I can confirm has no chance is Remy. I would say two weeks, three weeks (out).
[-added]: He was injured when Costa was fine and scoring goals, which was OK. But the moment Costa couldn't play and especially now Remy can't play, he understands the responsibilities and needs and pushes himself to different levels to do what he must for the team.
ahram 24-OCT-14
[-told]: We know Solanke's talent is there, but he is in the phase of being far from (complete),
rediff 24-OCT-14
[-told]: We know Solanke's talent is there, but he is in the phase of being far from (complete),
[-said]: Diego has a chance, he has a little chance,
[-believes]: Sunday we go to win. If you give me now one point and I don't go and I don't play, I don't accept the point you give me. I want to fight for the three points.
[added:]: He (Costa) was obviously injured. That was the hamstring. He had to go to hospital with a viral situation that we didn't manage to resolve without being in hospital over one night.
[added:]: Last week he was incredible. He hadn't trained once but pushed himself to help us.
[added:]: Diego was injured and then he had to go to the hospital with a viral situation that we didn't manage to resolve without him being in hospital over one night.
bbc 24-OCT-14
[ said]: Everything has happened to him,
[-said]: Didier's OK, no reaction from injuries so it was a good training session for him against Maribor,
[-added]: The problem is that being ill obviously didn't help his recovery process because we didn't want him here at Cobham,
[-said]: I start with Thibaut,
[said:]: Diego has a chance, he has a little chance.
themirror 24-OCT-14
[replied:]: For me Juan is a very good player and I look at him as a very good player.
[-said]: For me Juan is a very good player and I look at him as a very good player,
[said:]: Man United is Man United. For me it doesn't matter the manager, the moment, the table, the players. Man Utd is Man Utd and I always look at them independent of these factors.
[-said]: I would say Pogba has been the best young player [in the tournament], because he had a good World Cup despite the fact his team didn't reach the last four,
ibtimes 24-OCT-14
[-added]: We go to every match to win,
[said:]: Diego Costa has a chance, a little chance. Remy no chance, Diego has a little chance, the same [John Obi] Mikel and Ramires. The only one that I can confirm has no chance is Remy.
[-added]: Remy no chance. Diego a little chance, the same as John Obi Mikel and Ramires. The only one I can confirm has no chance is Remy.
[-recently told]: It's up to them, to take of players, or be selfish,
ibtimes 23-OCT-14
[-said]: Loic has a muscular injury. I don't know the dimension and I'm not worried. When a player is injured – play another one,
dailypost 22-OCT-14
[-said]: I was surprised [Hazard gave Drogba the penalty]. I was not particularly pleased. Hazard is first choice for penalties. But it was a goal, so I was happy for that,
ibtimes 22-OCT-14
[-said]: I was not expecting him to play 75 minutes tonight (Tuesday),
ahram 22-OCT-14
[ said]: Loic Remy has a problem in his groin,
themirror 22-OCT-14
[-insisted]: No, I don't expect him to be.
Quotes about - English
Gaal [said:]: Yes - you know that also, and Jose Mourinho knows that also.
Robben [-told]: If somebody can do it as a manager, he (Mourinho) can,
dailyindependentnig 25-OCT-14
van Gaal [-said]: Chelsea are one of the top teams, as are Manchester City at the moment. Jose [Mourinho] has worked more than a year with his team and last year didn't win anything,
Fabregas [said:]: I felt valued when I spoke to the boss [Mourinho].
ibtimes 21-OCT-14
Ancelotti [-told]: Before I arrived I was aware that there were lots of problems in the dressing room – problems between some players and Mourinho,
ibtimes 16-OCT-14
Schurrle [-told]: I went through a hard schooling with him [Mourinho], he put me on the bench in my first year
ibtimes 15-OCT-14
Schurrle [-told]: Jose Mourinho has taught me a different style of play and a different way of thinking to reach the world-class level someday,
dailypost 14-OCT-14
Wenger [-said]: >Arsene Wenger wants his sideline clash with Jose Mourinho to be a thing of the past. The Arsenal manager apologized for shoving Chelsea's boss during last week's 2-0 loss at Stamford Bridge. In hindsight I think I should not have reacted at all, it's not a way to behave on a football field,
ajc 12-OCT-14
Keane [ said]: I don't mind all that [Mourinho mind games] but the game is still going on,
independent 10-OCT-14
Ancelotti [-told]: Before I arrived I was aware that there were lots of problems in the dressing room - problems between some players and Mourinho,
ibtimes 10-OCT-14
Terry [-said]: With Mourinho back in now, that's our target and that's the standard,
independent 02-OCT-14
Valdano [-wrote]: I've never heard in public or in private a football statement from Mourinho worthy to be remembered,
ibtimes 09-SEP-14
Hazard [-insists]: It is a pleasure to play under Mourinho,
independent 23-AUG-14
McAvoy [ said]: I would like to thank my ex-friend Jose Mourinho for nominating me for the Ice Bucket Challenge,
TheScotsman 22-AUG-14
Courtois [ said]: He [Mourinho] said it an hour before the game,
themirror 19-AUG-14
Cole [-said]: I've always had a good relationship with (Mourinho). I understand that he was perhaps looking for something else and my time at Chelsea had come to an end,
miamiherald 15-JUL-14
Cole [-said]: I've always had a good relationship with (Mourinho). I understand that he was perhaps looking for something else and my time at Chelsea had come to an end,
theglobeandmail 15-JUL-14
Khedira [-said]: I feel insulted by the Spanish press, I will never be one of their favourite sons. I began the season on the bench and once again I've been made a scapegoat. They don't value me, even when I play well. I'm not Spanish, I didn't cost a lot and I'm a disciple of Mourinho,
ibtimes 03-JUL-14
Courtois [said:]: I can reveal now that I have had a big meeting with Jose Mourinho in May, before the Atletico v Barcelona game.
themirror 21-JUN-14
Terry [-said]: >John Terry has signed a one-year extension to his contract in a deal which will be seen as a victory for Jose Mourinho. The Chelsea manager had made it clear that he wanted his captain to remain at Chelsea. The 33-year-old - who has won the Champions League, Premier League, Europa League, FA Cup and League Cup with the club - made his debut in October 1998 as a 17-year-old. He joined Chelsea as a youth trainee aged 14. 'I'm delighted to have signed an extension to my contract with Chelsea taking me int
thetimes 13-MAY-14
Nasri [added:]: I am a big fan of Jose Mourinho. I like him when he goes into the press conference, the way he talks, but what he said about Arsene is really disrespectful.
kenyan 26-APR-14
Pellegrini [ said]: I don't want to talk about the decision of Mourinho,
themirror 25-APR-14
Cruyff [-said]: PSG have a strong team with some great players. Chelsea have some great players as well, but Mourinho seems to disagree,
ibtimes 07-APR-14
Wenger [-said]: I would keep that (his opinion of Mourinho) for myself. Tomorrow I represent my club, I don't represent myself, and I will behave always in respecting the values of our club, and keep my own feelings far away from that,
ahram 22-MAR-14
Wenger [ said]: I would keep that [his opinion of Mourinho] for myself. Tomorrow I represent my club, I don't represent myself, and I will behave always in respecting the values of our club, and keep my own feelings far away from that,
herald 21-MAR-14
Sneijder [-said]: What can I say about Mourinho? We won this trophy [Champions League] together,
ibtimes 26-FEB-14
Varane [-said]: He told me that I'd have my chance to play and that I was going to find out about myself and get to know myself better. Mourinho kept his word. In the two years I played for him he always kept his word, and he also knew when to throw me in at the right time,
ibtimes 21-FEB-14
Alan Pardew [said:]: I have played against Chelsea teams under Mourinho many times and this is as good as he has had.
themirror 09-FEB-14
Jesus Navas [-acknowledged]: I don't talk about things that Mourinho said.
independent 31-JAN-14
Courtois [-added]: I've not spoken to Jose Mourinho. We'll have to see where we go in the Copa and the Champions League and find a time to meet when he can. I think we'll speak before the end of the season. A coach always wants the best for his team. They already have a great goalkeeper on the team, but I want to return and compete with him,
ibtimes 27-JAN-14
Guarin [said:]: I haven't spoken to Mourinho. My agent has done that.
sundaymirror 23-DEC-13
Ancelotti [-says]: They didn't speak about what happened last year with Mourinho, and I didn't ask,
todayonline 25-NOV-13
Falcao [said:]: I don't know if [Mourinho] was impressed by what he saw – I hope I made a good impression on him.
themirror 22-NOV-13
Luiz [-said]: It will be like it has always been, I am never worried. I train hard and seriously every day, he (Mourinho) has his options,
nst 22-NOV-13
Karanka [said:]: I have been three years with Jose Mourinho and he was supporting me every day. I learned from him and his staff and I think I am ready to start.
herald 14-NOV-13
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VIDEO: JCB backhoes, skid steers and telehandlers dance to tune of rock violinists
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Behind the Scenes
Nighttime Cat Operations
Cat operators, Brett and Mike, work through the night preparing the mountain for blissful skiing.
