November 2017

Despite more drivers on the road, Tier 3 vehicles and fuel standards will lower emissions in Utah. If you’re concerned about the Salt Lake Valley’s air quality, you probably know that vehicle emissions make up about half of our air pollution. And with …

An organizer in the Colorado River “personhood” lawsuit explains. If I asked you, “Which corporation provides drinking water to 40 million Americans?” you might guess Nestle or Pepsi or Coca Cola. It’s a trick question. No corporation provides drinking …

Ben Shapiro serves up a hierarchy that puts white men on top—again. Last month, conservative media celebrity Ben Shapiro came to speak at the University of Utah to approximately 400 people as a guest of the student organization Young Americans for Free …

Exploring Utah’s redrock desert through poetry of place. Poetry matters because it offers an alternative reality – it refuses the logical, reductionist, materialist aspects of industrial culture; aslant, it invites us to feel our way in the dark. – Edi …

Safe, legal choices for giving up unwanted firearms. One morning some years ago, I stopped by the CATALYST office on trash day. John deJong invited me to walk out to the curb with him and when he opened the lid of his trash can, I was astonished to see …

Congratulations to Repertory Dance Theatre (RDT). In October, RDT presented a new work to celebrate Utah’s newest national monument (if we can keep it). “Dancing the Bears Ears,” a world-premier by choreographer Zvi Gotheiner, got rave reviews from bot …

At a material level, life cannot exist without death: recycling of organic matter in the biosphere makes it about two hundred times more productive than it would otherwise be. _Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings: A 21st Century Beastr …

With the kickoff of each fall and spring semester comes a flourish of activity up at the University of Utah campus. Freshmen scrambling to find classes only five minutes apart (pro tip: get a bike), seniors sauntering around the library courtyard, stud …

OLIO Skin & Beard Care Company opens storefront Eight-year-old Olio Oils has moved up from its tent at the farmers’ market to a real, live storefront in the 21st & 21st neighborhood. Jennifer Williamson says her business is dedicated to 100% na …

Wondering what to do with your mortal remains? Want to be useful even when you’ve ceased to be, are bereft of life, have gone to meet your maker—are an ex-person? Then you should bequeath your cadaver to the body donor program administered by the Unive …

The Giv Group, a Salt Lake-based team of developers and planners, is working on a new affordable housing development they are calling Project Open that will offer along with single bedroom units a limited number of art studios, available for approved r …

The chic 9th & 9th vibe keeps creeping further west as boutique stores and pricey restaurants continue to open down Harvey Milk Boulevard, inching ever closer to the noise ofState Street (the planned future opening of a homeless shelter on 700 S ha …

The Climate Campaign BYU student Nick Huey and University of Utah student Collin Green have formed an alliance that is above any rivalry. Cougars and Utes are teaming up to protect the world—or at least, to create awareness about climate change (and ma …

The big news is that the popular nonprofit gardening organization has become the proud owner of acreage adjacent to its well-used Grateful Tomato Garden on 800 South at 600 East. We’ll tell you more about that next month. In the meantime, if you speak …

A monthly compendium of random wisdom for the natural world and beyond. by Diane Olson, Anna Zumwalt and Greta deJong. NOV 1 All Saints’ Day. Sun rises at 7:59am and sets at 6:22pm. Av. high: 57 degrees; low: 38 degrees NOV 2 Challenge yourself to writ …

Watch and wait like a Fox.. Osho Zen Tarot: Totality, The Creator, Schizophrenia Medicine Cards: Fox Mayan Oracle: Dreamer and the Dreamed, Eb Ancient Egyptian Tarot: The Devil, Temperance, Five of Disks Aleister Crowley Deck: Peace, Failure, The Fool …

Norwegian Nazi Resistance has lessons for modern times. In April, 1940, my father was seven years old, a child living in Moss, Norway, when German troops invaded his country. I grew up with stories of the Norwegian Resistance, and tales of the heroism …

When to call the teacher out. As I reel through my Facebook feed today, more than half the posts begin with “Me, too.” This is, of course, the social media request to post these words if you have been sexually assaulted or harassed. It’s intended to sh …

CATALYST @ The State Room, 11/30. One year ago, CATALYST Magazine became a nonprofit un­der the name Common Good Press. (We know that some of you, because of our focus on local nonprofits, arts and movers-and-shakers, thought CATALYST already was a non …

The studio of John deJong is an extraordinary place—an emanation of an extraordinary mind. I have visited many artists’ studios, and I have one of my own, but the sheer magnitude and variety of John’s output and collection of work is, to say the least, …

Each year the McCarthey Family Foundation trustees (whose great-grandfather purchased The Salt Lake Tribune in 1901) host a lecture series honoring the family’s commitment to cultivating a “lasting legacy for an independent press.” Recognizing the vita …

“Famous last Snapchats” — not likely. I flirt with photography, but I’m committed to words. On any given day I have a harem of cameras in my car. I have cameras on drones, one for underwater, two for video in case the first one fails. I have one that s …