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PODCAST

Coast Range Radio

Michael Gaskill

At Coast Range Radio, we interview folks who work to build just communities that provide for people and the natural world. We are particularly interested in the connections between Pacific Northwest forests, social justice, and the climate crisis.Coast Range Radio is an independent radio show and podcast hosted by Michael Gaskill. Michael is a lifelong rural Oregonian and climate justice organizer.

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All Episodes

55:35

The Plot to Sell Off National Parks, With Journalist...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/10/01

Wes Siler, author of the creatively named “Wes Siler’s Newsletter”, recently published a series of articles on the Trump administration’s secret plot to gut the National Parks, and I’m delighted to have him on the show today. We’re also going to get into his thoughts on the forest service, the roadless rule, and the opportunity this moment of crisis provides us. https://wessiler.substack.com/p/leaked-documents-reveal-trumps-planhttps://wessiler.substack.com/p/on-public-lands-could-chaos-be-aA...

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34:40

Why You Should Care About the Eugene Clean Energy...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/09/16

I’m joined today by Aya Cockram from the Breach Collective and Dylan Plummer of the Sierra Club to talk about the Eugene Clean Energy Fund, or ballot measure 20-388. The Eugene Clean Energy Fund is modeled after the wildly successful Portland Clean Energy Fund, and would impose a small tax on mega corporations to help fund clean energy projects in Eugene. But whether or not you live in Eugene, the Eugene Clean Energy Fund is absolutely worth following and getting involved with. We spen...

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29:00

Now is The Time to Protect The Roadless Rule! Here's...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/09/03

If you are hearing this before September 21st and you care about public lands, they need you to act! The Trump Administration is attempting to open 45 million acres of protected public lands to destructive road building, logging, and mining, by repealing something called the Roadless Rule. This has fortunately gotten a lot of press, but if you aren’t familiar, here;s a quick primer: Since 2001, the Roadless Area Conservation Rule (or simply The Roadless Rule) has protected over 45 million acr...

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36:26

Why Are Chinook Salmon Shrinking, and What is a...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/08/20

Have you ever heard of a June Hog?? June Hogs were legendary, gigantic summer run Chinook salmon that could weigh up to 100 pounds on their way up the Columbia river. These days, the average Chinook caught on the Columbia weighs between 10 and 20 pounds. So what happened to these giants? You may be familiar with some of the reasons: dams, overfishing, habitat destruction, climate change, and hatchery fish. But what about where the fish are caught? I’m joined today by Misty MacDuff...

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47:46

Could Geothermal Energy be the Holy Grail of...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/07/22

Let’s talk about something hopeful for a change! The ongoing renewable energy revolution is probably one of the most under-reported narratives in the story of climate change, and the American west is a literal hot bed for one of the most important green energy innovations - geothermal power. Geothermal power taps into the functionally limitless energy generated by earth’s molten core. It uses a fraction of the space that other green technologies like wind and solar require, and de...

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36:23

Just How Bad is Trump's Forest Service "Reorganization"?

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/07/09

Amidst the barrage of direct attacks that the Trump administration and their allies have been waging on public lands and the environment, you’d be forgiven for missing a potentially seismic shift in the Forest Service. On March 31st of this year (2026), the US Department of Agriculture, the agency which the Forest Service is a part of, quietly announced a dramatic restructuring of the agency which manages almost 200 million acres of public land. Responses have ranged from ‘Trump is destroying...

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43:45

Poisoning the Well: Understanding Environmental...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/06/25

Today’s show features the second half of a fascinating conversation I had with Patrick Hunnicutt, Assistant Professor of Environmental Administration at the University of Oregon. Patrick is the co author of a yet to be published research project called Poisoning the Well: Process, recognition, and opposition to environmental policy in rural America. His research argues that grievances rooted in procedural injustice, for instance, the perception of resource extraction dependent communities tha...

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29:00

Poisoning the Well: Understanding Environmental...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/06/10

My guest today is Patrick Hunnicutt, Assistant Professor of Environmental Administration at the University of Oregon. Patrick is the co author of a yet to be published research project called Poisoning the Well: Process, recognition, and opposition to environmental policy in rural America. His research argues that grievances rooted in procedural injustice, for instance, the perception of resource extraction dependent communities that they are excluded from meaningful participation in land man...

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29:00

Forest Victory! Plus, Why Does the BLM Keep Lying...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/05/27

Oregon forests recently got a big win in court. Earlier this month, a US District Court Judge ruled that the Bureau of Land Management, or BLM, had broken the law during the planning of its so-called “Blue and Gold” timber sale, and threw out the entire project. The “Blue and Gold” is a nearly 3,500 acre tract of mature and old-growth forest on the eastern slopes of the Coast Range between Eugene and Roseburg. I actually visited the Blue and Gold forest a couple years ago. It was immediately ...

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29:00

Is the Alaska "Landless Bill" Land Back or Land...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/05/13

Unless you frequent the same activist email listservs I do, you may have no idea that, completely aside from the Trump administration’s assault on public lands, there is a bill quietly making its way through congress that would privatize and clearcut over one hundred thousand acres Alaska’s Tongass National Forest. Seems like a pretty obvious bill for environmentalists and allied congress people to oppose. But there’s a twist. The bill, called the Alaska Native Landless Equity Ac...