Do you ever wonder what happens after the last lift stops and the sun sets on another great day of skiing? Does the mountain turn silent and still as the day comes to a close? As we found out today, that is hardly the case.Read More»
Snowmaking begins in Vail!
Oct 5, 2013 – In the midst of heavy snow late yesterday afternoon, Vail's snowmaking team was able to turn on the snow guns for the first time this season. Conditions have to be just right in order to make snow, with temperatures at least down to 30 but ideally under 20 degrees. The wet-bulb temp, or actual temperature relative to the humidity in the air, is also a major factor. Fortunately everything came together to blow snow throughout the night into the afternoon today. Snow will be made on Golden Peak throughout October and then expand to Front Side side runs in anticipation of our Opening Day, November 22nd.
Pictures of snow being made on Golden Peak this morning:Read More»
A peek into the life of Vail's Snowmakers
The evening snowmaking crew starts trickling in to the labyrinthine complex of mountain ops buildings at 3:30pm to change into uniform. Set at the base of Vail, this mix of offices and warehouses is home to the small army of men and women that keep this mountain going day in and day out.Read More»
First snow of the season at Vail
Sep. 22, 2013 – We woke up to snowy views around Vail this morning! Are you ready for winter?
A mix of fall and winter on Vail's slopes - Photo by Jack Affleck
Lift upgrades for the 2013/14 season
The high-speed quad out of Mid-Vail, Mountaintop Express Lift (#4), will be replaced with a Doppelmayr high-speed six-passenger chairlift for next season. This will increase capacity by 33 percent to 3,600 people per hour – the same capacity as Vail's new gondola, One.Read More»
What it takes to open Vail's Back Bowls
Every year Vail Ski Patrol and Mountain Operations work tirelessly to open the Back Bowls. Their work consists of analyzing how the snow has fallen, digging pits, doing snow profiles and blasting potential problem areas. It's tough, technical work but it's essential to making sure that the Bowls are not only skiable but safe.
Read More»
Vail Gondola Construction Update
Vail is building a new Gondola for the 50th anniversary this winter season! This post will give you an inside look at the construction process. Updates are in chronological order, with the most recent on top!
November 9, 2012
With one week until opening day, gondola construction is complete!Read More»
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Contact any Boardmember to Sponsor a team...
Click on the link above to register for your 2014 banquet tickets. Please remember that the players and cheerleaders are free with a paid adult ticket. The Banquet starts at 6pm.
Tickets are now on sale for our END OF YEAR BANQUET Friday November 7th at Antonio's Rest. at 6pm.Tickets can only be purchased on our website at nfjfc.com- Tickets CAN ONLY be purchased up to Nov 1st and they will not be sold at the door. Players and Cheerleaders are free only with an Adult Banquet ticket purchase. All Children must attend with a parent or guardian. ALL EQUIPMENT and UNIFORM's MUST be returned prior to the day of the Banquet.
Football team gear turn in is Monday Oct. 27th and Wed Oct. 29th at 5:30-7:00 in the basement behind the school.
Equipment turn in dates are Monday October 27th and Wednesday October 29th from 5:30-7pm in the basement behind the school. Please have everything washed and dried.
Team and individual photos will be distributed then.
DiMino Family Tops Friendly Markets
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716 215-1350
2014 Diamondbacks Team Sponsor- THANK YOU!
To read the Last NFJFC Message sent to your phone click on the link at the left called "Communication Corner"


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Breading without eggs?
- a
- allisonkwolf Aug 31, 2008 12:44 PM
Is there a way to bread chicken without using eggs, or by using some egg substitute?
re: Liz K
Yes, either buttermilk or plain yogurt will guarantee tender, moist chicken. Season the marinade with garlic, cumin, salt and pepper, and if you like a bit of heat, some hot pepper sauce or cayenne pepper. Cover and refrigerate at least 3 hours, up to overnight. Lift chicken out of the marinade, allowing extra to drip away. Dredge in your breading of choice. At this point, it is wise to refrigerate breaded chicken for half an hour, so crumbs will adhere well. Then bake.
An alternative glue for breading is a thin coating of mustard, perhaps mixed half-and-half with marmalade or apricot jam.
since you asked about egg substitute, i assume you're just trying to avoid the fat from the yolks...? if that's the case, egg substitute will work just fine, as will egg whites [i like to whisk a little mustard into the whites for added flavor & binding power].
i like to use a good mustard--like Hot Sweet mustard from trader joe's as the "glue" when breading.
Milk, buttermilk, yogurt, water will all work. For something exotic, try something like maple syrup, apple cider, or OJ, depending on your recipe. I've even used balsamic vinegar (watered down about 5:1)
A real surprise dipping ingredient before breading is applesauce, works fantastic.
CH's have already mentioned by favs plain yogurt and buttermilk. If you aren't counting calories sour cream is another excellent coating prior to breadcrumbs.
Give the applesauce a try, my kids love it on chicken & turkey cutlets.


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Sheraton Turns To Eleven to Upgrade Lobby Computers
Friday November 8th, 2013 - 9:58AM W
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PORTLAND—Sheraton Hotels and Resorts recently updated the brand standards of their signature lobby computers, Link@Sheraton, as the result of a partnership with Eleven.
With a strong focus on the guest experience, the upgrade included the migration to Windows 8, deployment of Lenovo touch-screen computers, customization with Sheraton-selected applications and a new desktop design.
Sheraton Hotels originally chose Eleven as a preferred provider in 2005 when Link@Sheraton was first implemented for each hotel lobby. ElevenGC has been widely deployed in Sheraton hotels throughout North America.
Tags: link • lobby • Hospitality •
For the past few years, the talk of The Lodging Conference in Phoenix had been focused on the economic recovery, solid industry projections and "cautious optimism." With the word cautious no longer necessary, the economic outlook took a backseat this year to the seemingly unending parade of new lifestyle brands.
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From thousands of pages of official reports, we've culled dozens of the worst incidents and summarized each one. We passed over the ordinary rowdy encounters with inebriated civilians, focusing on the serious confrontations with anti-government overtones. All mapped incidents have occurred since 2010 and only represent those most egregious and reported. Many incidents go unreported.
Hover over the dots on the map to read an excerpt from the incident. Click on the dots to access the full incident as a PDF.]]>
Trail dogs really do work like dogs, cutting back brush, sawing through trees and rebuilding rough paths in heat, sleet and thunderstorms. They wolf down dinner after a day spent building bridges, managing pack mules or removing invasive weeds from some high-mountain meadow. Like a canine pack, a crew bonds together, building camaraderie and mutual trust.
But that's where the analogy ends, because working on a trail crew is more than an outdoor experience that builds muscle and confidence. It gives young people an opportunity to get out on our nation's forests, grasslands and parks and develop a commitment to service as well as a deep love for our public land. It's like a boot camp that churns out lifelong conservationists. At least that's what happened to me.
That's why the decline of this dignified trade is so troubling. Trail dogs everywhere face a steep reduction in public support for their work, as across the country, land-management agencies continue to slash budgets for recreation and trail maintenance programs.
The Forest Service, which manages more trails than any other agency, is currently burdened with more than $500 million in backlogged maintenance costs for its trail system. The hemorrhage of resources that has caused such neglect shows no sign of abating. In 1980, reports The Wilderness Society, the Forest Service budget allotted $793 for every trail mile on its system. Today, that amount has fallen to about $540.
