Our Public Lands

In this episode, I interview Carla Chung Mattix, a former National Park Service attorney, about her new book National Parks and the Supreme Court: Groundbreaking Legal Battles (University of Nevada Press, published August 11). Carla began her book project about four years ago to address a knowledge gap about how park laws work, explaining the Organic Act as the core mandate along with other federal statues. She discusses Supreme Court cases including Cameron v. United States (1920) upholding Grand Canyon National Monument under the Antiquities Act and Ward v. Racehorse (1896) on treaty hunting rights, later effectively overturned by Herrera v. Wyoming (2019). We also discuss Park Service planning and defensive litigation, Yellowstone microbes “benefit sharing,” air tour regulation at Grand Canyon National Park, concerns about logging in parks, and worries about waiving environmental and cultural laws in proposed bills like the Save Our Sequoias Act, which is currently before Congress.Buy Carla’s book→ National Parks and the Supreme Court: Groundbreaking Legal Battles00:57 Episode and Guest Preview03:00 Carla’s Career and Motivation05:03 Organic Act and Core Park Laws06:17 From Engineer to Park Lawyer08:27 Career Highs and NAGPRA Challenges11:41 Dual Mandate and Impairment Standard13:03 Supreme Court Case Grand Canyon Monument18:32 Treaty Hunting Rights and Yellowstone26:15 Hunting Rules Across Park Units29:08 How Park Laws Evolved Since 191633:31 Planning Review and Yellowstone Microbes37:20 Defensive Litigation and Air Tours42:46 Logging Debates and Organic Act Reform53:56 Waiving Environmental Laws Concerns54:50 Wrap Up Book Links and Public Lands Meaning Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I interview Josh Schlossberg, representing Protect Colorado’s Land, Communities and Tax Dollars in opposition to Colorado Prop 137. Josh argues Colorado has become a proving ground for “wildfire pretense logging,” enabled by fear-based messaging, supportive media coverage, and corporate-aligned NGOs. He says fuel-reduction projects in Colorado commonly involve industrial logging, clearcutting, and large-tree removal, which he claims can worsen fire risk while harming ecosystems, wildlife habitat, and recreation. Our discussion centers on Proposition 137, which he says would divert $175 million annually from the general fund or TABOR surplus refunds, with about $83 million effectively incentivizing up to 25,000 acres of public lands logging per year, while excluding proven home-hardening approaches. He highlights groups like The Nature Conservancy and Western Resource Advocates who are major funders, and that media and state processes have quelled opposition.https://noprop137.com coloradogreenvoice.substack.com00:57 Episode Focus Prop 13702:12 Meet Josh Schlossberg03:11 Colorado as Logging Proving Ground08:29 Propaganda and Media Failure13:20 Why Forest Thinning Doesn't Work15:50 Prop 137 Money and Acreage20:11 Home Hardening vs Logging23:26 Where the Funds Flow27:36 Green Groups as Cover35:13 Building a Stronger Movement39:18 Culture War Over Logging40:55 Truth Versus Managed Nature43:46 Prop 137 Money Trail47:30 Tax Shift And Precedent51:18 Early Warnings And Roadless Logging55:16 Media Blackout58:51 Late Campaign Ramp Up01:02:41 Media Bias And Democracy Crisis Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I interview Ryan Callaghan, former hunting and fly-fishing guide who worked in PR & media at First Lite, led conservation efforts across MeatEater brands, and is now six months in as president and CEO of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers (BHA), a 501(c)(3) advocating for public lands, waters, and wildlife. We discuss current threats including monument reductions, wilderness and WSA reviews, mineral-withdrawal rescissions, roadless rule rollback, land sells offs, unfair land exchanges, and Alaska issues. We debate roadless management, wilderness protections, declining public favorability toward hunting, beaver trapping restrictions, and public-lands livestock grazing, including permit buyouts and disagreement over whether grazing can be responsibly managed.03:48 Montana Check In05:04 Cal’s Background06:24 From Guiding to Media09:18 Leading BHA Today11:40 Mission of BHA12:29 Fighting Land Sell Offs16:29 Alaska Dalton Corridor19:02 Crazy Mountains Land Swap20:53 Roadless Rule Debate29:51 Wilderness Reviews and WSAs32:41 Gallatin Range37:44 Hunting Favorability Decline38:52 Disconnected From Food40:15 Defending Hunting42:17 Beaver Trapping Debate51:36 Ungulate Habitat Threats53:06 Grazing Impacts55:47 Permit Buyouts And Policy58:10 Cows To Condos01:03:00 Wild Horses And Wrap Up Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Roadless Areas contain some of my favorite places on our National Forest lands. Some of your favorites spots are probably in Roadless Areas as well. Unlike