By now, many, if not most of you have heard that ICE has been secretly planning to build some kind of jail or detention facility in Newport here on the Oregon Coast.

The community pushback has been immediate, fierce, inspiring, and seemingly successful, at least so far.

This is a developing story, and only one skirmish in a wider war to protect our communities from these masked and lawless thugs.

The Newport City Council has been proactive, out front, and clear in their staunch opposition to ICE, so I invited Newport Mayor Jan Kaplan on to the show to talk through what’s going on with the facility, the huge groundswell of resistance, and what comes next.

Note: this interview was recorded on the morning on November 17th.

My email is [email protected], I would love to hear your thoughts, feedback, guest ideas, all of that.

Show Notes:

https://lincolnchronicle.org/evidence-mounts-for-possible-immigration-detention-center-in-newport-as-two-companies-advertise-for-work-there/

https://lincolnchronicle.org/my-dad-was-picked-up-sept-17-newport-girl-tells-packed-council-hearing-on-how-immigration-sweep-has-affected-her-family/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

My guest today is Britney Van Citters, Political and Organizing Director at the Oregon League of Conservation Voters.

Britney joins to discuss how the Environmental Protection Agency is being refashioned into the Environmental Destruction Agency, OLCV’s legislative Scorecard, and what we can do to push Oregon legislators to meet this moment of overlapping crises with real action.

My email is [email protected], I would love to hear what you think of the show!

Show Notes:

• https://www.olcvscorecard.org/2025/
• www.olcv.org/
• https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-launches-biggest-deregulatory-action-us-history
• https://www.npr.org/2025/07/29/nx-s1-5463771/epa-greenhouse-gas-regulations-cars-pollution
• https://oregoncapitalchronicle.com/2025/09/29/oregon-senate-votes-on-4-3-billion-transportation-package/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

I’m joined today by filmmaker Jesse Andrew Clark, to talk about his recent documentary, “Free to Grow”.

Free to Grow uses deeply personal first person storytelling to highlight the harms of herbicide spraying on industrial timberlands in the Northwest.

Show Notes:

https://www.oldgrovefilms.com/forest-stories

https://www.opb.org/news/article/blm-investigates-after-company-sprays-pesticide-on-public-land-without-license/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

My guest today is University of Oregon professor and longtime activist, Sarah Wald.  Sarah is the author of multiple books, and as you’ll hear today, a profound thinker on a wide variety of issues concerning the conservation and environmental justice communities.

This is one of my favorite conversations I’ve ever had on this show, in part because Sarah was so game to explore some really complicated points of tension within our movements. I definitely learned a lot, and was happy to have some of my beliefs and understandings challenged. 

The show email is [email protected], please reach out anytime with guest ideas, feedback, your harshest criticisms, or if you’re interested in helping make this show!

Research Links/Show Notes:

Referenced: 

• Tradeoff Denialism: https://scholarship.law.columbia.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4885&context=faculty_scholarship
• Bill McKibben on tradeoffs and the promise of renewables: https://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/articles/entry/wind-and-solar-will-require-mining-but-not-as-much-as-fossil-fuels-bill-mckibben-sun-day

Sarah's Recommendations:

• The Anti-Creep Climate Initiative’s zine, Against the Ecofascist Creep.
• Olivia Aguilar, A Latine Outdoor Experience: Remembering, Resisting, and Reimagining (2025)
• Carolyn Finney, Black Faces, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors (2014)
•  Jessica Hernandez, Fresh Banana Leaves: Healing Indigenous Landscapes through Indigenous Science (2022)
• Tao Leigh Goffe, Dark Laboratory: On Columbus, the Caribbean, and the Origins of the Climate Crisis (2025)
• Tiya Miles, Wild Girls: How the Outdoors Shaped the Women Who Challenged a Nation (2023)
• Alexander Menrisky, Everyday Ecofascism: Crisis and Consumption in American Literature (2025)
• Kyle Powys Whyte “Against Crisis Epistemology” in Handbook of Critical Indigenous Studies (2021)
• Kyle Powys White, “Our Ancestors’ Dystopia Now: Indigenous Conservation and the Anthropocene” in the Routledge Companion to the Environmental Humanities (2017)

