Locus Focus

The American Southwest is a land that echoes with mystery, stark beauty, and

a history of brutality. On this arid landscape civilizations have risen and

fallen for thousands of years. Some were wiped out by changing climatic

conditions, others by the brutality of Spanish Co...

On the afternoon of September 2, a group of teenagers thought it was exciting

to hurl lit firecrackers into the Eagle Creek canyon in the Columbia River

Gorge. Shortly after a number of hikers witnessed and heard the firecrackers,

a wildfire erupted in the Eagle Creek area ...

This month while Barbara takes some time off, Locus Focus presents a

retrospective of some of her radio documentaries. On this episode of Locus

Focus we present SACRIFICE ZONES, Barbara's latest documentary, originally

broadcast on KBOO on June 5, 2017.

As the fossil fuel ...

This month while Barbara takes some time off, Locus Focus presents a

retrospective of some of her radio documentaries. On this episode of Locus

Focus we present FIGHTING GOLIATH, produced and broadcast in 2014.

The Canadian Tar Sands is the largest industrial project on ear...

This month while Barbara takes some time off, Locus Focus presents a

retrospective of some of her radio documentaries. This week we present

Sculpted By Fire, produced and initially broadcast in 2007.

In mid July of 2002 a series of lightning strikes ignited a number of smal...

This month while Barbara takes some time off, Locus Focus presents a

retrospective of some of her radio documentaries. This week we present

SALMONLANDS, produced in 2005.

Without the Salmon there would be no Pacific Northwest as we know it.

Yet since 1991, most of the salm...

This month while Barbara takes some time off, Locus Focus presents a

retrospective of some of her radio documentaries, beginning with RIVERS THAT

WERE, produced in 2002, at a time when no one would have imagined that coal

and oil trains would threaten the Columbia River eve...

As the fossil fuel industry targets the Pacific NW for massive fossil fuel

development, communities across the region have drawn a thin green line of

resistance. Most of these proposals are being vehemently opposed, but on

either side of the Lower Columbia River, the larges...

On July 19, 2017 the Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) ruled that

Portland’s Fossil Fuel Terminal Zoning Amendments, passed unanimously in

December of 2016, is inconsistent with the Commerce Clause of the U.S.

Constitution. Portland’s fossil fuel policy intended to pr...

It's been nearly six months since Trump became president and over seven

months since George Polisner, an Oracle senior executive, publicly resigned

from the company after his boss joined Trump's transition team, pledging her

support to the president-elect. Since then George...