Nominations for Tom and Pat Gish Award for courage in rural journalism due Tuesday, Sept. 6

The deadline is looming for nominations for the annual Tom and Pat Gish Award that recognizes courage, tenacity and integrity in rural journalism. Nominations should be sent to the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues by Tuesday, Sept. 6. (The deadline was Sept. 1 but has been extended to give you one more weekend.)

The award is named for the couple, above, who published The Mountain Eagle in Whitesburg, Ky., for almost 52 years. Last year’s winner was Samantha Swindler of the Tillamook Headlight-Herald in Oregon for her investigative reporting at The Times-Tribune in Corbin, Ky., and the Jacksonville Daily Progress in Texas. Earlier winners have been the Gishes; the Ezzell family, publishers of The Canadian Record in Texas; and former publisher Stanley Dearman and Publisher Jim Prince of The Neshoba Democrat of Philadelphia, Miss. For more details see http://www.ruraljournalism.org/.

The Institute seeks nominations that measure up, at least in major respects, to the records of previous winners. Nominators should send detailed letters explaining how their nominees show the kind of exemplary courage, tenacity and integrity that the Gishes and other winners demonstrated in their rigorous pursuit of rural journalism. Documentation does not have to accompany the nomination, but will be needed in choosing finalists or a winner, and additional documentation may be requested or required. Nomination letters should be postmarked or emailed by Sept. 6 and sent to: Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, 122 Grehan Journalism Building, University of Kentucky, Lexington KY 40506-0042. For more information, contact Al Cross at 859-257-3744 or Al.Cross@uky.edu.

Do these two look like Randall and Devil Anse? History Channel will make them McCoy, Hatfield

Next year's 150th anniversary of the start of the Hatfield-McCoy feud on the Kentucky-West Virginia border will be marked by a miniseries on the History Channel with an increasingly stellar cast. Bill Paxton, left, of "Big Love" will play clan leader Randall McCoy and Kevin Costner, right, will play his opposite number, Anderson "Devil Anse" Hatfield.

History announced this week that Tom Berenger, Powers Boothe and Mare Winningham will play brothers Jim and Wall Hatfield, brothers of Anderson, and Sally McCoy, wife of Randall. "The project follows the former friends and Civil War comrades who return home after the war to properties on opposite sides of the Tug [Fork of the Big Sandy] River border in Kentucky and West Virginia to increasing tensions that bring the neighboring states to the brink of another war," reports The Hollywood Reporter. Kevin Reynolds, director of Red Dawn, will direct the series for Thinkfactory Media. (Read more)

U.S. Department of Education's point man for rural outreach to hold forum on Twitter tomorrow

The U.S. Department of Education’s point person for rural outreach, John White, will host a forum on Twitter at #EDRuralChat Wednesday, Aug. 31, from 3 to 3:30 p.m. ET. Beginning today, Twitter users can submit questions on rural education to White, the deputy assistant secretary for rural outreach, using the hash tag #EDRuralChat. The forum is a follow-up to the department’s first Twitter town hall held by Secretary Arne Duncan Aug. 24. The department says it uses several Twitter accounts to share information. Click here for a list.

The department offers this guidance for education reporters: "For general news and information about ED, follow @usedgov. To keep up-to-date with Secretary Duncan, follow @ArneDuncan. Justin Hamilton, ED’s press secretary, can be found at @EDPressSec, and Massie Ritsch, deputy assistant secretary for external affairs and outreach, shares information and converses with stakeholders, teachers and parents at @ED_Outreach.

Thursday is deadline to apply for Rural Computer-Assisted Reporting Workshop to be held Oct. 21-23

Thursday is the deadline to apply for the first Rural Computer-Assisted Reporting Mini-Boot Camp, to be held Oct. 21-23 at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City with instructors from Investigative Reporters and Editors Inc. With funding from the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, IRE and the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues will select 12 applicants for fellowships that will include meals, lodging and travel assistance.

The workshop is being held in the Tri-Cities area partly to remind rural journalists that Daniel Gilbert, left, won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for public service for the Bristol Herald Courier with his reporting on the mismanagement of natural-gas royalties in Southwest Virginia. He was able to crack the case with computer-assisted reporting skills learned at one of IRE's boot camps. Now journalists in the region will have a chance to gain most of the same skills.

