State trust lands generate millions of dollars for carceral facilities and programs every year, largely from extractive industries like oil and gas drilling.
Montana
Posted inArticles
The beautiful and awful Butte, Montana
The indelible history of mining poisons a town yet extracts something new.
Posted inArticles
How luxury real estate benefits from Montana’s agricultural tax code
Key takeaways from our investigation revealing how expensive properties use a system meant to help farmers and ranchers.
Posted inArticles
Outgoing Bureau of Land Management director optimistic about public lands
Tracy Stone-Manning discusses the BLM’s achievements and talks about the future as we enter a new political era.
Posted inArticles
Montana’s ag tax slashes bills for thousands of million-dollar homes
Properties classified ‘agricultural’ get a tax break despite no bona fide operations. Can lawmakers’ new proposals tighten qualifications?
Posted inArticles
Who’s against wind development in ‘The Crazies’?
Amy Gamerman’s new book examines attempts to block the energy transition in Montana’s Crazy Mountains.
Posted inJanuary 2025: The West's Most Wanted
Why the West needs prairie dogs
They’re among the region’s most despised species, but some tribes, researchers and landowners are racing to save them.
Posted inIssues
‘I started to grass dance when I was just a little girl’
#iamthewest: Giving voice to the people that make up communities in the region.
Posted inArticles
Key Senate and House races remain uncalled across the West
A dramatic shift by Latino voters toward Trump helped create a red wave.
Posted inNovember 2024: The Once and Future Prairie
Lovesick elk, flamingo fathers, Frankensheep and Bach for bison
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
Posted inArticles
Montana’s Jon Tester might lose. Here’s why that matters
What the Senate contest says about the unexpected shift in Western politics.
Posted inOctober 2024: Latino Vote
The downballot issues driving the West’s 2024 elections
From climate and public lands to shifting political allegiances, the region faces critical choices at the ballot box.
Posted inOctober 2024: Latino Vote
Wildfires could devastate Butte’s water supply
How officials are working to get ahead of disaster.
Posted inAugust 2024: In the Wake of the Floods
The vision of Little Shell
How Ayabe-way-we-tung guided his tribe in the midst of colonization.
Posted inAugust 2024: In the Wake of the Floods
Fur-class travel, wonderful whippets, delinquent donkeys and a white buffalo
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
Posted inArticles
When the end of the road brings a new beginning
Two accomplished new novels by Joe Wilkins and Willy Vlautin feature weathered protagonists called back from the brink.
Posted inArticles
When grasshoppers attack
Is the cure for grasshopper outbreaks worse than the disease?
Posted inJuly 2024
Pollution knows no borders
A long-awaited agreement will address Canadian mine waste flowing downriver into Montana
and Idaho.
Posted inArticles
The theft of the commons
It’s time to turn away from land ownership and back to land relationship.
Posted inJune 2024: The Idea of Wilderness
When school lunch is free
New programs that provide free meals to all students are gaining popularity.