Toward the beginning of his new book, ($29; Viking), investigative reporter Christopher Ketcham travels to a Bureau of Land Management parcel south of Ely, Nevada. He watches a heavy machine called a Bull Hog charge through a forest of pi帽on and juniper, tearing it to shreds on behalf of ranchers who want a landscape more amenable to cows. After witnessing the carnage, Ketcham walks back to his car and fishes from his trunk a copy of , the riotous novel about eco-saboteurs who travel the West disrupting the industrial machinery that destroys public lands. Ketcham clings to the book as if it were a protective talisman. 鈥淚 suppose I clutched at The Monkey Wrench Gang,鈥� he writes, 鈥渙ut of a sense of shame that I let the Bull Hog live.鈥�

This Land听might serve a similar purpose in years to come. If it weren鈥檛 432 pages long鈥攁nd I鈥檓 glad it is鈥攊t might someday find a place in the back pockets of militant environmentalists as they chain themselves to bulldozers, road graders, and mining machines. Part reportage, part history, part backcountry travelogue, the book is full of righteous anger and reverence for wild spaces. It is a polemic meant to incite. While this is Ketcham鈥檚 nonfiction debut, he has distinguished himself over the years as one of the West鈥檚 most indispensable muckrakers. He builds on his past reporting, and other outlets, examining the right wing鈥檚 war against the Endangered Species Act, the follies and failures of the public lands ranching industry, the ecological impacts of predator control, and many other themes.

The book鈥檚 central argument is simple: The American people collectively own some 640 million acres of public lands across the country, a vast expanse of national parks, forests, wilderness areas, and more听that, combined, constitute a grand experiment in egalitarianism, environmental protection, and social democracy. This project, however, is threatened. A powerful clique of industry groups, right-wing ideologues, religious zealots, and corrupt officials are working together to privatize and exploit these lands, ruining living ecosystems and breaking environmental laws in their quest for profit and control. 鈥淚 went west,鈥� Ketcham writes, 鈥渢o see what we are losing as a people.鈥�

Traveling by car, the upstate New York鈥揵ased writer loads his trunk with books and a tiny tent听and takes us on a rollicking and elegiac journey. Ketcham听starts in the region surrounding Escalante, Utah, where Mormon elites and cattle ranchers have plotted for years to dismantle the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which they see as the product of an overreaching federal government. He visits Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, where right-wing militants led by the fanatical Bundy family led an armed takeover to demand the federal lands be turned over to state, local, and private interests. He travels to Yellowstone National Park听to witness Park Service employees caging听wild bison on behalf of livestock growers. And he takes us into the arid tablelands of the Mountain West, where the greater sage-grouse struggles to survive after the Obama administration declined to protect it under the Endangered Species Act.

Ketcham writes about these landscapes with grace and deep attention. After a soft spring rain in sagebrush country, he says, 鈥淭he steppe鈥akes on the aspect of sublime enormity, like the ocean, and heaves and calms with the changing weather.鈥� At other times, his prose, revealing his disgust for the status quo, edges into the kind of intense invective that may well turn some people off. This Land is also filled with dense references to federal agencies and environmental policy, but Ketcham skillfully deploys a parade of colorful characters鈥攕crappy earth defenders, villainous cowboys, obsequious bureaucrats, legendary conservationists鈥攖o keep the narrative moving through history, analysis, and the occasional rant.

We frequently hear, for instance, from Bernard DeVoto, the brilliant writer who for decades in the mid-20th century used his 贬补谤辫别谤鈥檚听column to advocate for the conservation movement and rail against the bankers, cattle barons, mining magnates, and politicians who sought to plunder the West. DeVoto called such people 鈥渓iquidators鈥� and 鈥渨estern hogs,鈥� and This Land skewers plenty of its own hogs. Ketcham personally meets Cliven Bundy, describing him as a 鈥渕onstrous brat child.鈥� He introduces readers to听Rep. Rob Bishop and other anti-conservation politicians from Utah, and he writes with fury about that state鈥檚 鈥渟editious鈥� efforts to undermine the federal government, and especially the federal lands. Ketcham鈥檚 most fiery ire, perhaps, is reserved for the 鈥渨elfare ranchers鈥� who graze their cattle on public lands and at public expense. He spends a great deal of time discrediting the romantic myth of the cowboy, documenting the devastation of grazing, and reminding us that the largest holders of western grazing permits today are rich people and giant corporations. Quoting an environmental historian, Ketcham writes that 鈥渢he impact of countless hooves and mouths over the years has done more to alter the type of vegetation and landforms of the West than all the water projects, strip mines, power plants, freeways, and subdivisions combined.鈥�

This Land听also has its heroes, of course. They are mostly hardscrabble environmentalists on the margins of the movement鈥攑eople like Natalie and Brian Ertz, Idaho-based activists who battle everyone from wolf hunters to logging companies; Laura Leigh, a wild horse advocate at war with Nevada鈥檚 cattle ranchers; and Mike Garrity, a disheveled Montanan who spends his days suing the Forest Service to defeat industrial projects. These are fighters with no patience for compromise or collaboration. 鈥淲hen I was in high school,鈥� says Garrity, 鈥淚 learned [collaboration] meant the Vichy French. The people who facilitated an occupying enemy.鈥�

Ketcham is also impatient with compromise. For him, the ongoing extinction and climate crises caused by the 鈥渕etastatic advance of techno-industrial man鈥� demand not friendly collaboration but ferocious opposition. He has little use for mainstream environmental groups like the Nature Conservancy or the Wilderness Society, which he sees as corporatized bureaucracies that too often betray the public lands for political expediency. And he has particular disdain for the Obama administration, which placed Sally Jewell, a conciliatory functionary, and Ken Salazar, an industry stooge, in charge of the Interior Department.

Indeed, is a useful reminder of how far the American conservation movement has fallen. It鈥檚 been decades since visionary campaigners pushed through landmark laws like the Wilderness Act and the Endangered Species Act. No longer do we see bold socialists like Bob Marshall and Stewart Brandborg at the helm of groups like the Wilderness Society. And gone are the days, if ever they existed, when the American public could trust our land management agencies. The book compels us to reflect on the banality of petty corruption鈥攖he way in which careerist bureaucratic culture and profit-seeking corporate influence undermine听government integrity and the rule of law.

My least favorite thing about This Land听is Ketcham鈥檚 occasional tendency to听follow in Edward Abbey鈥檚 footsteps and subject us to a bit of macho bravado, like when he writes, 鈥淢ostly I car-camp, living out of a tent, a tiny thing, enough room for me and one adult wolf or two women or 26 weasels.鈥� A wolf? Two women? What?

Ketcham might also elicit some eye rolls when he suggests that groups like the Wilderness Society should 鈥渆ither take up the fight armed to the teeth or disband and get out of the way.鈥� The Wilderness Society ain鈥檛 perfect, I agree, and perhaps 鈥渁rmed to the teeth鈥� is merely a metaphor here, but we don鈥檛 need the staff of prominent conservation groups to turn into gun-toting听guerrillas. Nor should they disband鈥攁fter all, organizations like the Wilderness Society have done more than most in recent years to hold the legal line against the Trump administration鈥檚 public land predations, including his听assault on Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments.