These skills are needed to make effective use of millions of electronic records, which exist at every level of government from tiny city halls to bureaucratic bunkers in Washington. In these records are thousands of stories that need to be told. Every community has them, but not all community news outlets have the tools and skills to "mine the data." Here is a chance to get those skills, from some of the best trainers in the field.

To download a PDF of the application, click here. For more background information, go here. For information on the Fund for Rural Computer-Assisted Reporting, created at the Institute by a gift from Gilbert, click here.

Report answers questions about post office closures; rural advocate reacts to closings

Earlier this month, the Congressional Research Service released a report to address common questions about possible post-office closures. The report defines "post office," tells how many there are and how many face closure, describes the Postal Service's authority to close offices, explains the closure process and when it will occur, speculates on the number of employees who may lose their jobs, and identifies legislation on post offices.

The report says 4,380 retail facilities may close – 3,652 announced on July 26 and 728 identified in 2009. Of those earmarked for closure, "two thousand at the top of the closure list are primarily rural and frontier," Carol Miller, community organizer from Ojo Sarco, N.M., population 400, writes for the Daily Yonder. (Yonder photo by Miller)

Miller, whose local post office closed six years ago in a round of closings, suggests federal spending cuts almost always start with rural post offices referring to the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 and the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 that resulted in many changes to the postal service. "Nothing brings home to a community how absolutely unimportant they are to the federal government more than losing a post office," Miller writes.

Loggers lose Clean Water Act exemption; lawyer-farmer says farmers could be next target

An Illinois lawyer-farmer says farmers with drainage systems may be the next type of business required to get a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit for storm water run-offs under the federal Clean Water Act.

Gary Baise, a trial attorney, writes in Farm Futures that a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco will require loggers and counties to apply for NPDES permits for storm water from logging roads that is "collected in a system of ditches, culverts and channels and is then delivered into streams and rivers." He says that describes the tubes and tiles that drain millions of acres in the Midwest.

The decision came in a lawsuit involving an environmental plaintiff, the Oregon Board of Forestry, private foresters and Tillamook County, Oregon. Loggers had been protected through an exemption similar to the agricultural exemption.

Farming operations are currently exempt from needing an NPDES permit for storm water runoff, but Baise believes the latest ruling will soon draw attention to Midwest farmers. "My guess is we will see either EPA or environmental groups asserting in the near future that our farm tile systems and roadside ditches and culverts are point sources," which need NPDES permits, Baise writes.

Internet and computer use on farms is growing, but few farmers do business online

Sixty-two percent of U.S. farms have internet access, up from 59 percent in 2009, says a report from the National Agricultural Statistics Service. Of those, 38 percent connect with DSL, 20 percent with wireless and 15 percent with satellite, Bob Meyer of Brownfield Network reports. (eHow photo)

While many regions show growth in the numbers of computers on farms, Internet use for farm business is still low. Only 14 percent of farmers purchase agricultural inputs online and 12 percent market their products online, Meyer reports. However, 35 percent use the computer to conduct business with non-agricultural websites. (Read more)

Congressional report looks at impact and cost of proposed regulations on coal-fired power plants

As waves of new Environmental Protection Agency regulations to curb coal-fired power plant pollution are finalized, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service has released a report separating fact and fiction following industry warnings of higher electric bills, more blackouts, and fewer jobs, Brad Plumer of The Wall Street Journal reports.

The report confirms that the new rules are likely to prompt closures of many coal plants between now and 2017, but the number is uncertain. "Many of these plants are inefficient and are being replaced by more efficient combined-cycle natural-gas plants," the report states.

The impact of these closures on the electric grid will be minimal, according to the report. The recession and the increasing use of natural gas has resulted in excess generation capacity that can easily be tapped again to quickly add capacity, Plumer writes.

The report does not estimate or evaluate costs for complying with the new rules, but suggests industry estimates are overstated because many estimates were based on earlier proposals which have been changed to address some industry concerns, Plumer reports. (Read more; subscription may be required)

Marking 9/11 anniversary? Get the terms right

Two weeks from today is the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that killed 2,977 people in the United States. News media large and small are preparing to mark the anniversary, and The Associated Press provides some help getting key names, words and phrases right, with a Sept. 11 Style and Reference Guide.

Some examples: "ground zero" and "twin towers" are not capitalized; AP's spelling of the terror group is al-Qaida; and "Flight 93" qualifies for a short reference, unlike the other three that were hijacked.