The agency's Northern Region, where I worked for three years, is a good place to take a closer look at the problem. I talked to one trail dog there, a 23-year veteran on Montana's Bitterroot National Forest, who said, "We don't have enough money to do the job. It's not even close."
Garry Edson, the region's trails coordinator, described his program's grim financial reality. His trail budget, he says, has decreased by 18 percent in four years, from $10.5 million in 2011, to $8.6 million in 2014. As a result, the region maintains only about one-third of the 28,000 miles of trail for which it is responsible. Without volunteer help from nonprofit groups, it wouldn't be able to do even that.
All this is largely the result of the austerity craze in Washington, D.C., where politicians love to heap scorn on public services like trails maintenance. But it's also due to the fact that an ever-growing portion of the Forest Service budget goes toward fighting wildfires.
"When I started in the agency, fire was about one-third of the budget, says Edson, "and now it is nearly half of the budget. That money has come out of someone's hide, and it comes out of these other areas."
The Forest Service released a report this August that pinned the blame for its declining trail budget on its fire-suppression crusade. The report noted that the number of firefighting personnel --12,000 people -- now exceeds the number of land managers employed on our national forests -- 11,000 people. When people call the agency the Fire Service, they are only half joking.
What does this mean for trail workers and trail users? It means that many ranger districts have stopped fielding trail crews altogether. It means there are fewer access points to the public lands, fewer trails from which to hunt or fish, and fewer opportunities to take a horseback ride or an ATV adventure in the national forest. It means that more sediment is washing off old eroded trails and into pristine streams. And it means there are fewer job opportunities for young outdoor enthusiasts who want to be a part of our country's magnificent public-lands legacy.
The agency's acceptance of this trend is a breach of public trust. It's a betrayal of the conservationists -- most notably members of the Civilian Conservation Corps and their trail-dog descendants -- who labored over generations to ensure public access to the public lands. It also shows heedless disregard for the 313 million Americans and counting who increasingly rely on our trail system for affordable recreation.
The Forest Service needs to resist its drift toward neglect and urge Congress to put a little balance back in the agency's budget. And maybe it's time for trail dogs to show their teeth and start howling until our public lands get the respect and care they deserve.
Jimmy Tobias is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a column service of High Country News. He is a freelance journalist and former trail worker with the Forest Service.]]>
The compilation from Real Clear Politics tells the story in its map, showing Republicans ahead in Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Iowa, Louisiana, Montana, South Dakota and West Virginia. Subtract Kansas and that leaves seven, one more than what's needed for Mitch McConnell to move into the majority leader's office.
As Nate Silver points out on FiveThirtyEight.Com, "Republicans are favored to take control of the Senate but the race is close; essentially the same conditions have held all year. As of Sunday morning, the GOP's odds of winning the Senate are 60 percent in the forecast, only half a percentage point better than where they were after our previous update on Friday."
There is only one problem with that scenario. We haven't voted yet (except where early voting has started, such as South Dakota and Iowa). And if you think back to 2012, remember that two states that most forecasters got wrong were Montana and North Dakota. Why? Because the American Indian vote "outperformed" the models. That can happen again in Alaska, and, in my long-shot special, South Dakota.
Let's look closer at South Dakota's Senate race. No pollster even ranks this as a competitive race. Former Gov. Mike Rounds is leading the polls by an average of 13 percent. He is facing several opponents: Democratic nominee Rick Weiland, and former U.S. Senator Larry Pressler, a former Republican now turned Independent. The conservative alternative, Gordie Howie, will also be on the ballot.
So unless something changes, Rounds will probably win with about 42 percent of the vote.
What could change that equation? Perhaps the Keystone XL pipeline.
Should the Republicans capture the Senate, a vote to build the Keystone XL pipeline could come as soon as "January 2nd," Rounds said over the weekend. This is not just Rounds talking. A recent Associated Press story said a bill to approve the pipeline will be the GOP Senate's first act because "Obama might find it difficult to veto such bipartisan efforts."
Both Pressler and Weiland oppose the pipeline, splitting the vote. Weiland has even called the pipeline "a big money con" that would bring little benefit to South Dakota. Weiland was an adviser to former Sen. Tom Daschle and is familiar to many on Indian issues. He's been endorsed by all nine tribes in the state.
Earlier this month the Native Sun News held a debate on American Indian issues and Rounds was the only no show.
But at forty days out, there needs to be a game changer. Folks who see the Keystone XL pipeline as the most important issue facing South Dakota ought to settle on one candidate and use the last month to let voters know why. This will not be easy. Unlike Kansas and Alaska, there will be several candidates on the ballot no matter what. But if a single message is sent loud and clear, well, it might be enough to win. South Dakota is usually one of the top states for turnout, probably in the range of 355,000 people. That means a candidate could win a multi-candidate race with 160,000 votes. (Even Obama could not do that, he only received 145,000 votes two years ago.)
Still, 160,000 is not an impossible number when several candidates are on the ballot. But it will take elevating the Keystone Pipeline issue and for the Cowboy and Indian alliance to coalesce around a single candidate. That is if the Keystone XL pipeline debate is important enough to chuck politics as usual.
Mark Trahant holds the Atwood Chair at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He is an independent journalist and a member of The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes. For up-to-the-minute posts, download the free Trahant Reports app for your smart phone or tablet.]]>
The Protect Marriage Coalition claimed victory on Election Day, Proposition 8 passed with 52.3 percent of the vote and gay marriage in California was eliminated. Mormons made up an estimated 80 to 90 percent of the early volunteers who walked door-to-door in election precincts, canvassing. On Voting Day, there were 100,000 volunteers staffing get-out-the-vote efforts, a sizeable portion of whom were LDS. Financial contributions from Mormons in and out of state made up as much as half of the nearly $40 million raised on behalf of the measure in state where they account for 2% of the population. (HCN did an in-depth 2008 story on this aspect of Mormon politics, titled "Prophets and politics.")
A new book, Seeking the Promised Land, examines Mormon political behavior by looking, among several points of inquiry, into their responsiveness to church leaders. The authors are professors: Notre Dame's David Campbell, Quin Monson of Brigham Young University—both of whom are Mormon—and John Green of the University of Akron, who is Protestant. Calls to action from LDS leadership are infrequent, so when the leaders speak uniformly with specific directions on political issues, the authors argue most Mormons follow their leaders. Of course, Mormons are overwhelmingly aligned with the GOP, much like the African American vote is Democratic, which is not always the most desirable political situation to be in.
The Mormon vote, while thought to be a lost cause for Democrats, could just as easily be taken for granted by Republicans. The Mormon constituency, in other words, could easily find themselves overlooked and marginalized in the political sphere. Furthermore, Monson, of BYU, cautions that the imbalanced Mormon Republicanism "ought to be concerning, because [it] has potentially some negative consequences for the church as an institution." If the church is perceived as partisan, missionaries proselytizing among non-Republicans could face a tarnished reputation among groups of possible converts.
Why are Mormons so overwhelmingly Republican? The short answer is that they, as voters, look to protect their traditional values, the authors argue. They are a communal and homogenous group that exhibits a high level of faith in their everyday lives—abstaining from alcohol, caffeine, etc.— making them distinctive. Their belief and culture are heavily focused on the family, and this can bleed over into politics with issues they see as "moral," such as gay marriage and abortion.
This is not to say Mormons have always been predisposed towards the Republican Party, however. After Utah was granted its statehood in 1896, Mormons were largely Democrats, because the Republicans of that era, in addition to being against slavery, were against polygamy. Mormons eventually became bipartisan; their values were not so at odds with the greater culture as a whole. The 1960s, however, brought with it a sexual revolution and significant cultural change that caused disruption. During this time, Monson says, "you see Mormons gravitating towards the Republican Party for the similar reasons that evangelicals did": a defense of traditional values. The ensuing culture war pushed Mormon voters further to the right.
That rightward drift has continued. The authors found that young Mormons are more likely to be Republican than older ones. Mormons growing up in the 80s and 90s aged in a cultural environment where their faith and politics tightly aligned, something that their parents and grandparents wouldn't have seen so definitively, Monson says.