I also wish This Land had wrestled more intently with the fact that much of America鈥檚 public domain is derived from the violent and illegal theft of indigenous lands. Ketcham documents that bloody legacy on numerous occasions in his book, but he could have spent more time writing about its present-day implications for the public lands. The conservation movement must address the claims of indigenous people to places like the听, a landscape now home to national parks and other public parcels听that the U.S. government obtained through violence, fraud, and theft from the Sioux Nation.

All in all, though, Ketcham has done a great service for the environmental movement. He bears witness to the terrible scars that disfigure the public lands, he illustrates the ecological and social importance of such lands, and he proposes radical changes. Among other things, Ketcham calls for abolishing grazing on public lands and decommissioning roads in national parks. He calls for strict enforcement of laws like the ESA, which, if fully applied, 鈥渨ould smash the entire exploitative economy on the public lands.鈥� And he calls for a public lands movement focused on grassroots organizing and public education, a movement that is 鈥渧ital, fierce, impassioned, occasionally dangerous, without hypocrisy, that stands against the tyranny of money鈥� and against the industrial extraction economy.

I would add to his proposals only this: Bold visions, populist campaigns, and public education are essential, but the public lands movement needs more. The movement must also be prepared to take power. It must participate in elections, challenge incumbents in primaries, propose policies, pass legislation, and take over federal agencies. It can鈥檛 be afraid to get its hands dirty in the halls of government.

For a long while now, I have been looking for a big, bold book about public lands, one that brings the fighting spirit and conservation vision of great writers like Edward Abbey, Rachel Carson, and Bernard DeVoto into the 21st century. In This Land, I think I鈥檝e finally found it.

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Jackie Biskupski, the tenacious, curly-haired , breezes into the lobby at the Hotel Monaco, plops onto a plush leather couch, and after a very brief introduction, immediately makes apparent her most pressing concern.

鈥淐limate change is messing with my ski season,鈥� she says, leaning forward with intensity. Precipitation, even in Utah鈥檚 high Wasatch mountains, has been uneven of late. And precipitation means everything鈥攏ot just for Utah鈥檚 skiers听but for Salt Lake City itself. If the snow goes away, the city鈥檚 water supply goes with it.

The 51-year-old Democrat听mayor of the largest city in one of the most conservative states in the nation understands the peril that the climate crisis poses. Indeed, for her鈥攁 Minnesota transplant drawn to this region more than 20 years ago to ski these towering peaks鈥攊t鈥檚 personal. And the personal is political, especially when you run an enormous metropolis.

Biskupski鈥攁 progressive, a lesbian, and one of only a handful of high-powered women in Utah politics鈥攈as emerged as a state and national climate leader since she was sworn into office in 2016. She is one of a cohort of outspoken local politicians around the nation rushing to surrounding issues from women鈥檚 rights to environmental protection. In June, Biskupski joined scores of other mayors across the country after the White House announced that it would pull out of the agreement. She was also a key player in convincing the U.S. Conference of Mayors to adopt a resolution by 2035. Salt Lake City made in the summer of 2016, helping catapult Biskupski to national prominence.

She has also contended with some serious struggles right here in her own backyard. Over the summer, Salt Lake City reluctantly said goodbye to Outdoor Retailer, the country鈥檚 premier outdoor-recreation-industry trade show, after the state government鈥檚 vigorous industry-backed assault on public lands drove the expo from town. And earlier this month, President Trump stood on a stage in Utah鈥檚 State Capitol and announced to a gloating crowd of politicians and conservative activists that he would downsize Utah鈥檚 Bears Ears and Grand Staircase鈥揈scalante national monuments by 85 and 50 percent, respectively. Biskupski was not around to welcome the president, but she did his way: 鈥淭hings @realdonaldtrump should help reduce 90 percent other than public lands: carbon emissions, student debt, school-to-prison pipeline, medical costs鈥�.鈥�

When her city鈥檚 image,听economy, and听well-being are at stake, Mayor Biskupski will stand up to anyone, even the president.

The mayor鈥檚 black boots click听and her leather jacket hangs off her back as she strolls through the lobby of the Hotel Monaco, hops the elevator, and emerges in a second-floor conference room. She鈥檚 here to address a group of environmental nonprofit leaders who have traveled from across the country to hear her plan to transition Salt Lake City to clean and renewable energy. And when she takes the podium, she gives them what they came for: She speaks of the devastation of climate change. She speaks of the city鈥檚 investments in solar farms, electric vehicles, and green buildings. She speaks of her desire to reduce local carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2040.

The president and his administration 鈥渃hose to turn their backs on the world and ignore science,鈥� she concludes听with a nasal Midwestern twang. 鈥淏ut cities will not be deterred, nor will we turn our backs.鈥�

And then she鈥檚 done,听back through听the elevator听and out the hotel door. She climbs into the passenger seat of her small silver Subaru, tells the driver to go, and we are on our way through the streets of the glittering and complicated city she leads. It鈥檚 a little after 9 A.M., and Jackie Biskupski is on the job.

The mayor鈥檚 Subaru merges onto a broad boulevard and zips east toward the Wasatch Range. Biskupski relaxes in her seat while a burly man with a blond buzz cut and a slight limp sits behind the wheel. He鈥檚 her bodyguard. As听a lesbian with a wife, two kids, and very left-leaning political views, she has received a number of threats over the years. 鈥淚t鈥檚 heartbreaking,鈥� she says.

Biskupski has long been a fixture in Utah politics. She came come to Utah in the 1980s to live close to the mountains, spending as much time as possible on the slopes while working in the city. It was during those youthful days that she fully realized she was gay. Despite the state鈥檚 conservative Mormon culture, she found in the city a tight community of fierce LGBTQ advocates. When local voters sent her to the legislature in 1998, she became the first openly gay person elected to state office in Utah鈥檚 100-year history. When she became mayor in 2016, it was another milestone. She is the city鈥檚 first openly queer mayor, though not the first female and certainly not the first progressive to hold that role鈥擲alt Lake City has elected Democrat听mayors since 1976.

Like many members of the queer community, Biskupski learned how to persevere in the face of sometimes scary adversity. On a broad, lightly-trafficked boulevard, our car passes within sight of East High School, the origin of Biskupski鈥檚 political career.

In the mid-nineties, kids at East High School tried to form the first gay-straight alliance in the state. They did it, the mayor says, 鈥渏ust to feel safe at school and to support one another and get through the day.鈥� But the conservative school board and the state government freaked out, and the controversy consumed Utah. 鈥淭hey banned all [student] clubs for years,鈥� she says, 鈥渁nd it to get the clubs back into our schools.鈥� After that, Biskupski signed on to manage a campaign to unseat one of the incumbents who had supported the crackdown. When her candidate won, she was hooked. In 1996听she ran for the Salt Lake City Council and lost. Two years later, she ran for the state legislature and won. She has been in government service ever since, and says she always harbored ambitions to become mayor. 鈥淓verything feels impossible here,鈥� she later tells me, 鈥渦ntil you do it.鈥�

In 2015, Biskupski ran as a pragmatic progressive on a platform that called for the creation of a city-level department of economic development, fast action to address the city鈥檚 affordable-housing shortage, and the protection of public lands and waters. Her opponent, Ralph Becker, was an unflashy two-term incumbent who also laid claim to the mantle of progressive politics. 鈥淚t was two progressive individuals running against each other who probably agreed on the bigger picture of things but disagreed on how to get there,鈥� says Matthew Rojas, Biskupski鈥檚 communications director. 鈥淚t was about style.听We said it was time for a mayor who is more accessible.鈥�

In the end, by a little over 1,000 votes.