The guide also includes basic references, such as a 9/11 timeline, the flights hijacked, where the planes crashed, the hijackers' full names, their names on second reference, and their pronunciation. It notes that 2,983 victims' names will be on the memorial at 1 World Trade Center, including six killed in the 1993 al-Qaida bombing of the center.

For details, via the Nieman Journalism Lab, click here.

Rural hospitals in S. Carolina are in jeopardy

Many of South Carolina's 30 rural hospitals, "once the heart of their communities, are struggling to find a niche in a health care system that values the complicated procedures offered at large hospitals much more than the basic and emergency services provided by rural hospitals," Joey Holleman reports for The State newspaper in Columbia.

In 2007-09, fewer than half the hospitals' beds were filled on an average day, and 10 of the 13 smallest lost money in those years, Holleman found, thanks to a study by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The hospitals' poster child, he writes, could be Bamberg County Hospital, which he uses as the story's main example. (Photo by Gerry Melendez, The State)

"Rural hospitals are caught in a vicious cycle," Holleman writes. "They don’t have the customer volume to help pay for new technology and facilities that might lure specialty physicians to rural areas. But without those specialists, the hospitals can’t perform the procedures that bring in the most money to pay for new technology and facilities." (Read more)

Poll on mountaintop mining shows opposition outside coalfield, more support inside it

This month, three groups opposed to mountaintop-removal coal mining released a poll that showed the controversial practice is clearly opposed by likely voters in the four states where it is conducted. But the groups didn't talk about a contrary finding that is arguably more interesting: Likely voters in the area where mountaintop removal is most common are closely divided about it. (Theresa Burriss photo: Kayford Mountain in southern West Virginia)

The poll found that among those who said they were likely to vote in the 2012 election in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia, 57 percent were against mountaintop removal and 20 percent supported it. But in the combined region of Eastern Kentucky and southern West Virginia, the results were 41 percent in favor and 47 percent opposed. That was within the error margin of plus or minus 7 percentage points for each of those figures. In Eastern Kentucky, more people favored mountaintop mining, and in southern West Virginia, more people opposed it, but the smaller sample sizes meant there was no clear advantage in those results, either.

The above results were for a question that was preceded by a definition saying coal companies “mine coal from mountains through a process called mountaintop removal mining, where the top of a mountain is removed to extract the coal, and waste is disposed in nearby valleys and streams.” Boiled down, the question said waste is put into streams, creating a mental image of unwholesome substances being dumped into creeks and rivers. That is not quite what happens. Small headwater steams, often wet-weather or intermittent, are covered by valley fills made of the rock and dirt mined from the mountains, and the drainage from the fills sends pollution downstream.

It's impossible to guess how much the definition skewed the results, but a separate group was asked simpler question, which did not define the practice, and they favored it by wide and clear margins, though a fourth of Eastern Kentuckians and a fifth of West Virginians said they didn't know one way or the other. On the more detailed question, the "don't know" group was much smaller.

After those questions, both groups were asked differently phrased questions about elected officials who favor strengthening or weakening regulations on mountaintop-removal mining, and about full enforcement and strength of the federal Clean Water Act, which the Environmental Protection Agency is citing in its stricter control of the practice. By clear majorities, voters in the coalfield said they favored full enforcement of the act to protect streams from mountaintop-removal mining, and even said they favored strengthening it to accomplish that.

But after two more questions, concluding with an argument and counter-argument about electricity, energy, national security, the economy, environmental regulation, damage to streams and health impacts, including birth defects, 56 percent of voters in the mountaintop-removal region said they favored the practice, while only 31 percent opposed it. Support for it was beyond the margin of error in Eastern Kentucky, at 62 percent to 26 percent but not in southern West Virginia, at 52-35 with a 9-point error margin. Still, the most likely result is that residents of the region favor the controversial practice, as hard as that might be for opponents of it to accept.

The poll was sponsored by Earthjustice, the Sierra Club and the Appalachian Mountain Advocates (formerly the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment) and was conducted by Lake Research Partners and Bellwether Research & Consulting July 25-28. For the groups' press release, headlined "Powerful Opposition to Mountaintop Removal Mining in the Heart of Coal Country," click here. To read the poll for yourself, you can download the 2-megabyte document here. The maps below show the regional boundaries used in the poll results. It should be noted that coal mining is more prevalent in southern West Virginia than the region the poll defined as Eastern Kentucky, where some counties have no coal mining and a few have no coal at all.

