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Let’s tell the truth about those big, bad wolves

By Story Warren

The return of wolves to the West has always been contentious, and the deaths last fall of more than 40…

Hans Veth via Unsplash

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Chronicle of an abandoned oil and gas well — one of millions

By Jonathan Thompson
Abandoned well, Jonathan Thompson image

Even from a distance it’s clear that an oil and gas well called “State Senate #2” in New Mexico has…

Abandoned well, Jonathan Thompson image

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Colorado is conflicted about cutting its water use

By Dave Marston

In Colorado, farmers must enroll in a four-state program by March 1, if they want to get paid for fallowing…

Tom Kay in front of his John Deere tractor, image: Dave Marston

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It’s do or die for the Great Salt Lake

By Stephen Trimble

Last November, the Great Salt Lake, iconic landmark of the Great Basin Desert, fell to its lowest surface elevation ever…

Antelope Island Looking Over Great Salt Lake, photo courtesy of Michael Shoemaker

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Backcountry adventurers know they’re taking chances

By Molly Absolon

Six people have died in avalanches in the United States since the snow started to fly this fall. Every year,…

Five backcountry skiers cross a avalanche path while hiking outside of Jackson Hole Resort, Wyoming.

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The West is an exploiter’s paradise

By Richard Knight

High on a mesa where everyone can see it, a trophy house is going up in the northern Colorado valley…

Outside Capitol Reef, photo courtesy of Michael Shoemaker

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The housing crisis is harming my town

By Tim Lydon

In Girdwood, Alaska, we’ll long remember the snowstorm of Dec. 6, just three months ago. But it won’t be for…

Girdwood Valley courtesy of Nathan Searles

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Atmospheric rivers endanger the West

By Dave Marston

Moab, Utah, gets just eight inches of rain per year, yet rainwater flooded John Weisheit’s basement last summer. Extremes are…

Glen Canyon Dam under construction 1960-63, courtesy USBR

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What also counts is where the snow falls

By Dave Marston

This week Writers on the Range explores the possibility of dangerous flooding in the Colorado River Basin. But there’s something…

A girl and her dog sledding at Durango’s off-leash dog park Jan. 20, photo courtesy Dave Marston

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Banning books is for bullies

By Crista Worthy

By Crista V. Worthy Some people have become so alarmed by what children might read in school or in libraries…

Image courtesy of Rediscovered Books, Caldwell, Idaho

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What a long strange trip to kill four dams

By Rocky Barker

Finally, after a 50-year effort, four massive dams on the Klamath River in northern California and Oregon will start coming…

Copco No. 1 dam Photo Credit Michael Wier

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The “energy gap” nobody wants to tussle with

By Dave Marston

Many Western states have declared they will achieve all-renewable electrical goals in just two decades. Call me naïve, but haven’t…

Clouds over a windmill farm near Oakley, Kansas

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What others are saying See More

Larmer was the first editor of Writers on the Range after it landed at HCN in 1998, he went on to become publisher/editor of High Country News (HCN) 2003-2020, and is currently senior development director HCN. Larmer is also on the advisory board of Writers on the Range.

Writers on the Range grew out of the West’s public lands, growth, and culture wars of the 1990s. At the time, environmentalists were at loggerheads with the timber, mining, oil and gas and ranching industries that had dominated and shaped land-use and rural communities for decades. 

Meanwhile, a flood of newcomers poured into the region’s urban areas and smaller towns, stressing their social and economic fabrics beyond recognition. How could the West sort through these contentious issues in a civil manner?

The answer was to give voice to a wide range of people from the region itself.  Writers with different backgrounds, espousing new ideas, were put front and center on the region’s opinion pages.

After a brief run as a think tank, Writers on the Range landed on the front porch of High Country News in 1997.  High Country News is the well-known, highly awarded publication that covers the west’s diverse natural and human communities.  It was a perfect match.

Soon dozens of news outlets subscribed.  Over the next 20 years, Writers on the Range published fresh columns from writers and thinkers across the ideological spectrum, provoking thought, generating debate, and defining the possibilities of a better west.

 It was truly a grassroots opinion service and, now as an independent non-profit organization, is still so today.

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