During her first year in office, Biskupski focused largely on local economic matters: crafting an affordable-housing master plan, planning four new鈥攁nd 鈥攈omelessness resource centers, and establishing an economic-development department. Then she began in earnest the arduous process of transitioning Salt Lake City away from fossil fuels. Less than six months after taking office, she subscribed the city to a solar farm in rural Utah. The idea, Biskupski says, was to both encourage sustainable energy generation and create new jobs in Utah鈥檚 countryside, where the decline of traditional employment in extractive industries has fueled anti-public-lands sentiment.

That summer听the city made its historic pledge to power itself entirely on clean and renewable energy by 2032. Then, in September 2016, after a yearlong negotiation, the mayor announced with Rocky Mountain Power in which both parties promised to work together to develop clean-energy projects that will enable Salt Lake City to meet its ambitious goals. This put the city well ahead of large municipalities like Seattle and New York City, which have not yet made 100 percent clean-energy commitments much less plans to realize them.

This bold, deliberate approach is quintessential Biskupski. 鈥淚 wouldn鈥檛 call her a shrinking violet by any means,鈥� says Mike Noel, a Republican state representative from Utah鈥檚 rural southwest. 鈥淪he is very set in the things she believes and she has certain political issues that motivate her strongly, but she would listen, you know? We had our differences, but it was never to the point where you couldn鈥檛 discuss things with her.鈥�

And then there is her work on the national level. As Jodie Van Horn, director of says, 鈥淗er leadership extends far beyond Salt Lake City.鈥� She has rallied her colleagues in the U.S. Conference of Mayors to unanimously support a nationwide transition to clean and renewable energy, and recruited them to join Sierra Club鈥檚 Mayors for 100% Clean Energy initiative, of which she is a cochair.

鈥淣obody is waiting now for the federal government to do something,鈥� Biskupski says. 鈥淲e are leading the way. We have to.鈥�

Biskupski鈥檚 Subaru continues through Salt Lake鈥檚 bustling weekday streets and passes beneath the long shadow of the state capitol building, a granite neoclassical behemoth that looms on a hill above the city. In recent years, that building has become the nerve center of Utah鈥檚 anti-conservation campaign, which has made national headlines, and served as the dark backdrop for all of Biskupski鈥檚 accomplishments.

Most notoriously, both Governor Gary Herbert and Utah鈥檚 congressional delegation, led by House Natural Resources Committee chairman Rob Bishop, have crusaded against the 111-year-old Antiquities Act, a foundational conservation law that enables the executive branch to independently establish national monuments on public lands.

In May, Utah鈥檚 powerful senator Orrin Hatch helped convince the Trump administration to launch its review of dozens of national monuments, eventually leading to this month鈥檚 decision on Bears Ears and Grand Staircase鈥揈scalante national monuments. The mayor denounced the review straightaway: 鈥淎ny federal decision to modify acreage or roll back protection of these incredible spaces,鈥� she said , 鈥渨ill have negative and far-reaching impacts on Salt Lake City, as well as our entire state.鈥�

One of those impacts arrived earlier this year, when several outdoor-gear companies lobbied to pull Outdoor Retailer听from Salt Lake. For decades, the show brought thousands of people to the city to view new products from brands like REI, the North Face, and Patagonia, generating an annual $45 million for the region. But in February, the show that it was leaving Utah due to the state government鈥檚 relentless political assault on federal public lands. 鈥淚t is a huge hit,鈥� Biskupski says. 鈥淚t is a huge hit for us.鈥�

Despite the mayor鈥檚 behind-the-scenes attempts at negotiation and repeated pleas for it to stay, Outdoor Retailer decamped for Denver, Colorado, with听its more public-lands-friendly politicians. While Biskupski understands the trade show鈥檚 motivations to relocate, she鈥檚 saddened by听the move. 鈥淚t is so hard,鈥� she says. 鈥淏ecause they were mad at the state, yet the city really got punished. And I am on [the outdoor industry鈥檚] side, you know?鈥�

Against the backdrop of Utah鈥檚 state politics, her efforts were not enough. Indeed听sometimes her accomplishments seem bite-size compared with听the damage the state government has done. 鈥淚n the end, our disagreement was with statewide policies and the policies of the congressional delegation, so there were limits to what the city of Salt Lake could do,鈥� says Amy Roberts, the executive director of the Outdoor Industry Association. 鈥淓ven if [Biskupski] had used her bully pulpit to the full extent, would it have changed the mind of the governor or congressman Rob Bishop? It seems unlikely.鈥�

鈥淭he mayor [recognizes] the integral value of public lands, clean air, and clean water to Salt Lake City鈥檚 quality of life,鈥� says Peter Metcalf, the former CEO of Salt Lake City鈥揵ased Black Diamond, who worked with Biskupski , an effort to protect the Central Wasatch Mountains. 鈥淗owever, the state legislature and congressional delegation have done all they can to limit the mayor鈥檚 ability to effectively deal with many of these issues.鈥�

Metcalf, who was instrumental in the negotiations to move Outdoor Retailer, also pointed to Biskupski鈥檚 inexperience at the time, with only one year on the job. 鈥淚n my opinion, she [did not] have relationships with the governor or the congressional delegation that could have moved the needle.鈥�

While Outdoor Retailer is gone for good, the fight is far from听over. As Utah continues its attack on federal lands, the economic fallout from the trade show鈥檚 departure could still provide Biskupski with an opportunity to highlight the damage done by the state government鈥檚 policies, and could well have implications in the 2018 midterm elections and beyond. Indeed, exploiting this kind of leverage will be crucial if she has any hope of preventing the state and federal government from undermining her progress in protecting the region's vital ecosystems and decreasing carbon emissions.

The extent to which she can accomplish that remains to be seen, but Biskupski seems up to the task. 鈥淲e lost what I would say is a big battle with Outdoor Retailer, but that doesn鈥檛 mean we just go away and听tuck our tails,鈥� she says. 鈥淚t means we absolutely have to continue being that vocal minority, and even more so now.鈥�

The mayor鈥檚 one-car motorcade climbs out of the city and into the dry foothills of the Wasatch Range. We have arrived at our destination: . Salt Lake City purchased this tract from the U.S. Forest Service last year in order to conduct studies into watershed management. It is a place where many of Biskupski鈥檚 most pressing concerns鈥攑ublic lands, outdoor recreation, and climate鈥攃onverge.

We walk up the canyon as the sun inches above the mountains. Light catches the cottonwoods and the scrub oaks and sets them aglow. Sheer slopes of red sedimentary rock surround us on all sides. Leading the tour is Laura Briefer, the first female director of the city鈥檚 department of public utilities in its 150-year history. Publicly owned canyons like these, she explains, collect snowmelt from the high mountains and deliver it to the city鈥檚 ever expanding population. As much as 60 percent of Salt Lake鈥檚 drinking water comes from such Wasatch streams. But Briefer, a trail runner who knows these foothills intimately, says the future here is frighteningly听uncertain. 鈥淐limate change, especially in the intermountain West, is manifested in the water system,鈥� she says.

A 2013 study in the American Meteorological Society journal Earth Interactions, for instance, for every degree Fahrenheit of warming, the volume of water in the streams that feed Salt Lake City's watershed could decline by up to 6.5 percent. 鈥淚t could really just turn the water system as we know it upside down,鈥� says Briefer.