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

As I’ve talked about on this show before, the Trump administration is using every tool available to target public lands and our mature and old-growth forests (along with, of course, democracy, basic human rights, any shred of protection against corporate oligarchy, etc etc. But this is primarily a show about northwest conservation and climate, so as much as I want to rant about all the things, I’m going to keep it focused!)

As we gear up for a new round of the Timber Wars, I’ve been thinking a lot about the elders and unsung heroes of our community.  Even as the fight ahead presents new challenges, we have a lot to learn from the OGs of the environmental and forest defense movements, and aside from that, they deserve to be celebrated!

So I’m excited to be interviewing some of those folks over the next few months in an occasional series I'm calling "heroes of the forest".

First up, my guest today is Francis Eatherington.  Francis has been defending our northwest rainforests for decades, and I’m honored to have the chance to talk with her and learn from her wisdom and experience.

For our radio audience, you can hear the second half of our conversation on the Coast Range Radio podcast feed.

The show email is [email protected], please reach out anytime with guest ideas, feedback, or if you’re interested in helping make this show!

Francis' trailcam youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@WOWTrailCam

Francis' Flickr page: https://www.flickr.com/photos/umpquawild/page7/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

I don’t have to tell anyone how bleak things look at the federal level.  Here in the Pacific Northwest, if we’re being honest, there is not a lot that we can do at the moment to influence federal policy.

But when it comes to climate and the environment, I’ve always been a little ambivalent about how much can be done at the state and local level.

I want to be clear, local activism and organizing are incredibly important, and that’s where most of us can make the most difference.  But even there, we run into issues. For instance, where I live in Lincoln County, voters passed a ban on aerial herbicide spraying in 2017, but that was overturned by a state court.

So how can we actually make a difference at the state and local level?

My guest today is Maya Van Rossum.  Maya is, among many other things, the founder of the Green Amendment movement and the author of the book, The Green Amendment.

She makes a pretty compelling case for why passing state level constitutional rights to a healthy environment, also known as a Green Amendment, would be a powerful tool for climate and environmental justice, and I honored to have her join us.

As always, the show email is [email protected], please reach out anytime with feedback, show ideas, hot takes, or whatever else is on your mind!

Learn more about the Green Amendment: https://forthegenerations.org/

Oregon: https://www.oceraunited.org/

Washington: https://wagreenamendment.org/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

We’re heading East today!  

Oregon’s Blue Mountains encompass some of the most beautiful landscapes and habitats anywhere. Within the Blue’s 15,000 square miles, you’ll find such Oregon gems as the John Day river, the Eagle Cap wilderness, Hell’s Canyon, and a huge percentage of Oregon’s forests. 

But because they are geographically isolated from major population centers, they often don’t get the recognition they deserve.

That remoteness also makes them vulnerable to resource extraction.  And right now, the Forest Service, which manages millions of acres of public land within the Blues, is revising their management plan under the most environmentally hostile administration in my lifetime.

To learn more about this special part of Oregon, and how to defend it, I’m joined today by Paula Hood, co-director of the Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project.

And as I mentioned last week, I am looking for volunteers to help with produce the show! That means help hosting, researching, editing, whatever! No experience necessary.

To learn more, or if you have feedback, guest ideas, etc, you can email [email protected].

Show Notes:

BMBP Action Alert: https://bluemountainsbiodiversityproject.org/2025/09/06/action-alert-for-blue-mountains-forest-plan-revision-scoping-comments/

BMBP Vision for the Blues: https://bluemountainsbiodiversityproject.org/2025/08/04/an-overarching-vision-for-the-blue-mountains-forest-plan-revision/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

My guest today is author and journalist, Paul Koberstein.  I spoke with Paul in 2024 about a book he co-authored called “Canopy of Titans: The Life and Times of the Great North American Temperate Rainforest”.