Fealty to the GOP may not end any time soon. However, Mormons contradict their partisanship on certain key issues. "When LDS teachings are out of step with conservative orthodoxy," the authors write, "Mormons generally follow their church over their party." In 2013, for example, Dieter Uchtdorf, a member of the church's governing First Presidency, was among other faith leaders who met with President Obama about immigration reform that would have create a pathway to citizenship for 11 million undocumented immigrants. Obama's policy, Uchtdorf said, "was totally in line with our values." He later said, "breaking up families who have lived in the nation for generations…does not seem right." The Mormon's more centrist view on immigration is also attributed to the exposure to other cultures many have had while serving as missionaries.
What this means for the future of Mormons in American politics is not entirely clear. There seems to be no sign of strong Mormon Republicanism waning. But many Mormons are, above all, faithful to their church. "When those messages from the church hierarchy are consistent and repeated over time," Monson says, "the members respond."
Wyatt Orme is an editorial intern at High Country News. He tweets @wyatt_orme.]]>
When it comes to water use, the United States,
A. Withdraws billions of gallons more water from rivers, lakes and aquifers than it did in 1970.
B. Withdraws the same amount of water
C. Withdraws less water.
2. The state whose residents use the most domestic water (indoor and outdoor) on a per capita basis is:
A. Nevada
B. Arizona
C. Utah
D. Idaho
3. The biggest water gulping category in the United States is:
A. Golf courses
B. Thermoelectric power
C. Irrigation
3. The biggest water using category in the West is:
A. Las Vegas Fountains
B. Fracking
C. Irrigation
You'll have to read on to find the answers.
According to a US Geological Survey report on water use released last week, the U.S. in 2010 not only withdrew* less water than it did when the agency conducted its previous survey five years earlier, but it also withdrew less than it had since 1970. As the Pacific Institute's Peter Gleick, a well-known water guru, put it: We appear to have reached Peak Water, decades ago.The implications are huge. The U.S. has added 105 million people since 1970, and the economy has grown tremendously. Yet we somehow have managed to shrink our overall water footprint. It's not only counter-intuitive; it's baffling. Surely, some of our water guzzling was sent overseas when we outsourced manufacturing and food production. Yet most of the savings can be attributed to simple thrift, and huge gains in efficiency in just about every sector.
It's proof that conservation is not an impediment to economic growth, and that we can limit our collective environmental impact even as the population grows, without sacrificing quality of life. And the western U.S. is leading the way.
The biggest water user in the country is thermoelectric power — most coal, natural gas and solar thermal power plants need water to produce steam to turn turbines and for cooling purposes. Over a five-year period, U.S. plants were able to cut their water withdrawals by 20 percent by installing dry-cooling technology or simply by becoming more efficient. The West has shown even more progress, cutting use by about 50 percent since 2000.
Irrigation is second in water use nationwide, but in the West, it tops the list, guzzling water at almost ten times the rate of Western power plants. Nationwide, irrigators cut water use by about 9 percent since 2005, about the same as in the West, by increasing efficiency and switching from flood irrigation to micro-irrigation, or drip, systems.
Domestic use dropped by 5 percent. Some Western cities hit hard by drought have cut water use by incentivizing homeowners to tear out their lawns, or by limiting turf at new homes. Increasing water rates on big guzzlers has also helped, as have more efficient plumbing fixtures. Las Vegas reduced a tremendous amount of waste simply by plugging the leaks in its pipes.
The mining industry, on the other hand, which includes oil and gas extraction, pulled 39 percent more water from the earth than it did in 2005, thanks to the sharp uptick in drilling. The mining industry still only accounts for about 1 percent of all withdrawals, about half of which consist of the otherwise unusable saline byproduct of oil and gas production, which is then re-injected into the well to stimulate production. But drillers use mostly fresh water for the hundreds of thousands of gallons of water used to hydraulic fracture a single well. This use shows up in North Dakota, for example, where mining's water withdrawals shot up from 5.6 million gallons per day in 2005 to 27 million in 2010. Still, that's only one-sixth of the state's withdrawals for agriculture. In Wyoming, which saw a natural gas drilling bust between 2005 and 2010, mining's water use plummeted.
All of this, and there's still plenty of waste. Las Vegas has taken great strides in conserving water over the last decade, but it still has entire neighborhoods that look like Connecticut, thanks to gluttonous lawn-watering. Colorado, Arizona, Wyoming and California farmers still rely mostly on flood irrigation for their crops. And folks in some of the driest places pay the least for their water, contrary to economic principles. This is all good news, because it means that despite gains, many low-hanging fruit remain. We must pluck them before we even think of building the next dam, pipeline or groundwater pumping scheme.
*The USGS report tracks total withdrawals, or the amount pulled from the source, whether it's returned to the source or not, rather than consumptive use, which is arguably a more critical measure. Consumptive use is when the water is precluded from subsequent use (at least for a while) because it's consumed by humans or livestock or is incorporated into a product or plant. A good deal of the water sucked up by a power plant, for example, goes right back into the source, as does a portion of the water used to flood irrigate a field.
Jonathan Thompson is a senior editor at High Country News. Follow @jonnypeace
As I dug through past blotters, though, I had a hard time scraping up incidents that involved land mines, riots, terrorists or ambush of police officers.
And yet, over the past several years, La Plata County's law enforcement agencies have received over 5,000 battlefield-tested items from the Department of Defense, including (but certainly not limited to): at least 100 bayonet knives, three ordnance- and explosive-disposal robots, 18 5.56 mm rifles (M16s), five 7.62 mm rifles (M14s), 15 .45 caliber pistols, 30 bipods for machine guns, four night vision sniper scopes, two exercise bikes and a Cat-1 MaxxPro Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle (MRAP).
They got them through program 1033, which distributes surplus military equipment to local law enforcement agencies at little or no cost, essentially equipping cops and sheriffs' departments in even the most rural Western counties to go to war. Though it's been happening for decades, the militarization of our local cops has escalated in recent years, as billions of dollars worth of equipment is shipped home from Afghanistan and Iraq. The protests in Ferguson, Missouri in response to the police shooting of an unarmed black teenager, brought a heavy-handed response from the police. Images and accounts of local cops outfitted with military-grade gear have alarmed the public and politicians.
Back in La Plata County some citizens recently expressed concern about all of the new gear, particularly the MRAP. So Durango Herald reporter Chuck Slothower asked the sheriff's office why it needed a $658,000 armored combat vehicle. The vehicle, a department official said, would only be used to rescue people from a natural disaster, or to evacuate people during an armed standoff. He also said he felt a lot safer (from irate cyclists and trail mix-pilfering bears, perhaps?) while cruising around in the thing. Okay, fair enough. But what about the M16s, the bayonets and night vision sniper scopes?
Program 1033 was created as program 1208 in 1990 in order to give local law enforcement the equipment they needed to fight the so-called War on Drugs. Our local sheriff has been an enthusiastic soldier in that conflict since he took office in 1995, and it hasn't always gone well. In 1997, the SWAT team entered a house on a marijuana bust and roughed up and pointed guns at kids (they did the same in a bust a year earlier), drawing a lawsuit. Then, in 2007, on a meth bust, the disoriented team, equipped with combat gear and gas masks, entered a home and encountered not a gun-toting Walter White, but 77-year-old Virginia Herrick, who was watching the Price is Right at the time. They ordered her to the floor and searched the home before realizing that they had gone to the wrong address. "I'm not about to argue with those big old guys," Herrick told the Durango Herald, "especially when they've got guns and those big old sledgehammers."
These are the same folks who now have an MRAP and an increasingly large arsenal. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? Innocent folks can die, for one thing. The conservative think tank the Cato Institute has mapped botched paramilitary raids across the U.S., some of which have led to both civilians and officers getting killed. And a recent analysis by Richard Florida for CityLab found that Western states, namely Arizona, New Mexico and Utah -- all of which are big recipients of program 1033 gear -- are among the worst in the nation for arrest-related deaths per capita.
Jonathan Thompson is a senior editor at High Country News. He is based in Durango, Colorado, and tweets @jonnypeace.