Ultimately, then, all of Biskupski鈥檚 rhetoric meets red-rock reality right here in in this narrow canyon. Biskupski stands before a freshwater reservoir as trout dimple its surface. In the hills above, where local hikers and trail runners traverse the ridges, a coyote crosses into view. This is the kind of healthy publicly owned landscape that drew the mayor to the American West in the first place. This is the kind of place she鈥檚 fighting for.

鈥淥h,鈥� says Biskupski, with delight, 鈥渢his is beautiful.鈥�

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At first the black bear was just a blur in her peripheral vision. Karen Williams, an ultrarunner and trauma nurse, was rounding a bend near the finish line of a backcountry marathon in the mountains of northern New Mexico when the animal burst from a wooded riverbank. As it surged towards her on that hot summer day in 2016, she stopped and screamed. In a matter of seconds, she was overtaken.

The bear tackled Williams to the ground while its cubs scattered. It sank its canines into Williams鈥� arms and smacked her across the skull. “I had this split-second thought that I was going to die,” Williams says. 鈥淭hen I stopped thinking that, and started trying to figure out how to survive.”

With the bear mauling her, Williams had the presence of mind to roll on her side and lay still and silent. “When [the bear] left, I tried to get up but I was too nauseous and dizzy because of the head wound,” she says. “Then I waited ten minutes and I started calling for help.”

Half an hour later, two fellow runners found Williams near the side of the trail, very bloody, with her back against a tree. She was rushed to a nearby hospital, where doctors bandaged her wounds and performed a full skin graft on her badly lacerated eyebrow. A day later, after returning to her Los Alamos听home, she learned that the bear was already dead. . The two cubs, meanwhile, were captured and temporarily put in听a veterinarian's care.

Williams, for her part, was deeply disappointed by the outcome. Despite her brutal encounter, she did not believe the bear deserved to die鈥攊t was only protecting its offspring, after all. So she decided to try to change the way that New Mexico handles human-wildlife conflict. Her effort is in line with a broader push to find new ways for people and animals to peacefully coexist in the open spaces of the American West.听

Advocates and officials in the 11 western states, with their still-wild landscapes and rising human populations, are increasingly eager to establish new and between people and large carnivores. Such encounters, says Bryan Bird, the southwest program director at the conservation non-profit , “are going to become more and more of a problem because people are recreating outdoors more than ever before.” When Bird moved to New Mexico in the 1990s, “you didn't really see so many trail running events or backcountry skiing. Even mountain biking wasn't nearly as big,鈥� he says. 鈥淣ow, it's off the charts.”听

Scott Talbott, the chair of the ' human-wildlife conflict committee, agrees. Though there isn't a comprehensive source for information about violent encounters between animals and people, he says such encounters are “absolutely” on the rise, especially in places where dense cities abut wild landscapes.

For this reason, he adds, there's been a “huge upswing” in efforts to teach people . Defenders of Wildlife, for example, is trying to encourage organizers of trail running marathons and similar wild-land sporting events across the West to refrain from scheduling their gatherings during the springtime emergence of mother bears and cubs from hibernation. It also encourages other preventative measures, such as carrying bear spray when running in the backcountry and putting small bells on mountain bikes. “We are going into their habitat,” Bird says. “And we have a responsibility to protect ourselves.”

But with outdoor recreation on the rise across the country, and continued growth in backcountry recreation in particular, . Bird, Williams, and others wonder: when wild animal attacks do occur, what's the best way for government officials to respond?

Some states, like Montana, have a flexible approach to the problem. When an attack takes place there, Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks sends out its Wildlife Human Attack Response Team to investigate the situation and determine the best way forward. In a tragic 2016 case, for instance, a on a backcountry trail and was immediately killed by the frightened animal. A taskforce of biologists and wildlife wardens decided that the bear had acted naturally and in self-defense and the search for the offending griz was eventually called off.

Other states use more rigid methods鈥擭ew Mexico is one of them. A state regulation first promulgated in the 1970s mandates that any animal that bites a human must be killed, beheaded, and its brain tested for rabies.听There are no exceptions, even for species like black bears that have an extremely low incidence of the infectious disease. The state's Department of Health says that “laws and regulations around animal bites of humans in听New听Mexico听are critical to our efforts to keep听New听Mexicans healthy听and safe.” (The state Department of Game and Fish was not available to comment for this article.)

Williams disagrees with the state's hardline rule. And so, before her wounds had even healed, she launched her effort to change it. She did some research, recruited scientists, reached out to political representatives, and, just this year, she and her allies . The bill revokes the lethal response rule and mandates a more nuanced approach to the problem. State officials will be permitted to kill an animal, using their professional discretion, if it has acted in a predatory or unprovoked manner, is identified as a “rabies reservoir” species like skunks, fox and raccoons, or has exhibited symptoms of rabies, among other conditions.

“The propensity for bears to carry rabies is very low, and particularly for a female raising her cubs out in the middle of nowhere,” says Diana Doan-Crider, a bear biology expert at Texas A&M University who has helped advise Williams. Nevertheless, due the New Mexico rule, state officials didn't have discretion. They had to kill the mother bear that bit Williams.

In early February, a state legislative committee held an initial vote on Williams' proposal. To her disappointment, it was a tie, and the bill is temporarily shelved. But the ultrarunner believes she will eventually prevail and help set a different course for the way humans deal with wild animal attacks in the state.

“That is the thing with ultra athletes,” she says. “We don't really give up, even when it hurts.”听

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Governor Mary Fallin of Oklahoma, a vice-chair of the Trump transition team whose aggressive pro-oil and anti-tax policies have made her an industry darling, has emerged as a top contender to be our country's next Secretary of the Interior. If she is formally nominated in the coming days, Fallin could soon lead a federal department responsible for protecting endangered species, handling Native American affairs, controlling the U.S. Geological Survey, administering lucrative oil and gas leasing programs, and managing more than 440 million acres of public land, including the National Park system.

Should Fallin take the reins at Interior, she will have broad power to reshape policies that will impact the future of the United States' most beloved landscapes. Her priorities will undoubtedly be very different than those of current Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, who has used her time in the post to , offset energy development with large-scale land conservation projects, and preserve new national monuments. Jewell has also sought to mitigate carbon pollution by placing a moratorium on new public lands coal leases. Fallin, it鈥檚 safe to say, will see things differently.

Johnson Bridgwater, the director of the Sierra Club's Oklahoma chapter, calls Fallin's potential nomination “problematic.”

“She has basically been an absentee governor on all important environmental issues in our state during her term,” he says, specifically highlighting her slow response to the oil-industry-induced earthquakes that have rocked the state as well as her decision to dissolve the Oklahoma Scenic Rivers Commission. Fallin, he adds, has starved the state's environmental enforcement agencies of funding while at the same time prioritizing the desires of fossil fuel developers. 听

Oklahoma's oil and gas interests, for their part, laud the governor's legacy. Fallin has “balanced competing interests well, including oil and gas producers, environmental concerns, royalty owners and surface rights,” says Chad Warmington, president of the Oklahoma Oil and Gas Association, in a written statement to 国产吃瓜黑料. “She understands the importance of keeping the United States a number one global competitor in oil and natural gas.鈥�

Fallin began her Beltway career as a Congresswoman for Oklahoma's fifth district, which includes the state capital and surrounding suburbs. During two terms on Capitol Hill, from 2007 to 2010, she 听in oil and gas campaign contributions, making the industry her top supporter. It鈥檚 no wonder: in Congress, Fallin to boost fossil fuel development on federal land and pushed to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling.