I recently read a great new article of his entitled “Greenwashing in the Evergreen State”, exploring how an industry funded quasi-academic entity got the Democratically controlled Washington State Legislature to endorse industrial logging as beneficial for the climate.

I’m a sucker for exposing industry greenwashing, so I’m delighted to have Paul back on the show to talk about his deep dive into the shady world of the Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials, or CORRIM, as we will be referring to them throughout the show.

Are interested in radio and/or podcasting??  I am looking for volunteers to help with produce the show! That means help hosting, researching, editing, whatever! No experience necessary.

To learn more, or if you have feedback, guest ideas, etc, you can email [email protected].

Show Notes:

Greenwashing in the Evergreen State: https://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/magazine/entry/the-logging-lobby-in-the-evergreen-state##

Canopy of Titans: https://www.orbooks.com/catalog/canopy-of-titans/?mc_cid=6d93e8f667&mc_eid=UNIQID

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

If you’re hearing this before September 19th, I need you to do me a favor: the Trump administration is attempting to eliminate a policy called the “Roadless Rule”, which would open tens of millions of acres of vibrant forests and public land to industrial logging and mining.

The Forest Service is accepting public comment on the plan to eliminate the Roadless Rule until September 19th, and it is important that we flood them with comments and petitions to leave these critical forests and ecosystems intact!

And look, I’m not going to pretend like our comments are going to stop the Trump administration.

But they serve multiple other critical functions, like strengthening resistance within the Forest Service, de-legitimizing the administration’s actions, bolstering lawsuits, and laying the groundwork for stronger protections in the future.

To learn more about the Roadless Rule and how to take action, I’m sharing a really well done presentation by the Oregon Chapter of the Sierra Club and Representative Andrea Salinas.

Thanks to Kai McMurtry and the Oregon Sierra Club for sharing this presentation, please check out the great work that they are doing  throughout the state!

You can find all action links and resources in the show notes of the podcast feed, or by connecting with the Sierra Club or your favorite conservation org.  I personally think that Cascadia Wildlands action page is very simple and straightforward, and you can find that at cascwild.org or bit.ly/cascadiaroadlessrule.

Show Notes:

• Interactive Roadless Areas Map: https://tetontopo-roadless-map.vercel.app/
• https://www.sierraclub.org/oregon/subscribe-oregon-climate-action-corps
• H.R.3930 - Roadless Area Conservation Act of 2025: https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/3930/cosponsors?r=1&s=4&q=%7B%22search%22%3A%22hr+3930%22%7D
• Cascadia Wildlands Action Alert: https://cascwild.org/actions/defend-the-roadless-rule-act-now-against-trumps-reckless-plan-to-punch-roads-and-log-through-protected-public-lands/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

I just got back from a really amazing backpacking trip in the wilderness of Wyoming, and I’ve been reflecting on how nature, wilderness, sacred lands, whatever you want to call them, have always been a source of refuge, spiritual rejuvenation, and healing for humans.

But a question I and so many others are grappling with right now is, how do we continue to find inspiration and healing in a world that is being so deeply harmed.

My guest today is author, travel writer, and speaker, Adam Sawyer.  Adam is leading a series of facilitated discussions through the Oregon Humanities Project around grieving in nature and addiction recovery in nature.

Adam talks and writes openly and beautifully about how nature helped heal him on his journey through addiction and grieving, and I am thankful to be able to share this conversation with you all.

I love hearing feedback, guest ideas, or just a hello, and you can reach me at [email protected] or on the coast range radio instagram feed.

Show Notes:

https://adamsawyer.substack.com

https://adamsawyer.com/

https://oregonhumanities.org/programs/conversation-project/

https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/