Articles by Grist staff

A Friend of the Devil Is a Friend of Mines

An announcement by the Bush administration yesterday that it would repeal a Clinton-era mining regulation pleased industry leaders but angered environmentalists. The regulation, which applies to hard-rock minerals such as gold, silver, and copper, allows the Interior secretary to veto new mines on federal lands if they threaten the well-being of communities or the environment. […]

Ranger Rearranger

Federal wildlife agents and rangers — the folks who protect U.S. public lands from poaching, endangered species smuggling, illegal off-road activity, and other no-nos — were in short supply long before Sept. 11. But now their ranks are even thinner, after scores of agents were re-assigned to serve as sky marshals or guard federal buildings […]

Hi Ho Silver

Notwithstanding intense citizen pressure, the U.S. EPA decided yesterday to proceed with a massive cleanup of Silver Valley, Idaho, making the area one of the nation’s biggest Superfund sites. Many residents had argued that toxins leftover from more than a century of mining no longer posed health or environmental problems, and feared that the EPA […]

Accountant Dracula

The U.S. Forest Service’s accounting practices are “totally unreliable,” the General Accounting Office reported Tuesday. The GAO report, which came in response to a request by Reps. Cynthia McKinney (D-Ga.) and George Miller (D-Calif.) for an agency audit, was by far the most scathing condemnation of irregular accounting practices at the USFS to date. Watchdog […]