Utah counties bulldoze the BLM, Park Service (1996)
Nevadans drive out forest supervisor (1999)
Shoveling vs. sniveling (2000)
Showdown on the Nevada range (2001)
Change comes slowly to Escalante country (2003)
Road warriors back on the offensive (2003)
Rebels with a lost cause (2007 Sagebrush Rebel lawyers)
Rebels in Kane County, Utah (2011 package)
A dark moment, a glimmer of light (2011)
Utah's Sagebrush Rebellion capital mellows as animal-lovers and enviros move in (2001)
One Sagebrush Rebellion flickers out -- or does it? (2012 Wayne Hage)
Cliven Bundy (2014)
Rancher vs. BLM: a 20-year standoff ends with tense roundup
After the standoff, what's next for Bundy and the BLM?
The revolt that wouldn't die
Cliven Bundy needs to pay his grazing bills (Writers on the Range)
Timeline: The BLM vs. Cliven Bundy
A reluctant rebellion in the Utah desert (2014 )
A year ago, High Country News Senior Editor Ray Ring and contributor Marshall Swearingen sent out about 100 requests under the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, seeking incident reports on threats and violence targeting employees of the federal Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest service. They discovered tens of thousands of pages indicating that threats and violence toward agency employees are fairly common, although seldom reported in the media. On Oct. 8, Tay Wiles and Paul Larmer of HCN sat down with four public-land experts to discuss the issue. We asked what inspires these kinds of incidents, why they persist and where we can go from here. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity, and a shorter version appeared in our recent print edition.
BOB ABBEY – Former director of the Bureau of Land Management.
PHIL LYMAN – County commissioner in San Juan County, Utah.
JOHN FREEMUTH – Boise State University professor of political science and public policy and administration.
JEFF RUCH – Executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which provides legal support for government employees working on environmental and public health issues.
Wiles: Tell us about your experience with public-lands management and these issues we're discussing today.
Abbey: I served for over 34 years in public service, with most of that time as an employee of the Bureau of Land Management. I worked in various roles and served in Wyoming, Arizona, Washington, D.C., Mississippi, Colorado and Nevada. I had the distinct pleasure to wrap up my career in public service as the director of the Bureau of Land Management, retiring in 2012.
Lyman: I'm a fan of Director Abbey, and he's done some good stuff for us out here in Utah. I'm a county commissioner in San Juan County. We're a county that's only 8 percent private land, so the public land is really important to us, especially access and roads. We're constantly dealing with Forest Service and BLM and trying to protect rights of way that have been there for a long time.
Ruch: I run an organization called Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). We represent people that work inside these agencies like BLM and the Forest Service, range conservationists, biologists, law enforcement officers. In many instances, we act as shelter for battered staff. With respect to the land management and violence issues, we've been monitoring this and handling cases for the last 20 years.
Freemuth: I got into all this when … I was a ranger at Lake Powell at Glen Canyon. I got a Ph.D. in public policy. I was the science advisory board chair for BLM while such a thing existed. My number-one area of interest is public lands.
Wiles: Let's talk about the origins of these types of confrontations between federal land managers and individual public-land users in the West. Could you talk about the creation of the public lands and how it's relevant to where we are today?
Freemuth: You can take public-land history back in some ways to Western concern over the establishment of the forest system. People forget that actually several presidents created the current forest system, when they were given that power that was then removed. But people pushed back 110 years ago about that sort of conservation policy. From then on, there have been things that stir up Western anger. The Sagebrush Rebellion was hardly the first time. But usually it had something to do with something like the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, or FLPMA. What's interesting this time is, I don't see anything particularly in a big policy sense that the federal land agencies have done that would cause Western anger. I could see it in the past, but this time this seems to be driven as much from ideological think tanks from the East rather than bad Western land policy per se.
Ruch: Phil, are you being driven by ideological think tanks from the East?
Lyman: Well, I wanted to get a little clarification on the ideological think tanks from the East. That kind of struck me, too. I would have thought you'd said maybe ideological think tanks from the West.
Freemuth: Well, we know Mountain States Legal Foundation has always been involved. But I've noticed this time that with some of the stuff that's come up in states like Utah, Arizona, Idaho, these sort of various demands to quote "return the federal lands," which is historically and legally probably wrong, but these resolutions were sort of passed in various state legislatures and they were all inspired by ALEC (the American Legislative Exchange Council, a nationwide think tank based in Arlington, Virginia). I'm not diminishing legitimate Western concerns about federal land management, but … it seemed like this current "we want the federal lands" sort of movement didn't come from any, that I saw, horribly bad federal land event — more that it's part of our politics today, where these ideas were coming from elsewhere and Westerners adopted them.
Larmer: The West has been built on the back of a lot of a lot of federal dollars. But (then there were) the regulations that happened in the '60s and '70s, NEPA (the National Environmental Policy Act) and the Endangered Species Act. Then FLPMA in the '70s. These were all direct laws that tightened the conservation focus on these lands. So I guess you're confirming that indeed that was part of it, but you're not seeing it now.
Freemuth: Yeah, I could totally understand why Westerners, especially, felt that regarding the BLM lands that they had quote a "promise" that those lands would eventually be disposed of. And then when FLPMA was passed, it made it clear that the federal BLM lands would remain under federal management. I think that sort of set off the Sagebrush Rebellion. I just simply contrast that with our current era, and I never saw an event like that which made Westerners angry.
Wiles: So, sticking with the historical perspective for a moment here. Bob Abbey, would you comment: Are there any other key moments in our nation's history and the history of the West that lead to where we are right now on these issues?
Abbey: Controversy between citizens in the Western states and the federal government really isn't anything new. The West has depended on and resented Washington, D.C., involvement in its activities since the first settlers. … My first exposure to the Sagebrush Rebellion was in the early 1980s. The emotions were really set off by the Federal Land Policy and Management Act in 1976, where for the first time in many years or probably forever, many state legislators as well as members of the public in Western states were told through the passage of this law that it would be the intent of federal government to retain most of these public lands. If you look at the passage of FLPMA and the cumulative effects of all the other environmental laws that were also being passed in the 1970s, I believe it was a combination of all these things coming together that put the emotions at a fever pitch.
Tactics back in the '80s were very similar to what we're seeing today. They ranged from legal challenges of federal authority to outright defiance of federal law. During that period back then, we saw state legislatures pass laws laying claim to millions of acres of federal land within their borders. (Public) concerns ranged from administrative processes that contained too much red tape to stubborn and inefficient bureaucracies and needless interference in daily activities. Many of those citizens were accustomed to being able to do without any permit or authorizations.
Ruch: But these laws are 40 and 50 years old. (What) is going on recently is sort of a combination of a healthy dollop of political opportunism, but more importantly a thick crust of resource scarcity. BLM has been avoiding really enforcing these laws particularly in recent years to the point where the Cliven Bundy situation is just outrageous as to how lax it is. The agencies bend over backwards not to enforce the law. And to some extent, some of these tensions are, in our view, self-imposed from BLM not doing its job.
Abbey: I think (these laws) have been enforced. I don't think they've been enforced consistently from office to office or state to state. … But I also agree that the political rhetoric today does lead to animosity and increased tension, and there is a belief because of that rhetoric that it's OK to do certain things outside the law and some people believe that they're going to get away with it.
Ruch: The last cycle was in the '90s, and it was capped by the Oklahoma City bombing. That's what cooled the rhetoric. But you had a similar involvement by public officials encouraging acts of defiance and characterizing federal employees, range cons and other people like that, from the same towns, as "jackbooted thugs" and making comparisons to Nazi Germany.
Freemuth: You do find that there have always been incidents for as long as those agencies existed, if not longer. The rhetoric might be worse than it's ever been today. And I'd like to hear from other people, especially from Phil: Are on-the-ground managers making more decisions that concern you, or is it occasionally a bad decision gets people upset but you're alright dealing with more or less the local land managers on the ground? ... Has that changed, in your opinion?