Upon ascending to Oklahoma's governorship in 2011, Fallin further cemented her reputation as an industry ally. While implementing tax breaks and relaxing regulations, she that created immense private wealth and across the state. Last year, she signed into law that barred cities, towns, and counties from banning fracking, a tactic that has among localities across the country that oppose the controversial drilling technique. She has also helped lead the legal fight against the Obama Administration's Clean Power Plan, which seeks to reduce carbon emissions from power plants.

Her personal ties are pertinent, too. One of Fallin's is J. Larry Nichols, former chairman of the American Petroleum Institute and co-founder of the pioneering fracking firm Devon Energy, the multi-billion-dollar petroleum producer operating on public lands across the West. She's also听 the American Legislative Exchange Council, a nonprofit organization closely tied to the donor network of Charles and David Koch that promotes far-right policies at the state level. In the early nineties, ALEC deemed Fallon a “legislator of the year.鈥�

For Fallin and her allies, fossil fuel development even inspires religious fervor. In October, amid sagging global oil prices, the governor established an in Oklahoma to 鈥渢hank听God for the blessings created by the oil and natural gas industry and to seek His wisdom and ask for protection.鈥� As the nationwide oil bust continues to rock extraction-dependent states like Oklahoma, Fallin's government has preserved generous industry tax cuts while slashing school funding.

When about her qualifications for the top job at Interior, Fallin highlighted her time on the Oklahoma Tourism and Recreation Department's governing board as well as her relationship with the state's 39 Native American nations. On December 1, members of the Cherokee and Chickasaw governments听 for Fallin. (The Trump transition team did not respond to several requests for comment.)

Fallin's department of interior candidacy听has caused dismay among national conservation organizations. “Oklahoma has very little public land, and outdoor recreation there consists primarily of hunting leases on private land and boating on reservoirs,” says Erik Molvar, the director of the Western Watersheds Project, a wildlife and public lands advocacy organization headquartered in Hailey, Idaho. “It is not a great place to learn how to responsibly manage millions of acres of federal land in the West.”听

Alan Rowsome, a senior director at the Wilderness Society, says Fallin's past suggests she doesn't share “the mainstream conservation values” that the majority of Americans hold. “Across the political spectrum, Americans cherish their shared public lands and want to see them protected,” he says. “And I think turning the keys to these lands over to a staunch oil and gas industry ally is not what most Americans want.”

National fossil fuel groups, meanwhile, seem pleased with the possible appointment. “She certainly understands our industry and understands the role of the Department of the Interior,” says Dan Naatz, a senior vice president at the Independent Petroleum Association of America. His group would like more oil and gas development on federal lands, which Naatz says is part of the Interior Department's “multiple use mandate.”

A lot is going to depend on who the Secretary is, Naatz adds. “It's an exciting time.”

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In September 2007, John Sturgeon motored his personal hovercraft up the Nation River in Alaska's sprawling Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve. It was hunting season, and Sturgeon was trying to reach the preserve's lush, moose-filled meadows. Two miles upstream, though, the vehicle had engine issues and Sturgeon landed on a gravel bar to do some repairs.听

Three National Park Service rangers approached Sturgeon on the riverbank and informed him that the use of a hovercraft on the river violated park rules. They told him to remove it, and warned that he could be charged with a federal crime if he brought it to the preserve again. Sturgeon told the men听that their agency had no authority over rivers in Alaska, even ones within park boundaries, but nonetheless obeyed their orders and towed out the craft. Four years later, after sending numerous letters to the Department of Interior protesting the hovercraft ban, the hunter sued the NPS and its Alaska regional director, Sue Masica, in a bid to overturn the ban. Sturgeon's lawyers argue that, under the terms of a landmark 1980 Alaskan conservation law, the Park Service does not have legal authority to manage a broad swath of Alaska's wild rivers.听

Last month, after years of appeals, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear Sturgeon's case. Sturgeon v. Masica will determine whether and how the Department of the Interior will be able to regulate waterways on the millions of acres of federal land governed by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980, or ANILCA. ANILCA, passed during the Carter administration, protected 104 million acres听of听new or expanded national parks, refuges, and other federal land听in Alaska, with the provision that state, tribal, and听private听inholdings听within the areas would not be subject to certain federal regulation. Who controls the waterways within these lands, however, is contested.

If the high court sides with Sturgeon, many environmentalists fear that management of the waterways within ANILCA-protected听lands will be handed over entirely to the decidedly pro-development state government. That, they argue, could further open up rivers to industrial uses like dredge mining, encourage motorized travel in wilderness areas, and relax other restrictions on wild rivers and lands. There's also some concern, however unlikely, that other parties could try to extend such a decision to other public lands and waters across the U.S.,听though legal experts say that鈥檚 unlikely.

“It is a big deal,” says Katie Strong, a lawyer with the environmental law firm Trustees for Alaska, which filed a brief in opposition to Sturgeon's suit. She says that听rivers are the lifeblood of Alaska: they serve as trade routes, highways, recreation areas, and breadbaskets. Right now, the feds have an important say in how many of the state's most wild rivers are managed, but that could change if the justices side with Sturgeon. The court will likely hand down a decision next summer.

Sturgeon and the state of Alaska's stance largely rests on a specific,听听of听ANILCA that may differ from the spirit of its intention.听鈥婬e听asserts that navigable waterways鈥攔egardless of whether they pass through federal land鈥攁re technically state-owned lands and should therefore be freed from general NPS regulation, too. The state of Alaska, as well as a number of Alaskan tribal corporations, have supported Sturgeon in the case and filed numerous briefs in lower courts to support the hunter's legal position.听The Park Service's regulation of rivers like the Nation “ignores the way that [the law] ensures and respects Alaska's sovereign ability to continue to manage our lands and water,” says Janell Hafner, a lawyer for the state in the case. “Land and water use and management is historically and traditionally the sovereign right of the states.”听

The federal government disagrees, and the lower courts have consistently rejected Sturgeon's interpretation, too. Which is why many legal experts were surprised when the Supreme Court accepted the case.听John Leshy, a public lands legal expert at the University of California, Hastings, calls Alaska's state sovereignty argument preposterous, especially when applied to water. “The simplistic idea that the state owns the water once it is admitted into the union is contradicted by a couple hundred years of law,” he says. “This states' rights-sovereign rights claim is just political rhetoric.”

“It is something of a puzzle to me why the Supreme Court decided to听[review this case]”, says Bob Keiter, a law professor and public lands expert at the University of Utah. The high court, he says, usually takes cases that lower courts are split over, or which have high stakes and national implications. None of those conditions really apply here. Instead, they may have agreed to hear arguments because听ANILCA deals with such听a huge amount听of federal land.