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29:00

Upending the Conventional Wisdom on the Role of Fire...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/05/05

How did the majestic forests of the Pacific Northwest come to be? That may seem like an esoteric question, but if we want to know how to protect and steward them as we enter the chaotic era of the climate crisis, it’s a question worth asking New research by University of Oregon researcher James Johnston is upending a big part of the conventional wisdom around the key role fire plays in the lifecycle of our forests. James is an Assistant Research Professor in U of O’s Institute for Res...

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38:48

Environmentalists Are Losing on Wildfire. Here's How...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/04/15

As I’m recording this in mid-April, we are coming out of the one of the warmest and driest winters on record in the Pacific northwest, and snowpack is at catastrophically low levels. Add in the Trump administration’s intentional sabotage and decimation of FEMA, the Forest Service, NOAA, and other federal agencies, and it is hard not to think that we are in for an unprecedented fire season. Aside from the threat of homes and communities burning, and smoke potentially blanketing vast swaths o...

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35:20

The Fight To Save Roadless Forests, with Len...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/03/31

I’m so excited to be back with a new interview after taking a little time off. Unfortunately, there is no shortage of bad news to come back to, but as ever, I am inspired by all the great work being done by activists and organizations to fight for a better world. One of those people is Len Montgomery, Director of Environment America's Great Outdoors Campaign and one of the leaders of the coalition to protect the Roadless Rule. Len has been working tirelessly to hold the line against the Trump...

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55:33

Xerces Society Founder Robert Pyle on Invertebrate...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/02/11

Dr. Robert Michael Pyle is a pioneer and legend in invertebrate conservation research and advocacy, as well as an accomplished author and poet. In 1971, he founded the Xerces Society, which has grown into the most influential invertebrate conservation organization in the world. He is also the author of many books of prose and poetry, and a great storyteller. This is part one of our conversation, part two will be out next week. This episode was researched and co-hosted by Coast Ran...

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51:15

Against the Anti-Fascist Creep! With the Anti-Creep...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/01/28

The word fascism gets tossed around a lot these days, but what does that term even mean, and what does it mean to call, for instance, the Trump regime fascist as opposed to, or in addition to, authoritarian, or autocratic? And what about terms like eco-fascism or petro-fascism? Last fall I interviewed University of Oregon Professor Sarah Wald and we touched on the term ‘eco-fascism’. That sent me down a bit of a rabbit hole on that term and the dangerous myths that many environmen...

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40:44

Jamie Workman On Why He Wants Us To "Own The Wild",...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/01/22

Today I’m featuring the second half of my conversation with author, speaker, entrepreneur, and wearer of many more hats, Jamie Workman. Jamie is most recently the co-author, along with Environmental Defense Fund executive director, Amanda Leland, of the new book, “Sea Change: Unlikely Allies and a Success Story of Oceanic Proportions”, which highlights the under reported success of collaborative, rights-based management in restoring decimated oceanic ecosystems, and the human communities who ...

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48:28

Sea Change - Can 'Rights-Based Management Save Our...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/01/16

Of all the myriad harms modern society is inflicting on our oceans, overfishing is right up there with climate change itself as one of the biggest threats to both marine ecosystems and the billions of people who rely on seafood as a major source of nutrition and income. The authors of the new book, “Sea Change: unlikely allies and a success story of oceanic proportions”, argue that there is a proven policy that has been working around the globe to rebuild fish populations while also creating ...

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40:09

Will FOFA Fix or F**k our Forests?! A Debate with...

Coast Range Radio ·

2026/01/07

I have been a vocal critic of the so called “Fix our Forests Act” or FOFA, that is making its way through Congress. I think it is a cynical, bad faith bill that at best, doesn’t address the wildfire issues it purports to solve, and could actually make those issues much worse. Combined with the attempt to repeal the ‘roadless rule’, which protects vast swaths of public lands from road construction and extraction, and the Trump administration’s Executive Orders on dramatically increasing timber...

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28:56

Are We On The Cusp of a Community Forest...

Coast Range Radio ·

2025/12/30

It is plain for anyone to see that the short rotation, financialized plantation management practiced by the Wall Street investors who own the vast majority of private timberland is destroying our communities and ecosystems. Coast Range Radio has been highlighting the need for an alternative model of forest management that sustains both economies and ecosystems for years. So when I heard about today’s guest’s research into community forests, I was all ears. Alexander Harris is the Land...

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29:00

Landscape Conservation in the Kitsap Peninsula, with...

Coast Range Radio ·

2025/12/23

Today we’re joined by Nathan Daniel, Executive Director of the Great Peninsula Conservancy. Nathan has helped guide some of the most ambitious conservation work going on in Western Washington - specifically on Kitsap Peninsula, the forested lowlands between Seattle and the Olympic mountains. Big thanks to Andy Shoemaker for co-hosting this episode! https://greatpeninsula.org/ https://www.instagram.com/coastrangeradio/

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