As more Americans make their way to the nation’s parks (and every other variety of outdoor locales), big budget bumps may not be enough to tackle a variety of ongoing worries, from overcrowding and climate change impacts to maintenance backlogs and political backlash. The latest Issue Backgrounder looks over the state of our nation’s parks.
"A new project aims to shore up the disappearing coastline of New York City’s Staten Island, while reviving a once famously thriving oyster population".
"The Great Barrier Reef has been hit by bleaching due to heat stress, the Australian agency that manages the reef said on Friday, ahead of a visit by United Nations officials reviewing whether the reef should be listed as being "in danger"."
"A federal appeals court today [Wednesday] upheld the Trump-era approval of a land exchange agreement that could lead to the construction of a hotly contested road through congressionally designated wilderness within Alaska’s Izembek National Wildlife Refuge."
"Conservation groups are suing [Montana] Gov. Greg Gianforte’s administration to obtain records related to its decision to drop legal claims against a mining executive over decades of pollution from several mines."
"The transfer of a 34-mile section of a Adirondacks railbed from one state agency to another is being heralded as the start of a major phase to convert it into a recreational pathway."
"The Mining Law of 1872 lets miners pay no royalties for the precious minerals they dig from federal land and requires no restraints on their activities."
"Detected deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon reached a record high for the month of February following a similar record the prior month."
"Nearly all the world’s countries kicked off a U.N.-backed meeting Monday aimed at preventing the loss of biodiversity — seen as critical to avoiding the extinction of many vulnerable species, the emergence of pathogens like the coronavirus, and the damage to both lives and livelihoods of people around the world, Indigenous peoples in particular."
"A federal judge last week blocked five more Trump-era oil and gas lease sales for failing to comply with statutory protections for the greater sage grouse."