Lyman: My perspective is maybe it's unique being in the West, I don't know. I've seen a change in the BLM and with the Forest Service and the approach they take. For example, the Forest Service now, when they close the road, they say, "It's part of our 1991 travel plan." People say, "If it was passed in '91, why are you doing it now?" "Well, we just hadn't gotten around to it until now." And that gets people frustrated. It's an emotional issue. At the local level, we get along well with most of our local BLM. We get to know them, their families. But I'm speaking from my office in Blanding, Utah, which was the site of the raids in 2009, with the 140 federal agents (investigating the theft of Native American artifacts from public land), pulling people out of their homes in shackles early in the morning and they say they were breaking the law, but that kind of stuff is not good for relationships. That show of force frightens people.
In response to whether this is heating up more recently, I go back and read some of the things that were written 30, 40, 50 years ago by some of the San Juan County commissioners, and I see the same thing. And this notion of the equal footing doctrine for states and the Enabling Act of the state of Utah, I see that in writings. It sounds like you're reading something that was written last week, but you look at the date and you find out it was written 50 or 100 years ago.
I don't know what ALEC is. I've never been associated with them. I do know where I get some of the information is from some local people here in Utah that write about some of this stuff. I go back and look at the Constitution and try to make my own interpretation.
Ruch: I wanted to pick up a small thread of that before it got away. A number of people inside the law enforcement programs of both the Forest Service and BLM are probably even worse critics than you are, Phil, of the way those programs are being managed. I don't know whether it's a function of coincidence or the fact that both programs are stove-piped and separated from the chains of command of the agency. But both of those programs are in need of dire reform. I think you'd find the field officers on the ground standing with you.
Lyman: You're right, and I have seen that. There are some that ideologically are 180 degrees from where we're at, but for the most part, we have friends in the BLM, especially at the local level.
Ruch: We hear of a cultural war within these law enforcement branches of basically new cops, a lot of ex-military being hired, who suddenly treat where they are as if they're on the streets of Iraqi and Afghani towns, as opposed to people that get into this because they're interested in resource management and conservation.
Larmer: Phil, you partook in the Recapture Canyon ride not too long ago. Tell us about why you did that and how it might relate to what we've been talking about.
Lyman: You probably know the BLM along with the Justice Department has filed criminal charges against me and four others, so I have to be a little bit careful about what I say.
We're on the rim of Recapture Canyon, so it's not remote. There's a reservoir that was built in 1986 with a dam and a lot of archaeological clearance and a pipeline from that reservoir that extends about four miles south down the canyon. It's got a pipeline maintenance road on that disturbance and it's been torn up. For the purposes of the protest, we rode to the end of that pipeline road with the permission of the water conservancy district who manages that, turned around and rode back. We picked up a lot of publicity because it came on the heels of what happened down in Bunkerville (in Nevada, with Cliven Bundy). That was an unfortunate association because ours was so, so different.
I feel for the Bundy family when I look at what they were going through. Ryan Bundy came, and I told him, "If you go on that trail, it's going to look like you're here for the purpose of conflict and that's not what we're about. You've got your livelihood at stake, and we're talking about a few miles of dirt road that the BLM did not follow their process on. We're challenging that closure." So it picked up this whole tenor from Bunkerville, and it was certainly not that.
But what spurred that was an emergency closure. I've been sitting in meetings for eight years now with the BLM on Recapture — I or my predecessor as a commissioner — and it says right in the instruction memorandum that it's a two-year closure, yet we're going on seven years. All we get (from the BLM) is, "We're close, we're almost finished." I said, "It seems like the ones that sue the BLM are the ones that get all the attention. And the counties are trying to look after our own people and we're not getting any of the resources devoted." The area manager said, "Sorry, that's just the way it is." We were going to do a peaceful protest. The district granted us permission, and it just kind of took on a different flavor.
Ruch: And you never got an explanation for eight years?
Lyman: No. The initial right-of-way application was filed in March 2006. We're talking about 13 miles of trail. As we got into the process, we found some sensitive archaeology at the south end, so that was dropped from the application, with the assurance we could open up that loop and the city of Blanding would be able to market it to tourists and it would be useable. So we dropped that seven miles, and that was more than seven years ago. And still no action.
Abbey: Yeah, there has to be more timely decisions. (In some cases) the agency would rather defer than make that decision and stand by it. … I think it's to some degree a fear of litigation. That's been one of the biggest changes in my career. From 2008 to 2012, there were over 250 lawsuits filed against Bureau of Land Management. One result is the inability of the agencies to move forward in a more timely manner and issue decisions and stand up to what the decisions reflect.
At the same time … there are some members of Congress who are going out of their way to see that these agencies fail. To create their own sense of conflict, but also through reduced budgets. And if the agencies can't respond in a timely way to proposals like that, it does lead to frustrations and discontent.
Wiles: Jeff Ruch, would you tell us about the documentation project PEER has been working on and trends you've noticed pertaining to threats to federal employees?
Ruch: I wanted to note as someone who brings lawsuits against these agencies, the only way these small nonprofit groups can afford to bring them is to win the suits, which means that the suits are an indication of agency dysfunction, not a cause of it. What we've been doing is since the Oklahoma City bombing, we've been FOIA'ing each natural resource agency for records of threats and violence against their people and facilities. In the early period, very few agencies report or even kept track of it. The tracking is getting better. Now, agencies like the Forest Service, they're reporting 400 or 500 incidents a year, whereas a few years ago with the same level of violence, if not more, they were reporting 30 or 40.
The incident that will stick with me was with Guy Pence, a district ranger in Nevada, and the issue was grazing. His office was firebombed and his truck in front of his house was firebombed. And the Forest Service for his own safety moved him to the regional office in Boise, which was closed immediately for a bomb threat. We likened it to moving a burn victim into a match factory. During those periods, the agency sort of had a "don't ask, don't tell" approach. These incidents were going on, but they didn't want them reported.
Freemuth: I want to add to this that the agency's funding has been cut quite a bit over the last few years. I think Bob's onto something that there are people who have a strategy to so weaken and defund the agencies, they become incapacitated, and then it's easy to make the argument that they can't get anything done. But I think we're not going to see the agencies get the funding maybe they should get, given the political climate.
Ruch: In the Cliven Bundy incident, we were unable to discern what the agency plan was. So we FOIA'ed the agency. We're now in federal court battling a mum BLM that's about to be forced to give them to us.
Larmer: You talked about the agencies not reporting these incidents but now doing a better job of that. Are threats — everything from hurling an insult to hurling a Molotov cocktail — as ubiquitous as it was in the '90s or is it a matter of reporting?
Ruch: That's hard to tell. In the '90s, it culminated in the Oklahoma City bombing. But right before then, members of Congress were encouraging people to take action. There was a road closure on the cover of TIME magazine. It was like the issue was trying to evolve to its logical conclusion, but once people saw where it was going, everyone backed away from it. And that appears to be the dynamic (now).
Lyman: (With the BLM) we get a new area manager every two years and a regional manager and state directors and people who just show up.
Ruch: Can you blame them for not staying?
Lyman: I don't know why they switch so often.
Freemuth: Historically, this all stems from a philosophy that Gifford Pinchot started in the Forest Service that you wanted to move agency professionals so they wouldn't marry the natives, literally, and would be closer to the agency rather than the community they're in. So they do move a lot. I think a lot of us today would say that, unfortunately, that needs to be rethought.
Lyman: It's not that we resent Washington, D.C. It's that they just don't know what we're dealing with here. You take a rancher who's been ranching the same piece of ground for generations and a range con who comes in and tells him, "Nope, your grass is overgrazed, you've got to get off." They're looking at it and saying, "No, it's not overgrazed. This is the rye grass and you're talking about the bent grass." They know more about it than the range con, yet they get this authoritative response.
Ruch: But there's almost a fiction here that something's not going on on-the-ground. There's been three years of crippling drought, and when you talk to people both inside and outside the agencies, they'll tell you these lands have been abused. It's just getting worse. By BLM's own limited records, a third of their allotments don't meet minimum standards — an area the size of Alabama.
Lyman: Are you saying that the ranchers are disingenuous when they say that their grass is sufficient to maintain their cattle?
Ruch: I think what (some ranchers) are saying is, "This is the way we've always done it. And we've seen it worse." And that may be true, but that's still abuse of the land. That's why these environmentalists are winning these suits, because the conditions out there are so god-awful.