wilderness areas, there are no wooden signs you pass or lines crossed on the map. These invisible boundaries are often traversed without us knowing.Please read on for some useful links and information. And how you can submit your comments to USDA on the Roadless Rule rescission.Despite the rhetoric that you hear from national and state big green NGOs, Roadless Areas should not be considered as “protected lands.” Extraction like logging and livestock grazing are occurring in Roadless Areas right now.The information below was discussed in the video for your reference:Early government surveys found that ponderosa forests were 17x denser than claimed. And mixed conifer forests are 4x denser. Baker et al. 2023A comprehensive analysis of 1,500 wildfires in the west found they burned slower and less intensely in protected areas. Bradley et al. 201634% of “fuels reduction logging” occurs in Inventoried Roadless Areas according to Healey 2020.This tradeoff (better firefighting, more human-caused fires) partially explains why the presence of roads is relatively neutral with respect to the long term occurrence of fire in national forests. Management records also indicated that a lack of roads did not prevent fuel reduction efforts in IRAs between 2001 and 2019. IRAs contain approximately 21% of the total tree cover across NFS (Homer et al 2015); those areas accounted for 34% of the total fuel treatment activities and 8% of the total area treated (USDA 2019a). A lack of roads in IRAs has not implied passive fire risk management.The Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act would designate 23 million acres of Inventoried Roadless Areas as new wilderness in OR, WA, ID, MT, and WY.Submit your comment here for the Roadless Rule rescission here → http://www.Roadless.orgSome talking points to consider:* I oppose the Forest Service’s proposal to rescind the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule.* The Forest Service should strengthen the Roadless Rule, not eliminate it. The current rule provides essential protections but still permits damaging activities in Inventoried Roadless Areas.* Rescission would remove national protections from approximately 45 million acres of National Forest lands, exposing intact wildlife habitat and watersheds to additional logging, grazing-related roads, mining, and fragmentation.* Research examining 1,500 fires shows that protected (unroaded) forests burn at lower intensity and have lower rates of fire spread when controlled for weather conditions. Roads can increase human-caused fire ignitions and spread invasive plants.* The Forest Service should close loopholes that permit logging and the construction of so-called “temporary roads” in roadless areas. Temporary roads can cause lasting harm to wildlife habitat, soils, and watersheds.* The 2001 Roadless Rule does not address livestock-grazing impacts, and grazing has continued uninterrupted in Inventoried Roadless Areas. A mapping analysis estimates that between 10 million and 15 million acres of these lands are actively grazed by domestic livestock each year. Livestock can damage streams and springs, remove riparian vegetation, compact soils, spread invasive plants, and displace native wildlife. New road construction would enable harmful livestock grazing to expand.* The Forest Service should prioritize voluntary grazing-permit retirement within roadless areas and close vacant allotments and allotments where grazing conflicts with roadless-area values.* The existing rule does not prohibit hardrock mining claims under the General Mining Law of 1872, and mineral leasing can continue. USDA should ask the Secretary of the Interior to withdraw Inventoried Roadless Areas from mineral entry under section 204 of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, subject to valid existing rights. The Forest Service should also prohibit new mineral leasing within these lands.More than 9,000 miles of mapped motorized trails cross roadless areas.. Motorized use can compact soils, spread invasive species, disturb wildlife, fragment secure habitat, and increase human-caused wildfire risk. Inventoried Roadless Areas should be nonmotorized by default, with narrow exceptions for valid existing rights, necessary administrative access, and emergencies.* The Forest Service should withdraw the proposed rescission and adopt a stronger national rule that protects roadless lands from commercial logging, unnecessary roads, damaging grazing, new mineral development, and harmful motorized use. Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I interview Erik Molvar, executive director of Western Watersheds Project to talk about cheatgrass, an annual invasive grass taking over large areas of the America West. Cheatgrass is an invasive Eurasian annual that arrived in contaminated crop seed and spread through the West via rail corridors and especially through cattle and sheep, whose fur carries its spiny seeds. Erik argues cheatgrass establishes where perennial bunchgrasses have been knocked back by disturbance—particularly chronic livestock grazing—rejecting claims that it is primarily a fire-driven phenomenon, citing fires in ungrazed areas that recovered with native bunchgrasses rather than cheatgrass. Erik describes how cheatgrass grows briefly in spring, then dies into highly flammable fine fuel that enables large rangeland fires, kills sagebrush, and can lock landscapes into cheatgrass monocultures with fire-return intervals now around 30–40 years in invaded areas. He outlines identification tips, notes other invasive annual grasses, disputes blaming wild horses as the main vector, critiques herbicide-and-reseed approaches, and emphasizes long-term rest from grazing to allow native seed banks and bunchgrasses to recover and resist reinvasion.Cheatgrass Monographwww.westernwatersheds.org04:40 About Western Watersheds Project07:40 Overgrazing Impacts11:22 Grazing Economics Reality18:50 Pivot to Cheatgrass19:13 Cheatgrass Origins Spread21:47 Grazing Link Denial28:23 Fire Fuel Feedback30:01 Identify Cheatgrass31:50 Other Invasive Grasses35:23 Invasives Ecology Ethics43:14 New Fire Intervals48:25 Recovery Without Cows54:56 Cheatgrass and Ranching58:12 Wild Horses Scapegoat01:00:54 Herbicides Reseeding Limits01:04:40 Manager Playbook01:10:44 Buyouts and Restoration Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I interview George Nickas, the outgoing executive director of Wilderness Watch. George discusses ending his 30-year tenure at Wilderness Watch as the group transitions to new executive leadership under Dana Johnson. George recounts Wilderness Watch’s origins in 1989 in response to illegal outfitter caches and proposed lodges in the River of No Return country, then describes early battles against helicopter landing zones and monitoring flights in Tongass wilderness and winning the Cumberland Island case (Wilderness Watch v. Mainella) banning motorized van tours. He highlights key litigation on wild rivers, Boundary Waters motor use, rebuilding structures, and the Buffalo Creek case opposing fish-poisoning/restocking as unlawful “trammeling,” now on appeal. George warns of agency budget cuts, policy rollbacks, recreation commercialization, chainsaw proposals, grazing impacts, and the decline of “big green” advocacy, arguing wilderness needs vigilant enforcement and champions, and a new dedicated wilderness agency overseeing these federal public lands.www.wildernesswatch.org01:17 Why Fight Wilderness Fires02:26 Thirty Years In03:25 How It Began07:00 Early Battles10:06 Cumberland Island Case13:04 Courts And The Act15:18 Key Legal Wins17:21 Buffalo Creek Untrammeled22:10 Why Watchdogs Matter25:24 Programs Gutted27:13 Need A Wilderness Agency30:05 Logging Loopholes36:41 Fire Hysteria Pushback38:28 Recreation Impacts39:49 Wildlife Displacement Costs41:00 Recreation Industry Pressure43:07 Exceptions Eroding Wilderness45:14 Trails Chainsaws Enforcement49:45 Policy Attacks Funding Loopholes57:14 Big Greens Movement Critique01:05:15 Career Reflections Future Fight01:10:35 Public Lands Birthright01:12:34 Retirement Staying Involved Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I interview Tim Ingalsbee, co-founder and executive director of Firefighters United for Safety, Ethics, and Ecology (FUSEE). Tim and I discuss his critiques of the new U.S. Wildland Fire Service, arguing consolidation is framed as efficiency but functions as defunding, job shedding, and a suppression-first “Fire Force” detached from land stewardship, able to override local land managers. Tim says federal fire management is failing due to an obsolete full-suppression paradigm, reinforced by “attack all fires” directives, which wastes resources, increases hazards, and can worsen ecological damage. He advocates strategic suppression and an Alaska-style triage model, prioritizing protection of lives, communities, and infrastructure while living with fire for ecological benefit. Our conversation covers problems with thinning for timber, home ignitability and community-wide mitigation, workforce programs like the Oregon Conservation Corps, Indigenous fire stewardship, cultural change away from militarized firefighting, and FUSEE’s work promoting proactive fire management and policy reform.Firefighters United for Safety, Ethics, and Ecology (FUSEE)Oregon Conservation CorpsS. 