Free Republic

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) is demanding answers from Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray regarding Monday’s raid of former President Donald J. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence. On Thursday, the conservative titan and ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee sent Wray a list of questions concerning the unprecedented raid in Palm Beach, Florida, among other topics, including Hunter Biden. The FBI’s execution of a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago was reportedly about documents Trump may have taken with him when he left office last year. Grassley began by asking Wray about his knowledge of the raid before it happened, what...

Boat counters on the Northway for the Memorial Day weekend say that 89% of the trailered motorboats traveling north into the Adirondacks on Interstate 87 passed the inspection/decontamination station without stopping, according to the Adirondack Council. It is illegal to transport invasive plants, fish or wildlife from one water body to another in New York. The surest way to avoid contaminating one lake, pond or river with species from another is to have the boat inspected and cleaned by trained personnel. New York has installed a network of inspection stations in and around the Adirondack Park. Boat inspections and decontaminations...

Some people heard it as a boom, some as a bang, some as a series of explosions. Imagine the noise of a dump truck being dropped from 100 feet in the air onto pavement. It shook buildings. Many people said it sounded like it was coming from inside their building on their block. But it wasn’t just local; people heard it around the same time across a huge swath of northern New York. In response to an Enterprise Facebook post, people wrote that they had heard it as far west as Cranberry Lake, as far north as Malone, as far...

NEW YORK – When New York State voters go to the polls next Tuesday, besides choosing candidates in their local and county elections, they will be asked to vote yes or no on six constitutional amendment propositions, two of which are land exchanges.Proposition 4 would amend the the state Constitution to authorize the Legislature to settle longstanding disputes between the state and private entities over ownership of certain parcels of land in the town of Long Lake, Hamilton County. In exchange for giving up its claim to disputed parcels, the state would get land to be incorporated into the...

LAKE LUZERNE -- One of North America's largest Muslim organizations wants to build a summer camp in the Adirondacks on 114 acres it recently acquired. The Islamic Circle of North America, a Muslim advocacy group based in New York City, hopes to raise money to develop a camp for children and families of all religions on land donated to it last year, Muhammad Rahman, ICNA's secretary general, said in an interview Thursday.snip a doctor named Sayeeda Tahera Jafar transferred the deed on the 114.4-acre property to the ICNA last week. Word about the donation started moving around this North Country...

SARANAC LAKE - Powerful generals and admirals from some of the most powerful nations on Earth are reportedly meeting somewhere in the local area this weekend after flying into the Adirondack Regional Airport in Lake Clear on Friday. Among the passengers of a large Boeing 757 airplane with "United States of America" printed on its fuselage were top members of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff and their counterparts from France, Germany and another country, possibly Great Britain, according to Barry DeFuria, a town of Harrietstown councilman and Airport Committee member who was there when the plane landed. A top...

A 14,600-acre piece of the Adirondacks long prized by environmentalists for its forests and wetlands, including a pond where Ralph Waldo Emerson led a “philosophers’ camp,” was purchased on Thursday by a preservation group for $16 million, the group said. The property, which had been owned by a Vermont family for 56 years, will not immediately be open to the public because of leases for recreational hunting and fishing that will last several more years. But the group, the Nature Conservancy, said the purchase meant that the land would be protected and ultimately added to the Adirondack Forest Preserve in...

GABRIELS, N.Y. — After 17 years of marriage, Joy and Richard Gonyea managed to save enough to trade their trailer in November for a cozy prefabricated home with a room for each of their two children and a pool in the backyard. The home overlooks the pine trees on the edge of their two-acre property in rural Vermontville, eight miles from the secluded state prison where Mrs. Gonyea works. “This home is all we’ve ever dreamed of,” said Mrs. Gonyea, 43, a registered nurse who runs the medical department at the prison, Camp Gabriels, a minimum-security facility in this minuscule...

TUPPER LAKE, N.Y. — Those who love the Adirondacks most are worried they are being loved too much. Personal watercraft, all-terrain vehicles and snowmobiles shatter the stillness, from one season to the next. Nearly twice as many building permits were issued last year as in 1998, while home prices in some areas have doubled in less than three years. Two major development proposals that would resurrect defunct ski areas, one here and another in North Creek, could create a total of more than 1,000 units of housing and several hotels in what Peter Bauer, a leading environmentalist, described as “an...

WILMINGTON, N.Y. - Swedish snowboarder Jonatan Johansson died Sunday after falling during a snowboardcross run down Whiteface Mountain in the Adirondacks. The 26-year-old Turin Olympics competitor lost control on one of his jumps during training for an International Ski Federation World Cup competition, according to U.S. Ski and Snowboarding Association spokesman Tom Kelly. A state police report said Johansson tried to correct himself but landed hard. An autopsy found the cause of death to be multiple internal injuries. Officials said Johansson landed within the course boundaries and was wearing a helmet. Olympic Regional Development Authority spokesman Sandy Caligiore said he...

ASSOCIATED PRESS TUPPER LAKE, N.Y. -- High altitude, low population and little light pollution make the Adirondacks a stargazer's dream location. Look up from New York's northern forest and with the naked eye watch a cascade of stars. With a good telescope, see the rings of Saturn in color. Subzero winter nights are particularly good, with low humidity and clear, magnified skies, amateur astronomer Mark Staves said. That's when he likes to take his telescope outside in Tupper Lake. Staves, fellow amateur astronomer Tim Moeller and other enthusiasts plan to build the first public observatory in New York's northern mountains...

CARTHAGE, N.Y., Aug. 13 - For much of the summer, Dustan Wisner, 15, and his friends have whiled away the days fishing the banks of the Black River. On Friday, he and his friends were beside the river again - no poles in sight. This time, they were learning that a toxic spill was snaking its way through the slow current and killing vast numbers of fish. "That stinks," Dustan said. And it did. The toxin was liquid cow manure - three million gallons in all - creating a murky plume that stretched for miles and giving unfortunate new meaning...

Group Aims to Save Rattlesnakes in New York Park Westport, New York: The ponytailed environmentalist hiked down the ridge, over the gray rocks and matted brown leaves, stopped among the hardwoods, and said, "Right down the side, it's prime country here." The warm, southeast-facing rock cliffs overlooking Lake Champlain mark the northern limit of the Timber Rattlesnake's habitat. Jaime Ethier, in boots and jeans, was bushwhacking from Champlain Palisades down to the pebbled shores of the lake - through terrain where he wouldn't see a coiled dark snake unless he nearly stepped on it. The Adirondack Council conservation director appeared...

John Sheehan of the Adirondack Council said there is overwhelming historical precedent to prevent any type of building that detracts from the region's scenic vistas and landscapes. Barton Mines Co. wants to put 10 wind turbines near the north slope of Gore Mountain that would produce 27 megawatts of power. 'Its impact on the state's energy production would be negligible,' Sheehan said. 'But its impact on the Adirondack Park's future would be disastrous. That's the bottom line for us. 'Putting these towers up will not prevent the construction of a single coal-fired power plant, nor will it force a coal...

Adirondack Wolf Spawns Many Theories About Whether to Bring the Animals Back to New York By Michael Virtanen/Associated Press May 23, 2004 EDINBURG, N.Y. (AP) - The night Russ Lawrence shot dead the first confirmed Adirondack wolf in a century, the big canine wasn't alone. It came for the hunter's bait on a winter night with another animal. "It wasn't as big, but it was a pretty good size," Lawrence said. "That's why I figured it was a female." At first, Lawrence figured he'd killed a record-sized coyote that January night in 2002, and he contacted state conservation officials. It...