Feds plan to restore grizzly bears to North Cascades

SEATTLE — The federal government plans to restore grizzly bears to an area of northwest and north-central Washington, where they were largely wiped out.

Plans announced in late April by the National Park Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service call for releasing three to seven bears a year for five to 10 years to achieve an initial population of 25. The aim is to eventually restore the population in the region to 200 bears within 60 to 100 years.

Grizzlies are considered threatened in the Lower 48 and currently occupy four of six established recovery areas in parts of Montana, Idaho, Wyoming and northeast Washington. The bears for the restoration project would come from areas with healthy populations.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife rejects pleas from ranchers to kill wolves attacking livestock

There has been no confirmed evidence of a grizzly within the North Cascades Ecosystem in the U.S. since 1996, according to the agencies. The greater North Cascades Ecosystem extends into Canada but the plan focuses on the U.S. side.

According to the park service, killing by trappers, miners and bounty hunters during the 1800s removed most of the population in the North Cascades by 1860. The remaining population was further challenged by factors including difficulty finding mates and slow reproductive rates, the agency said.

The federal agencies plan to designate the bears as a “nonessential experimental population” to provide “greater management flexibility should conflict situations arise.” That means some rules under the Endangered Species Act could be relaxed and allow people to harm or kill bears in self-defense or for agencies to relocate bears involved in conflict. Landowners could call on the federal government to remove bears if they posed a threat to livestock.

NEW MEXICO

Record settlement reached over natural gas flaring

ALBUQUERQUE — New Mexico has reached a record settlement with a Texas-based company over air pollution violations at natural gas gathering sites in the Permian Basin.

The $24.5 million agreement with Ameredev announced on April 29 is the largest settlement the state Environment Department has ever reached for a civil oil and gas violation. It stems from the flaring of billions of cubic feet of natural gas that the company had extracted over an 18-month period but wasn’t able to transport to downstream processors.

Environment Secretary James Kenney said in an interview that the flared gas would have been enough to have supplied nearly 17,000 homes for a year.

The flaring, or burning off of the gas, resulted in more than 7.6 million pounds of excess emissions that included hydrogen sulfide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and other gases that state regulators said are known to cause respiratory issues and contribute to climate change.

Colorado State University lands $25 million grant to boost methane detection work

Ameredev in a statement said it was pleased to have solved what is described as a “legacy issue” and that the state’s Air Quality Bureau was unaware of any ongoing compliance problems at the company’s facilities.

While operators can vent or flare natural gas during emergencies or equipment failures, New Mexico in 2021 adopted rules to prohibit routine venting and flaring and set a 2026 deadline for the companies to capture 98% of their gas. The rules also require the regular tracking and reporting of emissions.

Under the settlement, Ameredev agreed to do an independent audit of its operations in New Mexico to ensure compliance with emission requirements. It must also submit monthly reports on actual emission rates and propose a plan for weekly inspections for a two-year period or install leak and repair monitoring equipment.

UTAH

Sundance exploring options for 2027 film festival and beyond

PARK CITY — The Sundance Film Festival may not always call Park City, Utah, home. The Sundance Institute has started to explore the possibility of other U.S. locations to host the independent film festival starting in 2027, the organization said on April 17.

The 2025 and 2026 festivals will still take place in Park City and Salt Lake City. But with the current contract up for renewal in 2027, the institute is taking steps to look at all options through a request for information and request for proposal process, beginning immediately. The final selection, which could still be Park City, is expected to be announced by early 2025.

Eugene Hernandez, the festival’s director, said they want to “ensure that the Festival continues to thrive culturally, operationally, and financially as it has for four decades.”

Colorado Ballet celebrates its 63rd season at The One Gala | NONPROFIT REGISTER

Park City has been home to the Robert Redford-founded festival for 40 years. The festival and its sponsors take over many venues in the small city every January to transform it into a film festival hub with theaters in places like the library and a recreation center. Store fronts along the city’s charming Main Street become exclusive lounges for actors and filmmakers, and restaurants host cast parties after global film premieres.

Mayor Nann Worel said she does not want the festival to leave Park City, which has grown into a world-renowned mountain town since Sundance first put it on the map decades ago.

Last year’s hybrid festival generated just over $118 million for the state of Utah, according to Sundance’s 2023 economic impact report.

Sundance has been a launching pad for many top filmmakers over the years and has hosted premieres for eventual Oscar nominees and winners, including “CODA,” their first best picture winner, and the past three documentary winners “20 Days in Mariupol,””Navalny” and “Summer of Soul.”

NORTH DAKOTA

Federal funds eyed for Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library

BISMARCK — Supporters of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library in North Dakota are cheering new federal legislation to help build the library and to showcase artifacts of the 26th president, who as a young man hunted and ranched in the state during its territorial days.

North Dakota’s three-member, all-Republican congressional delegation in April announced the bill to “authorize funding for the Library’s continued construction and go towards ensuring the preservation of President Roosevelt’s history and legacy.” The bill’s Interior Department grant is for $50 million of one-time money, most of which “will go into creating the museum spaces in our facility,” said Matt Briney, the library’s chief communications officer.

The bill also enables and directs federal agencies to work with the library’s organizers to feature Roosevelt items in the library’s museum, he said.

RIVER TOWNS: GLENWOOD SPRINGS | The Colorado and Roaring Fork are its lifeblood and a harbinger

In 2019, North Dakota’s Republican-controlled Legislature approved a $50 million operations endowment for the library, available after its organizers raised $100 million in private donations for construction. That goal was met in late 2020.

The project has raised $240 million in private donations, and complete construction costs $333 million, Briney said. Covering the library’s construction costs has not been an issue, he said.

Construction is underway near Medora, in the rugged, colorful Badlands where the young future president briefly roamed in the 1880s. Organizers are planning for a grand opening of the library on July 4, 2026, the United States’ 250th anniversary of independence.

Planned exhibits include a chronological view of Roosevelt’s life, such as galleries of his early life, time in the Badlands, travels to the Amazon and his presidency, Briney said.

MONTANA

Baseball team in dispute with Parks Service over arrowhead logo

HELENA — A minor league baseball team in Montana is calling out the U.S. Department of Interior for “unwarranted and relentless” trademark claims in a battle over the use of an arrowhead logo.

The Glacier Range Riders in Kalispell, Montana — members of a Major League Baseball partner league — applied for several trademarks and logomarks for the team that began playing in 2022. The logos include a mountain goat wearing a park ranger hat, a bear riding in a red bus like the Glacier National Park tour buses and an arrowhead with the letters “RR” in it.

The Interior Department opposes the use of the arrowhead logo. The agency filed a protest with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which rejected arguments that the baseball team’s arrowhead logo would be confused with the park service’s and create a false association between the two.

Could Dearfield become Colorado's next national park?

The federal agency then filed a letter of opposition last June, creating a legal case that team owners say will be costly to defend. A final hearing is tentatively scheduled for next year, team spokesperson Alexa Belcastro said.

The park service logo is an arrowhead enclosing a sequoia tree, a snow-capped mountain landscape, bison and the phrase “National Park Service.”

“The only commonality between the Glacier Range Riders and NPS’s logos is the generic arrowhead shape,” the team said in a statement, adding that the Parks Service “has no exclusive legal rights to the shape.”

Federal agency presents potential plans to support greater sage-grouse | OUT WEST ROUNDUP

Plumbing problem at Glen Canyon Dam threatens Colorado River system | OUT WEST ROUNDUP

Evacuation notice lifted in Utah town downstream from cracked dam | OUT WEST ROUNDUP