Lyman: I don't know a single rancher that wants to abuse his own grazing allotment, because it's his livelihood. He's got more incentive to take care of it than anybody.
Ruch: Not as private land. People are much more careful with the private land where they have to pay full market rate than they are with the public land where it's basically free.
Lyman: I admit it is cheap to operate on federal land. That's a huge benefit, and I think it was given to them through the Taylor Grazing Act.
Ruch: But it's now treated as a right and not a privilege.
Lyman: Yeah, it's one of those things — Well, ah —
Ruch: And it is a privilege.
Larmer: We want to turn you a bit more toward solutions. Do you have examples of where things are actually working between federal employees and locals?
Ruch: If you look at the contrast in states like Washington, Oregon and California, and the level of cooperation and joint action between federal and state, it's night and day a couple of states over. That signals to me that what's going on is a fundamental ideological split. It's hard to collaborate with somebody who doesn't want to plan, who believes that things should be open regardless of the resource damage.
Abbey: I would add despite all the divisive rhetoric, I found that we have much more in common than differences when it comes to how public lands should be managed. We allow our minor differences to be barriers to accomplishing our mutual goals. We need to engage in a lively debate but remain focused on how much we hold in common.
Larmer: The violence we're seeing today may or may not be more than in the past, but it persists and seems to have an ideological overtone. Is this a cyclical thing or are we in new territory here?
Freemuth: I think it'll stay contentious for a while; it's just the nature of it. There's enough people right now of the persuasion to keep the fight going, like Ken Ivory in Utah, who want to keep this revved up. Little successes will help, but I think we're in for it for a while. *(Correction: In the print edition, this quote was attributed to Jeff Ruch.)
Abbey: I don't see the solutions coming out of Washington, D.C. The burden falls on all of us as public-land stakeholders, of trying to put our differences to the back of the room. Having said that, it's important that there's repercussions for Mr. Bundy and his people. Without repercussions, we're going to continue to see copycats. I was disappointed in the tactics that were deployed by the Bureau of Land Management in that impoundment; there could have been a different outcome. But having said that, there were laws that were broken; there were lives that were threatened and there have to be consequences for that. I'm looking at the federal judge to issue a decision sooner rather than later. Something needs to take place against those people who threatened those federal employees.
Ruch: But, Bob, your comments also underline the fact that D.C. has to be involved in the form of agency leadership. If there's not agency leadership from the top, the middle managers are going to be left hung out to dry in the same sort of paralysis as you're seeing now.
Abbey: You're absolutely right. After the fiasco with Mr. Bundy, there was nobody in the agency willing to answer questions.
Ruch: Or right now, (BLM District Manager) Doug Furtado at Battle Mountain — there's a national demonstration calling for his removal; I haven't heard anyone from BLM saying, "We endorse what he did and we're going to stand behind him." It's almost like they're going to say, "We'll see how much of a dent you can make, and maybe we'll get rid of him."
Abbey: There is that fear among the agency employees that leadership will not stand behind them for making difficult decisions, and that needs to change.
Editor's note: If you would like to submit a tip or report to HCN about a threat to a federal public-land employee, see our tipster form here.]]>
Sarah has covered the West's natural resources, politics and people since 2006. Before moving to Portland, Oregon, to write features, shorts and blogs and continue editing cover stories and news, she spent six and a half years flogging writers and managing the intern program as High Country News' in-house associate editor. She grew up in Boulder, Colorado and has spent most of her adult life in small towns in the Rockies, studying white-crowned sparrows, reporting at a daily newspaper and working on a trail crew. Her favorite tool — from her days building steps and retaining walls on the slopes of Mount Massive outside Leadville — is the double jack. These days, she's also especially partial to her 8-lb. maul.
email: sarah at hcn.org Follow @sarah_gilman]]>
Music by Glenn Jones]]>
On a warm Tuesday in March, Larry Sanders shades his eyes with a leathery hand and surveys the irrigation ditch that slices through his 500-acre farm in Colorado's North Fork Valley. The ditch is running high and muddy with snowmelt; clumps of hay and the occasional red plastic cup spin lazily on its surface. I move to step onto the exposed clay bank, but Sanders plants his palm against my chest.
"Don't move," he hisses. "I've got him."
He unslings the .308 bolt-action Remington and raises the scope to his eye. I strain to see what he's aiming at, but I can't discern anything in the murky water. The gun abruptly explodes beside me, Larry stumbling with the recoil, and the ditch erupts with spray and flesh – I catch a quick glimpse of a hulking, reddish-brown monster the size of a pickup truck, its vast red maw gaping and the twin scimitars of its curved lower tusks, each as long as my arm, flashing in the morning sun. The creature roars like a freight train, an unearthly bellow that resonates in the deep pit of my gut, and then it's gone, vanished again into the opaque depths of the ditch. A cluster of bubbles breaks the surface and Sanders fires off a blind shot into the water, scans for telltale blood, but none rises.
"Missed the son of a bitch," grumbles the farmer. "Again."
I step away and lean over in the tall grass, my hands pressed against my wobbly knees. The echoes of the beast's roar still reverberate in the valley. I glance fearfully at the ditch – already settled and placid, betraying no hint of the improbable creature that lurks within it.
Meet the West's newest, most terrifying invasive species: Hippopotamus amphibious, the hippo.
No one's quite sure when the hippos began turning up in Western waterways, nor how they arrived on this continent. Some believe the animals to be escapees, perhaps from a Zanesville-like private collection of exotic fauna. Others claim the animals were deliberately introduced as a prospective food source. (Although that plan may sound farfetched, it was nearly implemented by President Theodore Roosevelt in the early 1900's.) Conspiracy theorists suspect that the 8,000-pound aliens were turned loose by conservationists who feared the loss of African mammals to poachers, and wanted to ensure that hippos would survive somewhere in the wild.
"With most invasions there's an obvious origin – zebra mussels on hulls or in ballast water, or the shipment of flax seeds that contained tumbleweed," says Mary Rabineaux, ecologist and invasive species expert at the University of Colorado-Boulder. "The fact that there's no clear mechanism in this case makes the hippopotamus' spread all the more remarkable."
Indeed, the hippo takeover has been swift and thorough. The Yellowstone, Snake, and Columbia Rivers now support breeding populations, and, after a juvenile was sighted in the Gila River last month, scientists believe it's only a matter of time before the creatures arrive in the main stem of the Colorado. Although hippos are exclusively freshwater dwellers in Africa, an individual captured in Utah's Salt Lake was found to have incipient salt excretion glands below its eyes, suggesting that the invaders may be capable of rapidly evolving to their environs.
Yet it is within irrigation and drainage ditches — whose stagnant waters resemble conditions in slow, muddy African rivers — where hippos have truly flourished. That's meant trouble for farmers like Sanders, who says he first spotted hippos in his ditch in May 2013 and has spent the last year trying, without success, to eradicate the immense pests. "Damn critters eat all my hay, tear up the creek banks, and keep me up all night with their ungodly noise," Sanders complains. "And they shit everywhere.
Sanders' problems pale in comparison to the damage suffered by Mark Ellis, a rancher in Montana's Blackfoot Valley whose property was overtaken last summer. Bull hippos are famously aggressive, and Ellis has lost several of his valuable Black Angus cows to the territorial male that has established residence in his pond. "The poor cows must've went down to drink," says Ellis. "I found the carcasses along the shore the next day. It was just… pure carnage."
Ellis adds that because his state's livestock compensation program only covers losses inflicted by wolves and grizzlies, he hasn't been reimbursed for his cattle. Nationwide, hippo damages to crops, livestock and property have been estimated at $500 million.
Although the hippos haven't yet killed any humans, wildlife experts believe it's only a matter of time before a fatality occurs. In Africa, the behemoths are notorious for attacking boats, often seemingly unprovoked, and are responsible for nearly 3,000 deaths per year – far more than any other mammal. Although they're generally more docile on land, they can reach speeds of up to 18 mph on foot, and have been known to pursue humans they perceive as threats.