3609 (The Community Protection and Wildfire Resilience Act)H.R. 948 (The SAFE HOME Act)03:26 New Wildland Fire Service05:50 Consolidation Risks And Missions10:18 Attack All Fires Directive14:29 Strategic Suppression Triage18:33 Smokey Bear Myths22:35 Thinning/Prescribed Fire Debate28:05 Home Ignition Zone Focus32:47 Community Workforce Programs35:46 Preparing Communities For Fire38:03 Fireproofing Homes First39:28 Oregon Conservation Corps Model40:28 Indigenous Fire Stewardship44:53 Living in the Pyrocene47:04 Militarized Firefighting Culture49:31 Toxic Tools and Home Hazmat52:31 Firefighters as Stewards55:23 Epiphanies on the Fireline59:51 FUSEE Mission and Advocacy01:01:08 Prescribed Burn Smoke Concerns Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I speak with Defenders of Wildlife’s Kelly Cox and Christian Hunt about the Wildlife Corridors Act and why it’s needed to counter habitat fragmentation and improve wildlife movement across landscapes that don’t match jurisdictional boundaries. They explain the bill’s goal of creating a national wildlife corridors system focused primarily on federal lands, requiring agencies to coordinate through a corridor committee, use mapping and science to prioritize corridors, and adopt implementing regulations within a couple years of enactment. The act defines connectivity around movements that support genetic exchange, range shifting/expansion, seasonal movement, and recolonization after disturbances, with urgency heightened by climate-driven range shifts.Beyer, Buchanan, Lofgren, and Fitzpatrick Introduce Bipartisan Legislation To Support Wildlife Migration and Protect Biodiversitywww.defenders.org02:59 Meet Kelly and Christian03:39 Defenders Parks Program06:45 Refuges Rulemaking and Predators10:38 Why Corridors Matter14:48 Defining Connectivity and Roads17:53 Climate and Private Lands21:14 State Models and Crossings Funding28:04 Science and Political Hurdles31:16 Mapping Agencies and Sideboards36:36 Economics ESA and Future Vision43:49 Public Lands Reflections Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

I this episode, I interview Dave Stalling, writer and wildlife advocate based in Missoula, Montana. Dave recounts his time serving in Marine Corps Force Recon, struggling for years with self-acceptance, and finding his footing by spending long periods alone in remote Montana wildlands, influenced by Doug Peacock’s Grizzly Years and writers like Edward Abbey and Jack Turner. Dave explains his deep connection to grizzlies as teachers of humility, and critiques how modern hunting culture, commercialization, and hunter-dominated agencies use “science” to justify politically driven predator killing and maximizing harvest of game animals. Dave argues wildlife management should include all citizens, discusses ballot initiatives, and shares how hiking with his son Cory, who has a muscular disease, taught him to slow down, notice small details, and practice “forest bathing.”https://substack.com/@davidstallingDoug Peacock’s Grizzly YearsJack Turner’s The Abstract Wild01:47 Meet David Stalling03:27 Gray Hair Hypocrisy05:21 Force Recon Self Acceptance08:32 Father Roots in Wild12:53 Grizzlies Teach Humility16:43 Hunting Culture Critique17:32 Anti Hunter Who Hunts25:20 Science Versus Politics27:03 Elk Bears Misused Science34:59 Commercialized Hunting Takeover37:51 Conservation Groups Letdown38:51 Reforming Wildlife Management40:33 Ballot Initiatives vs Science45:31 Calling Out Hunter Culture47:54 How Dave Learned to Write53:05 Lessons From Cory58:18 Rethinking Wild Places01:03:56 Forest Bathing and Healing01:07:17 Public Lands Are Everything Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I interview Alex Kelloff, a first-time candidate running in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District. Alex launched his campaign after Donald Trump’s 2024 reelection, citing concerns about January 6, public-lands selloffs and leasing for oil and gas, federal land-agency staffing cuts, and opposition to Republican Rep. Jeff Hurd and Project 2025-style policies. We discuss top voter concerns including cost of living, rural hospital instability, Medicaid cuts, and the need for universal affordable healthcare with an independently managed public system. Drawing on a 30+ year telecom career, Alex critiques AI data-center “land grab” spending, opposes data centers in his district due to land, water, and utility constraints, and discusses renewable transmission, mining tradeoffs, and public-lands governance.https://alexkelloff.com/00:57 Episode Preview Alex Kelloff02:54 Campaign Trail and Voter Struggles05:15 Public Lands as Economic Lifeline06:00 Inside Colorado Third District08:13 Why He’s Running Now10:52 Trump Era Impacts on Public Lands12:22 Top Issues Healthcare and Hospitals14:14 Universal Healthcare Vision17:33 Telecom Career and Infrastructure20:44 AI Data Centers and Public Lands22:31 AI Land Grab28:46 Opposing Data Centers in District30:05 Siting Data Centers Smartly30:43 Geothermal Drilling Risks31:43 Mining Materials Tradeoffs35:46 Rare Earths and War Strategy39:05 Renewables on Public Lands41:23 Transmission and Grid Bottlenecks44:13 RMPs and Project 202549:41 Grazing Permit Retirement51:47 Public Private Models Get full access to Our Public Lands Podcast at ourpubliclandspodcast.substack.com/subscribe