For Alaska, though, the stakes are high. If the Supreme Court reverses the lower courts, and decides the case in favor of Sturgeon, conservationists say that many听of Alaska's 350,000 miles of river could lose crucial federal protection or oversight. In a state with few roads, where rivers are the main access point to millions of acres of public land, that's a big loss.听

“If it turns out that our federal land managers are not able to manage the use of the rivers within [federally-owned] units, we are going to see a lot less protection of the habitat and the waters and the surrounding lands,” says Cliff Eames, a longtime Alaskan conservationist. He is particularly concerned about the door being opened to motorized travel and natural resource extraction on protected waterways. The state of Alaska, after all, has very different land management priorities than the feds. Consider, for instance, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The state of Alaska is vociferously opposing recent federal plans to designate four new Wild and Scenic Rivers and to permanently protect the refuge's oil-rich coastal plain. It would rather see the refuge, and other such lands and waters, opened up to fossil fuel extraction, which could do grave harm to the polar bears, muskoxen, caribou and many other species that call it home. The state's pro-development stance will have total sway over scores of Alaskan rivers should Sturgeon prevail in court.听

There's also a chance鈥攁n admittedly slim one鈥攖hat Sturgeon v. Masica could make a听nationwide听impact. Tucked away in Sturgeon's petition to the Supreme Court, and in his lawyers' briefs to the lower courts, is a bold argument that moves beyond ANILCA. 听says the case “raises a difficult constitutional question” then goes on to question the Park Service's constitutional authority to broadly regulate navigable waters on federal land. It asserts, again, that such waters are “state-owned” and that general federal land regulations, like the system-wide NPS ban on hovercrafts for instance, infringe on state sovereignty in a manner that exceeds Congress' constitutional powers.听

If the Supreme Court accepts that challenge to NPS regulation, then Sturgeon's case may听open the door for听a legal assault on the ability of federal land agencies to manage rivers around the country. Such a ruling is highly unlikely鈥攊n fact, the court probably won't even consider the constitutional question.听“This case will likely be limited to Alaska. That is what I would expect,” says Keiter. “It would be a strange case to get into these broader constitutional issues. But you never know for sure what the court will do.”

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The sudden spill on August 6 from Colorado's Gold King mine turned the Animas River a sickly shade of orange, prompted emergency declarations in two states, and garnered front-page headlines around the world鈥攂ut it was no anomaly. It's a symptom of a more insidious problem: Nationwide, federal authorities estimate there are 500,000 inactive or abandoned mines, most of them from former hard rock mining operations. Many are more than a century old, and slowly and silently leak toxic acid and sediments into streams and creeks鈥攄ay after day, year after year. They have contaminated headwaters on an astounding 40 percent of watersheds in the U.S, .

In Colorado alone, there are more than 20,000 such mines, and they've been wreaking ecological damage in the state for decades. In 1989, the Eagle Mine, near Vail, leached huge quantities of zinc and other metals into the Eagle River, killing fish and yellowing the water. (In 2012, another leak there of hundreds of thousands of gallons of tainted water .) The Yak Tunnel disaster dumped a slug of toxic mine slurry into 颁辞濒辞谤补诲辞鈥檚 Arkansas River in 1985. The Summitville mine spill killed most aquatic life along a 17-mile stretch of the state鈥檚 Alamosa River in the early 1990s. The list goes on. These poorly managed waste-ridden time bombs are the legacy of an industry that has simply walked away from its environmental responsibilities when boom times end.

鈥淭hese abandoned and inactive mines are perpetual polluters,鈥� says Lauren Pagel, the policy director of the environmental group Earthworks. 鈥淚t is widely acknowledged that if you have an acid-generating site, it will require constant maintenance to deal with the pollution.鈥澨�

Yet the federal government has no comprehensive plan or central source of money to deal with this vast and complicated problem. That must change. The Animas spill is a message from the mine-riddled mountains: finally, once and for all, it鈥檚 time to clean up the frontier-era pollution that poisons the high country. And the mining industry, not taxpayers, should fund the effort. If the problem is allowed to linger, the streams and waterways, the fisheries and river towns of the West will continue to suffer blowouts, polluted water, and the hefty taxpayer-backed cleanup bills that come in their wake.听

The dawn of hard rock mining began with the California gold rush, carried through the Gilded Age of the late 1800s, and accelerated during the early 20th century. Excavation and milling operations between the Rockies and the Sierras resulted in thousands of tunnels, shafts, and holes dug deep in mountain ranges. Once the gold or silver ran out, mine owners simply abandoned these sites.

They left fields of toxic mine tailings鈥攑iles of waste rock and other refuse produced when metal is separated from ore. When oxygen and rainwater, groundwater, or snowmelt seep into old mines and mix with exposed rock or tailings, the ensuing chemical reaction can produce potent acids capable of dissolving heavy metals. The toxic liquid can then leak into nearby waterways and cause all kinds of damage to flora and fauna. The liquid is called acid mine drainage. It鈥檚 what came gushing out of Gold King this month. It's our hard rock mining heritage.

This is not a cheap problem to fix. For instance, the Bureau of Land Management鈥檚 program, which started in 1997 and is funded through federal appropriations, spent $100 million to catalog and restore mine sites between 2006 and 2011. Of the 46,000 known abandoned mines on its lands, the bureau was able to restore only about 10 percent of them (just over 4,000 mines). The EPA the cost of cleaning up and monitoring abandoned and inactive mines nationwide at a minimum of $35 billion.

But there is no centralized mechanism for funding or coordinating such a task. At the state and federal levels, responsibility for cleaning up old hard rock mines is spread among many different agencies, each with its own inventory of mines and priorities for handling them. Colorado, for example, has a dedicated division of mining reclamation within its natural resources department, whereas mine cleanups in California are handled through the state department of conservation.听鈥淚t is a patchwork and it is crazy,鈥� says Jim Lyon, vice president at the National Wildlife Federation. “This is not going away unless we change our approach.鈥澨�

The worst sites achieve Superfund status鈥攁n EPA designation that routes Congressional appropriations and other funds to large, highly toxic sites like the Eagle Mine.听The status has benefits, like federal money and expertise, but it also brings unwelcome notoriety. Many residents in Silverton and other towns near Gold King, for example, have vehemently opposed Superfund status for the Gold King, fearing that the designation would hurt their town鈥檚 tourism and extraction economies.

Nonprofit and community groups also try to chip away at the problem. In Durango and Silverton, for instance, residents, state and federal agencies, mining companies, and environmental groups formed the Animas River Stakeholders Group to start cleaning up old mines in the San Juan Mountains. (The group听has led about 20 remediation projects over the past 21 years.) But the efforts of these groups are constrained by financial and legal hurdles. For instance, hold that 鈥済ood Samaritans鈥� who take on acid drainage cleanup and other kinds of mine remediation become legally liable for all future waste discharges from the site. That is a risk most small groups aren鈥檛 willing to take.

A new proposal currently moving through the House of Representatives, if approved by Congress, would alleviate that risk to citizens' groups and shift the burden to where it belongs: on the back of the industry.

The main piece of legislation that controls metal mining in America today is the General Mining Law of 1872, which was passed to give legal recognition to the mining claims of western settlers. It regulates today鈥檚 hard metal mining industry as if the frontier-era never ended. It doesn't require metal miners to pay royalties on the riches they remove from public lands nor does it establish a fund for abandoned and inactive mine remediation. Without royalty payments streaming into a federal remediation fund, there is no consistent source of money to pay for mine reclamation and taxpayers are on the hook when cleanup does happen. Many want to see reform, and soon.

鈥淭he law is antiquated,鈥� says Ty Churchwell a staffer at , a nonprofit group that advocates for clean waterways and has assisted with mine cleanup projects in the west. 鈥淚t is the industry that causes these problems and it is the industry that needs to pay for them.”