"We've been incredibly fortunate not to have a fatal attack on a human yet," says Leslie Derschowitz, a wildlife conflict specialist with the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish, who adds that avoiding rivers after dark and staying away from mothers with calves are the surest ways to avoid attacks. "Sometimes, though, you'll get a bull just feeling grouchy that day, and there's not much you can do besides get out of the way."
The destruction of property and the threat to human life have the government scrambling for a solution. A pilot sterilization program in the Missouri River was stymied when tranquilizer darts proved incapable of penetrating the hippos' thick hides, and the use of poisons has been prohibited for fear of impacts to other aquatic life. For now, scientists are still gathering information about the creatures' habits: a team of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists recently fitted a so-called "Judas hippo" with a radio collar in hopes that it will lead them to larger population centers.
Ultimately, private citizens may have to be enlisted in the war on so-called water horses. At least, that's the hope of Allen Ward, president of the Idaho Hunting Alliance. "Now that you can't shoot a grizzly in this country, you've got people craving the chance to take down big, dangerous game," he says. "Well, we've got aggressive four-ton animals in our own backyards. What could be better than that? And I hear the meat's okay."
Ward's idea, however, doesn't sit well with animal advocates, who argue that hippos are highly intelligent animals that form close social bonds within family units. The San Francisco-based Citizens for Animal Respect and Ethics (CARE) is among the groups touting a $5 billion plan to capture the animals, secure them in large slings beneath the bellies of Apache helicopters, and fly them back to Africa.
"It will be a true tragedy if even a single hippo is slain," declares Edward Bernard, executive director of CARE. "The only humane approach is repatriation."
Some environmentalists even wonder whether we should move the hippos at all. "These creatures are filling an ecological niche that has been vacant for ten thousand years," says Elena Sanchez, conservative biologist with the Pleistocene Rewilding Association. Sanchez points out that North America used to be packed with megafauna, from mammoths to ground sloths. "The hippopotamus could restore much-needed balance to our streams and grasslands," she argues.
While the management debate rages on, landowners like Larry Sanders continue to bear the invasion's brunt. After our encounter at the irrigation ditch, we walk back up to his house, picking our way around fly-speckled mounds of hippo dung and through swaths of trampled hay. As we pass through the electrified hippo-proof fence that Sanders has installed around his yard, he turns to look back at the ditch. There stands his nemesis, now hauled out onto dry land, its moist maroon flanks sparkling and its giant head lowered to graze, as though mocking us.
Sanders makes a move toward his gun, but we're too far away for a shot, and he throws his hands up in surrender. The gate in the electric fence swings shut with a clang and the hippo turns in our direction, not startled by the sudden noise but curious. Strands of duckweed hang from its snout. Its thick lips are curved in what looks suspiciously like a smile.
Ben Goldfarb is an editorial intern at High Country News. He tweets @BenGoldfarb13.]]>
To see the winner, and to learn about other 40th anniversary contests and events, see our contest page.
But the major local contention, one that's been going on for years, is one that appears on no ballot, for we don't get to vote on it. That would be the "Over the River" project proposed by Christo and his late wife Jeanne-Claude, who died last November. They specialize in big projects, like installing 7,503 saffron walk-through panels in New York's Central Park, or wrapping the German parliament building, the Reichstag in Berlin, in a million square feet of polypropylene fabric.
Here they've proposed to suspend translucent fabric panels over 5.9 mountainous miles of the Arkansas River in a 42-mile stretch between Salida and Cañon City. It's not just a local issue; national papers like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal have written about it.
Since the project will involve public land, the federal Bureau of Land Management has become the lead agency, and it -- rather than local voters -- will make the decision after reviewing a 1,400-page Environmental Impact Statement released last summer, along with the hundreds of comments the proposal inspired.
The decision is supposed to be announced next February, and if it's approved, there will be about three years of construction, installation, and removal, along with two weeks of viewing the full display in the late summer of 2013.
The objections to Over the River focus on many factors, most of them legitimate grounds for concern: traffic congestion on U.S. 50, emergency access, construction-caused travel delays, effects on wildlife from the fish in the river to bighorn sheep on the ground to eagles in the air.
But there's a theme to many objections that I find bizarre. It goes something like this: "The valley between Salida and Cañon City is a grand work of nature, and it would be despoiled by some artificial installation, even a temporary project like Christo's."
Why is this a bizarre statement? Because the Arkansas River along that stretch, sometimes called Bighorn Sheep Canyon, is about as natural as an amusement park.
We can start with the river itself. Area rafting outfitters like to promote "the free-flowing Arkansas River." It is true that there's no dam across the main stem of the Arkansas above Pueblo Reservoir, which sits 25 miles downstream from Cañon City.
But the Arkansas's flows are augmented by two major diversions that import water from the Western Slope -- the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project and the Twin Lakes Tunnel -- along with several smaller trans-basin diversions. All were built to serve downstream cities and farmers.
Most of its major tributaries (Busk Creek, Lake Creek, Clear Creek, Cottonwood Creek, Chalk Creek, South Arkansas) have dams and reservoirs. The river's flow is adjusted up to promote whitewater rafting from May to Aug. 15, then dropped to make life easier for spawning brown trout in the fall.
In other words, the very essence of the river -- the water flowing in its bed -- is a human artifact, not a phenomenon of raw nature.
As for those spawning brown trout -- the Arkansas here is a renowned brown-trout fishery -- they're human artifacts too. Most of them reproduce now without any help from hatcheries, but they were imported from Europe and introduced to Colorado in 1890. The "natural" trout (the greenback cut-throat) was exterminated from the Arkansas, partly by competition from the imported browns.
As for the bighorn sheep coming down to drink from the river, they're something of an artifact, too. Unlike the brown trout, they were native to the area. On Jan. 1, 1807, explorer Zebulon Pike was working his way down the river near Texas Creek. His journal says he "found on the way one of the mountain rams, which the doctor (J.H. Robinson) and (Pvt. John) Brown had killed and left on the road. Skinned it with horns, etc."
But after the Colorado gold rush of 1859 and ensuing settlement, the bighorns vanished from the valley, killed off by market hunters and diseases carried by domestic sheep. By 1950, the nearest herd was more than 20 miles away. Since 1980, the Colorado Division of Wildlife has performed a dozen bighorn transplants to restore sheep to the canyon. There's now a relatively stable population of about 520 in the area.
So the bighorns along the river are a result of human intervention aimed at reversing the extirpation caused by earlier human actions. And just how is this natural?
And as for observing the natural beauty along the Arkansas -- the cliffs and clefts of Precambrian granite, the Penn-Perm redbeds, the limestone and gypsum deposits -- that involves traveling through the canyon, which is hardly a natural corridor.
Let's go back to Pike, headed downstream from Salida on Dec. 27. 1806: "From there being no roads of buffalo, or signs of horses, I am convinced that neither these animals, nor the aborigines of the country, ever take this route, to go from the source of the river out of the mountains; but they must cross one of the chains to the right or left, and find a smoother tract to the lower country."
Pike was the second person to leave a written account of the area. The first was Juan Bautista de Anza, a New Mexico colonial governor who in 1779 led an 800-man army north from Santa Fe to punish Comanche raiders. Anza had Ute guides who knew better than to follow the river, and when he headed east from Salida, they avoided the canyon and swung through the hills to the north for "a smoother tract to the lower country."
There were wagon and stagecoach routes developed to serve the mining camps that sprang up along the top of the Arkansas after the 1859 gold rush -- and those routes also avoided the canyon.
The canyon didn't become generally accessible until 1880 when the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad blasted a route through the Royal Gorge and on up the Arkansas. Until convict crews from the state penitentiary in Cañon City finished their work in 1915, the wagon and auto road bypassed most of the canyon.
Obviously, it's not a "natural" transportation corridor. That it is so accessible today is a human artifact, just like the flow of the river, the fish within it, and the wildlife on its banks. It's an area with soaring mountain views, exciting float trips, great fishing and abundant wildlife -- all the result of human activity, rather than "nature."
Whether Christo's project would add or detract from that is a fair question, but it's a question about yet another human project. It's not about "nature," for in a strictly natural state, the canyon would be inaccessible and we wouldn't have this controversy.
Ed Quillen is a freelance writer and columnist in Salida, Colorado.]]>