The Rural Blog

A digest of events, trends, issues, ideas and journalism from and about rural America, by the Institute for Rural Journalism, based at the University of Kentucky. Links may expire, require subscription or go behind pay walls. Please send news and knowledge you think would be useful to benjy.hamm@uky.edu.

The Rural Blog

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Tired of big-city decisions, rural counties in some states work to form their own governments

Rural Nevada leaders seek a voice in massive energy builds, but almost 80% of their land is federally managed

Government officials have 'unqualified access to private land;' hunters sue to change Open Fields doctrine

Op-ed on improving news coverage: A news site publishes an indictment of the losses caused by cutbacks

Election official turnover is nearly 40% in some states, new report shows. Workers quit to avoid 2024 conflicts.

Rural election voting processes have improved since 2020; the election denial movement could pose a threat

Some Eastern Oregonians look to join Idaho, saying they have little in common with people in their current state

By addressing inmates' mental health problems, some rural counties aim to stop a cycle of incarceration

Oklahoma publisher who caught officials in racist, violent talk is losing his top reporter: son who took on the sheriff

Reporting on a rural county's political transformation, driven in part by outside forces, leads to threats of violence

Newspaper public notices take hit as big Fla. county shifts to online; some papers' mishandling of ads undermine industry

Kentucky newspaper offers $3,000 for proof of vote buying

Public-notice battles get more political, threaten existence of many small newspapers that need the 'legal ads' to survive

Pandemic influx of city-dwellers triggered housing shortages in many resort towns, pricing out the locals

Smaller communities worry they'll miss out on cybersecurity grant money from feds due to lack of expertise to ask for it

Op-ed: Towns with schools need newspapers; without one, their young people's achievements 'are left unsung'

Investigation: S.C.'s poor ethical oversight has let small-town corruption flourish, especially in news deserts

Kansas state officials hid public information at private firm's request; it's part of a national trend against transparency

Small Business Administration offers pandemic-recovery grants up to $5 million to local governments, businesses

Local jail operating costs rose by $25 billion over past 40 years, but recent cost-cutting could help long after pandemic