A listing of today's stories:
Changes to Oil and Gas Development in Wyoming
The State Board of Land Commissioners is expected to sign off on an updated oil and gas lease form early next month. If the changes go through, it will be the first revision in nearly 30 years. It will set the ground rules for how oil and gas development are conducted on state lands. And that dictates how and how much the Wyoming public receives in return for oil and gas extraction. Molly Messick has more.
University of Wyoming’s American Heritage Center began an oral history project focused on Sublette County’s natural gas boom.
Last summer, the University of Wyoming’s American Heritage Center began an oral history project focused on Sublette County’s natural gas boom. That boom is now a decade old, and residents have had time to reflect on the good and the bad of the development they’ve seen. Now, a second installment in our series of pieces from Sublette County. The voices in this piece belong to Ann Chambers Noble, Steve Smith, Ward Wise, Mary Lynn Worl, Albert Sommers, Leslie Rozier, Cally McKee, Carolyn Bing, Meredith Noble, Sarah Hixson, and Prill Mecham. To visit the Rural West Initiative online, please go to http://ruralwest.stanford.edu/.
Alzheimer’s disease Among Military Veterans
Five million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease, and experts are predicting that number will grow exponentially. Among those particularly vulnerable to memory problems are military veterans. A new program at St. John’s Institute for Cognitive Health is taking pro-active steps to help U.S. veterans in Jackson, Afton, Star Valley and Teton Valley, Idaho. Rebecca Huntington has more.
Many Rural Newspapers Continue to Thrive
While many major U-S Newspapers are on the decline, many rural newspapers continue to thrive. Judy Muller has written a book about small town weeklies called “Emus Loose in Egnar: Big Stories from Small Towns.” Geoff McGhee has been studying changes in rural newspapers over the last century in his post as creative director for media at the Rural West Initiative at Stanford University’s Bill Lane Center for the American West. They join Molly Messick.
The week of July 31st is the tenth Snowy Range Non Profit Institute in Laramie
The week of July 31st is the tenth Snowy Range Non Profit Institute in Laramie. The theme this year is the business of non-profits and one of the speakers will be James Drever of the Wyoming Small Business Development Center. He tells Bob Beck that it’s important that non-profits understand their market.
Wyoming’s Hazardous Abandoned Mines
Last week Congress was told that Wyoming’s abandoned mines are notorious for safety and environmental hazards. Lawmakers are working on legislation that could accelerate the clean-up and closure of the potential death traps scattered across the state. But the idea is not without hazards of its own. Patrick Terpstra explains from Washington.
Wyoming Department of Health is starting an Ambitious Effort to try and reduce suicide in the state
The Wyoming Department of Health says the state traditionally is among the top three in the nation for suicide death rates and the vast majority of them involve men. And the highest rate of suicide comes from what are termed middle age white men…between the ages of 35 and 54. The Wyoming Department of Health is starting an ambitious effort to try and reduce those numbers. Bob Beck reports.
Looking Deeper into the issue of students on free and reduced lunch in Wyoming
Earlier this month, Propublica – an independent, investigative news outlet - released a report detailing, among other things, the number of students on free and reduced lunch in the state. The number they came up with for Wyoming was 30-percent – well below the national average of 45. However those figures only looked at a small sampling of schools. Wyoming Public Radio’s Tristan Ahtone has more.
Wyoming’s recycling program
Despite early resistance, Cheyenne’s recycling program is now a well-oiled series of machines, diverting thousands of tons of waste from the landfill annually. But even in Cheyenne, the challenge of recycling in communities across the in Wyoming isn’t public interest, but rather communities’ distance from out-of-state facilities that can actually process the materials. Wyoming Public Radio’s Rebecca Martinez reports.
