Open Country

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USDA Strips Tongass Roadless-Rule Protections, Favoring Subsidized Logging Interests Over Hunters, Anglers, and Wildlife
Bjorn DihleOctober 28, 2020
Today, the U.S. Forest Service, under orders from President Donald Trump, announced the agency is axing the Roadless Rule and opening up more than 9 million currently protected acres of the Tongass for industrial development, including clearcut logging of old growth trees. At 16.7 million acres, and encompassing nearly all of Southeast Alaska, the Tongass is viewed by many as a vast, untouched temperate rainforest wilderness. But much of its old-growth forest has already been clearcut logged. The aftermath of these cuts has degraded, even destroyed, habitat critical to salmon, Sitka blacktail deer, mountain goat, and brown bears.
Will the Trump Administration Change Course on Alaska’s Pebble Mine? Key Republicans Are Rallying in Opposition
By Natalie Krebs Andrew McKeanAugust 24, 2020
As recently as early August, the Trump Administration appeared set to green-light the long-contested mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay, home to the world’s largest sockeye salmon run. However, a letter from the Army Corps of Engineers to the Pebble Partnership, dated August 20 and obtained today, reveals that administrative support for the open-pit gold and copper mine may be unraveling.The letter noted “discharges at the mine site would cause unavoidable adverse impacts to aquatic resources,” and requested that the Pebble Partnership create and submit a mitigation plan within 90 days. Further erosion of support for the proposed mine could be forthcoming in a call today with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.President Trump himself was reportedly preparing to issue a public statement withdrawing his administration’s support for the mine. That statement could be made as early as today, say sources, as Trump begins a week of public appearances at the Republican National Convention.
Breaking: Trump Administration Withdraws Pendley as Nominee for BLM Director
By Andrew McKeanAugust 18, 2020
Breaking News: The Department of the Interior is withdrawing William Perry Pendley, the acting director of the Bureau of Land Management, from leadership of the federal land management agency.
The President Just Signed a Historic Conservation Bill That Will Help Buy New Public Lands and Fix Our National Parks
By Alex Robinson Natalie KrebsAugust 4, 2020
For decades, the conservation community has been advocating for the full and permanent funding of the Land and Water Conservation Fund, a program that uses royalties from offshore oil and gas operations to purchase new public lands and maintain public access. Today President Trump—who has often been criticized by conservation and public land advocates—signed a bill that will do just that.
The Senate Is About to Pass a Bill That Will (Finally) Fund Public Lands and Ease Maintenance Backlogs in National Parks
By Natalie KrebsJune 9, 2020
This piece of landmark bipartisan legislation will fully—and permanently—fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund at $900 million annually. The second major provision of the GAOA will address increasingly dire public-land maintenance backlogs.
Video: Meet the Duck Hunting Queen of Plaquemines Parish
By Alex RobinsonApril 22, 2020
Albertine Kimble takes us on a duck hunt through the biggest wetlands conservation issue of our time

WHAT WE DO

In order to hunt or fish, you need a place to do it, and Open Country is committed to sportsmen's access—getting it, keeping it, defending it, and celebrating it—so that you always have that place.