Churchwell, Lyon, and others are urging lawmakers to consider a model imposed on the coal industry nearly 40 years ago. In 1977 Congress passed the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act, which levied new taxes on coal companies and created an abandoned mine lands reclamation fund. Since then the fund has spent more than $7.2 billion to reclaim, or return to a natural and economically viable state, more than 295,000 acres of abandoned coal mine land. It has been remarkably effective in sealing old mines, treating mine drainage, and otherwise protecting air and water from the toxic impact of coal extraction. (At times, when money is flush, it has even been applied to abandoned hard rock sites.)

A bill currently moving through Congress would institute similar rules for the hard rock mining industry. Introduced in February by Representative Raul Grijalva of Arizona, who has long been an advocate for abandoned mine cleanup, the Hard Rock Mining Reform and Reclamation Act of 2015 would establish an eight percent royalty on new mines and a four percent royalty on existing mines. Those royalties would, in part, fund abandoned mine reclamation across the country. It won't help the damage done by the Gold King breach, but it could prevent future events.

Andy Corra, owner of 4Corners Riversports in Durango, is all for mining reform. After watching the orange waste water course down the Animas, he is hoping something good will come out of this disaster. 鈥淚f there is a silver lining to this spill, it is the increased attention to this issue. We need to get these mines cleaned up for good.鈥�

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In 2012, 59-year-old Ed Bacon attempted a solo hike through New Hampshire鈥檚 White Mountains. While in the backcountry, on a windy, rain-drenched day, he tried to jump onto a rocky ledge, dislocated his artificial hip and found himself incapacitated in the wilderness. He was stuck, so he did what you鈥檙e supposed to do: he called for help.

The New Hampshire Fish and Game Department, which runs search and rescue in the state, mobilized fast. It sent 50 people, mostly volunteers, to his aid. After a nighttime operation in rough weather, they delivered him to safety. He was unharmed, save for an injured hip and a bad scare.

That鈥檚 where you might expect the story to end, but not in Bacon鈥檚 case. Shortly after his ordeal, he received a bill for . The state said he owed big money for the mission that saved him.

Under a 2008 , any person who acts 鈥渘egligently in requiring a search and rescue response鈥� is liable to pay for it. The state deemed Bacon negligent because he went into the woods despite a history of hip problems and a high likelihood of bad weather. Bacon fought the department鈥檚 decision , which ruled against him in April.听

New Hampshire is not the only state where hikers, climbers, and other outdoor enthusiasts can be hit with hefty bills for search and rescue (SAR) services that save their lives. At least six other states have controversial laws that enable officials to recover SAR听costs. Some of those laws are broad, and just about anybody can be forced to pay. Others are narrow, and you鈥檝e got to do something reckless to get a bill. In any case, many SAR providers across the U.S. believe the prospect of forcing individuals to pay out of pocket for help in times of crisis further threatens the lives of the people in danger.

鈥淲hen you have to make a decision in an emergency you don鈥檛 want to be hamstrung with economics,鈥� says , chief of search and rescue for the National Park Service. 鈥淵ou want to make the right decisions for the right reasons.鈥� 听

Despite the opposition, cost recovery remains on the books in states scattered across the country. (Federal agencies don't generally charge for SAR.)听Implicit in these policies is the message that public services like search and rescue are a financial transaction, and that risk-taking in the wilderness is only for those with backwoods savvy or a big bank account. If public lands are places to seek adventure and push oneself to new limits, laws like these could discourage the inexperienced, the young, and people without resources from venturing out. Search and rescue is a pure public service in most places, but veteran thrill seekers and greenhorn explorers alike ought to know where liability is lurking.

In addition to New Hampshire, Maine, Hawai鈥檌, and Oregon have wide discretion to bill wayward adventurers for SAR. The idea is to discourage reckless adventuring, and the circumstances that led to each state passing financial recovery laws are pretty similar鈥攑eople were acting recklessly and lawmakers were tired of footing the bill. But some states are more lenient than others when it comes to enforcement. Oregon听and Hawai'i, for example,听each perform several hundred rescues per year and听have never pursued claims against a person rescued. SAR coordinators in those states interviewed for this article say听they are morally opposed to charging people who receive help because it could dissuade victims from seeking aid in the future.听For its part, Maine has charged only five people since its law was put on the books in 1997. (SAR coordinator Kevin听Adams isn't sure听how much money the state has recouped.)

Other states can charge for search and rescue under limited conditions.听Colorado and Vermont can bill people who travel out of bounds at ski areas, and Idaho can charge hikers who venture into areas closed to the public. Sheriffs in California, meanwhile, can charge an individual鈥檚 county of residence for a mission that costs more than $100.

Even some counties around the country have adopted compensation laws. These are places that draw tons of visitors and have small tax bases to cover the costs of rescues.听Two Utah counties, Wayne and Grand, consistently charge for SAR. In Grand County, home to Moab, Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park, and a lot more public land, the local SAR team claims to be the busiest in Utah, with around 100 cases a year. For a county of approximately 9,500 tax-paying residents, that鈥檚 a big financial burden.听听says his team spends about $200,000 a year.听鈥淲e had to start charging because it was so expensive to conduct these operations in our county,鈥� he says, noting that most people who need rescuing are not locals and that county residents don鈥檛 get billed. Last year, the county billed for 37 out of 111 total missions and pulled in more than $15,000 in cost recovery fees.

New Hampshire is by far the most likely state to bill鈥攊t has collected fees from more than 60 SAR missions since 2008, for a total of $70,000鈥攂ut there is a silver lining emerging.听Recently (and mercifully) New Hampshire implemented a rescue coverage program called the听.听(Several听states have adopted similar “card” programs. More on that below.)听People who buy the card will not have to pay for SAR costs, even if they act negligently.听For many SAR providers, however, rescue benefits and other sorts of pseudo-insurance don鈥檛 cut it. Search and rescue, they say, ought to be free.听

鈥淲e oppose charging for one predominate reason,鈥� says Howard Paul, a 30-year search and rescue veteran and a听听spokesman. 鈥淲e know that when people have a perception that they will be billed for rescue, they may delay calling for help, they may choose not to call for help or they may refuse help when it arrives.鈥�

Paul points to a list the听听put together of 15 real-life cases in which people have refused or delayed asking for search and rescue assistance because they were afraid of being billed.听

New Hampshire officials, for their part, say billing people hasn鈥檛 resulted in negative outcomes like delayed calls for help. 鈥淲e haven鈥檛 seen it happen yet,鈥� says听, the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department鈥檚 SAR team leader. 鈥淚n fact, our calls continue to climb.鈥�

SAR card programs

鈥淐ard鈥� programs exist and are popping up around the country to spare hikers the same fate as Ed Bacon. The way they work is simple: You and your travel companions pay into them and, in exchange, you're alleviated from the dread of paying out of pocket for a rescue operation, should you need it.听They鈥檙e not insurance plans exactly鈥攎ore like communally supported听funds designed to offset the cost of SAR missions and protect the pocketbooks of people who need rescuing. While you鈥檙e planning your summer adventures, here are a few programs to keep in mind:听

颁辞濒辞谤补诲辞鈥檚 costs only $3 per year per person, and you can buy it at more than 300 retailers around the state. The card doesn鈥檛 explicitly prevent you from paying for SAR or indemnify you against claims from the state, but Colorado isn鈥檛 inclined to charge people for rescues. Rather, the program is听a way for people venturing outdoors听in the state to help contribute to that status quo.听Despite the nominal fee, the state fund has paid out more than $6 million to county SAR coordinators since its inception in 2002, according to a .

In March, Utah moved to join听the听bandwagon as well. Its brand-new听听program is set to听take听effect in July.

At the national level, too, there鈥檚 a solid option. The century-old听听offers its members a domestic rescue benefit that reimburses them up to $5,000 in the event that they are charged for SAR or similar services.

The post Is Search and Rescue a Public Service? Not Exactly. appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

On January 22, at the Outdoor Retailer Market in Salt Lake City, former interior secretary Bruce Babbitt told a roomful of recreation entrepreneurs, backcountry outfitters, and gear manufacturers to wake up.

鈥淚 would argue that your industry鈥攖he $646 billion per year outdoor recreation industry鈥攊s a sleeping giant,鈥� he said. 鈥淚f you mobilize the full economic and political power of your industry, you can change the debate.鈥� The persistent, high-stakes debate about public lands, that is.

Babbitt鈥檚 remarks were a vigorous reminder that a variety of forces, from congressional budget cutters to Cliven Bundy鈥檚 homespun militia, are threatening the legal and financial underpinnings that prevent听our nation鈥檚 public lands from succumbing to private interest agendas. These lands power the outdoor economy, but millions of federally protected acres in the West are currently under attack by what is commonly referred to as the land transfer movement.

Lawmakers in Utah, Nevada, Wyoming, and other states have passed or are considering bills that demand the federal government relinquish its claim to national forests and Bureau of Land Management parcels and transfer them to state control. If these campaigns succeed, there鈥檚 a good chance the states wouldn鈥檛 be able to bear the costs of managing their new holdings and would be forced to sell them off to extractive industries and developers. Lawmakers in Utah, who are leading this fight, have threatened to sue the federal government if it does not comply.听

鈥淭his is the moment,鈥� Babbitt told his audience, 鈥渢o apply the strength of your industry to the defense of America鈥檚 public lands.鈥�

There was a time not so long ago, during the Clinton administration and the early years of George W. Bush, when the outdoor industry wasn鈥檛 a giant at all. It didn鈥檛 have the strength to respond to this kind of challenge. It was young and inexperienced in the corridors of power. 鈥淲e would go into DC,听and we would be dismissed,鈥� says Frank Hugelmeyer, former CEO of the (OIA). 鈥淲e鈥檇 joke that we were meeting with the intern鈥檚 intern.鈥�

But the industry has come a long way in the past two decades. It has emerged as an employer of 6.1 million Americans, according to the OIA, and has one of its own, former REI CEO Sally Jewell, at the helm of the Interior Department. Outdoor companies and their employees are flexing their political muscles in novel and creative ways all across the country. From outspoken CEOs like Black Diamond鈥檚 Peter Metcalf to local advocacy by smaller outdoor businesses, the industry鈥檚 unique voice is growing louder and getting bolder day by day. For the public lands and the people who love them, that鈥檚 a very good thing.

In the days before April 15, a group of 55 executives from companies like REI, SmartWool, Patagonia, and more boarded planes bound for Washington, DC,听to attend the OIA鈥檚 annual . As the outdoor economy鈥檚 flagship trade group, the OIA calls on its membership to spend a few frenzied days each year bending ears and pushing the industry鈥檚 broad and growing agenda on Capitol Hill. With congressmen, senators, and other bigwigs on hand, it鈥檚 a good opportunity to plug the public lands.

This year, the group lobbied Congress to fully support the Land and Water Conservation Fund, a crucial pool of money drawn from offshore oil royalties and distributed among government agencies to develop outdoor recreation infrastructure across the country. It鈥檚 what builds those fishing access sites on the side of the road, those bike trails through town, and the campsites in your favorite parks. Congress has consistently raided the fund ; only twice in 50 years has it received its full $900 million allotment, and this year it鈥檚 up for reauthorization. The OIA鈥檚 message to lawmakers was simple: Failing to fully reauthorize the fund will hurt the communities and companies that count on trails, parks, and public access to generate business.

The gathered OIA board also took time to address the threat on everybody鈥檚 mind. For the first time, it officially voted to support OIA staffers who want to go after the land transfer movement at the local, state, and federal levels. The OIA in Congress, according to OIA government affairs director Alex Boian. It may also develop a network of outdoor businesses to help quash land transfer efforts in the states. Many of the organization鈥檚 supporters say the move couldn鈥檛 have come soon enough.

鈥淚 think that certainly we as an industry did not stand up soon enough on this state land-grab idea,鈥� says Metcalf, who attended the Capitol Summit. 鈥淲e need to move in a unified strident voice to say that this is a horrific idea, this is radical, it is dumb, and if it goes forward, it will be one of the worst things that has ever happened to our industry.鈥�

The OIA is not alone in its effort to harness the outdoor industry鈥檚 economic might and help it realize its full political potential and protect its interests. A slate of other independent projects is doing the hard work as well. The most notable, perhaps, is the campaign.听

The Center for American Progress and other groups launched Count My Job in January to persuade the federal government, and the Department of Commerce in particular, to start collecting comprehensive economic data on the outdoor industry. Federal agencies do that for industries like mining and timber, but it hasn鈥檛 happened for outdoor business, and that鈥檚 a problem. Right now, policymakers and legislators can鈥檛 find big-picture government numbers on the industry鈥檚 contribution鈥攊n jobs and dollars鈥攖o national, state, and local economies.听That lack of official data makes it more difficult to push for things like new land acquisitions, a beefed-up Interior Department budget, or more trail crews in the national forests.听

Being counted is crucial. Babbitt stressed the issue in his January speech, and the OIA is behind it. What鈥檚 more, the campaign is seeing success. Several听senators are already calling on the executive branch听to . On April 16, Count My Job 听that featured a very supportive Jewell, who offered this folksy advice to outdoor advocates:

鈥淚f you are not at the table, you are on the menu, and I think about that a lot,鈥� said Jewell, speaking of the need for better government data and more industry input on policy. 鈥淏ecause if we value public lands and they are important to our businesses and they are important to the things we care about, then we have got to be at the table.鈥�

Of course, there鈥檚 more to the world than Washington, DC.听Industry leaders are also looking to the local level to turn their values and dollars into action. In her speech to the Count My Job crowd, Jewell singled out a pioneering example of local advocacy done right. It鈥檚 called the Moab Master Leasing Plan, a Bureau of Land Management attempt to balance competing interests on more than 900,000 acres of public land around Utah鈥檚 Arches National Park. Outdoor businesses鈥攍ed by Ashley Korenblat, the hard-biking CEO of Moab鈥檚 Western Spirit Cycling鈥攈ave had a standout role shaping the plan.

鈥淪upporting the public lands has to become the mainstream agenda for everyone,鈥� says Korenblat, who is an OIA adviser and runs the nonprofit advocacy group . She believes the industry still relies too heavily on conservation groups to protect the public lands. 鈥淲e want to make it a business issue,鈥� she says. The BLM has taken notice of her work; its master plan is shaping up to keep Moab鈥檚 finest trails and recreation hot spots safe from oil and gas operators.

All these projects, and others like them, signal the same development: The outdoor industry is coming into its own as a political force. It is articulating the economic case for public land protection. It is building power. The giant is awake, but there is much more to do.

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