Report offers ideas for rural schools in South

A new report released by the State Collaborative On Reforming Education (SCORE), an education policy group started by former U.S. Sen. Bill Frist, offers specific ideas for improving public education in rural communities in the South. The recommendations are based on research, best practices, and input from rural communities across Tennessee and the rural Southeast.

The report is divided into six priorities with specific action items. Some action items include placing teacher trainees in rural schools, expanding virtual education programs, and convincing "philanthropists to put more money into rural districts," The Tennessean reports. To read the entire report, click here. The report was released following the Southeast Regional Rural Education Summit.

Federal geologists offer much lower estimate of natural gas available in Marcellus Shale

The U.S. Geological Survey estimates the Marcellus Shale formation underlying most of Central and Northern Appalachia has 84 trillion cubic feet of "undiscovered, technically recoverable natural gas . . . drastically lower than the 410 trillion cubic feet that was published earlier this year by the federal Energy Information Administration," Ian Urbina reports for The New York Times.

As a result of the USGS report, EIA plans to reduce its estimate by 80 percent, to match the USGS estimate. "The decision by the agency to lower the estimates comes amid growing scrutiny from Congress about how the administration calculates its numbers and why it depends on outside and industry-tied consultants to produce some of its reports," Urbina writes. "Accurate estimates are important for lawmakers who are making long-term decisions about subsidies and policies relating to the nation’s energy mix. They are also essential for landowners and investors as they decide where and whether to lease their land to drillers or invest in gas companies."

The new estimate is of resources, not reserves, which are always smaller because they are based on the ability to extract them profitably. "The geologists also did not discuss how high gas prices will have to rise before companies can make enough money to justify increased drilling," Urbina notes.

Cattle fitters or 'show jocks' are busy at fairs

California rancher Darrell Hansen (right) and partner James Vietheer are among many state fair competitors who go to great lengths to groom livestock before judging. Called "show jocks" on the circuit, cattle fitters take their jobs very seriously. "Show champion animals can fetch auction prices that are double those that fall short of the winner's circle," P.J. Huffstutter of the Los Angeles Times reports. (Photo by Huffstutter)

Presentation is so important during competition that some people cheat. People have been caught drugging bulls with Clembuterol to add muscle and "injecting vegetable oil between their skin and muscle tissue to give them a smoother look," Huffstutter reports.

EPA goes after Midwest CAFOs; it and enviros go after Georgia agencies, alleging lax regulation

The Environmental Protection Agency is cracking down on concentrated animal feeding operations, and it and and some environmental groups are going after state agencies for lax enforcement against CAFOs. EPA recently issued compliance orders to six in the Midwest and criticized the Georgia Environmental Protection Division and Department of Agriculture for poor oversight.

EPA ordered six CAFOs in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska "to correct a range of violations of the federal Clean Water Act," Ken Anderson of Brownfield reports. Ritter Feedyards of Beemer, Neb.; Reigle Farms of Madison, Neb.; Dave Uecker Livestock of Norfolk, Neb.; S & S Cattle Co. of Council Bluffs, Iowa; Callicrate Feeding Company of St. Francis, Kan.; and Bloom N Egg Farm owned by M.F. Waldbaum Company of Bloomfield, Neb., were all mentioned in an EPA release. (Read more)

An EPA report claims Georgia's agencies, which it trusts to enforce water-pollution regulations, issued faulty or incomplete inspection reports for almost three-fourths of Georgia's 48 large farms, concluding there is "significant risk that Georgia's CAFO program is failing to protect water quality," Chris Joyner of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.

State regulators say the report is inconclusive. "We still have not been provided with adequate documentation from the inspector general's office for us to draw our own conclusions at this point," Dominic Weatherill, industrial compliance manager for the Georgia Environmental Protection Division, told Joyner. "We can't say that we are completely on board with all of its conclusions." (Read more)

Environmental agencies in Iowa recently issued an intent-to-sue letter to EPA for failure to force the state's Department of Resources to enforce waste-discharge regulations. The Washington-based Environmental Integrity Project, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement and the Iowa Chapter of the Sierra Club, seeking a response to their 2007 petition, "asked EPA to strip the Iowa Department of Natural Resources of its authority to administer the Clean Water Act permitting program," Paul Quinlan reports for Greenwire. (Read more, subscription required)

Telecoms persuading more legislatures to pass laws posing obstacles to municipal broadband

At the behest of telecommunications companies, states have resumed enacting legislation to keep municipalities from offering broadband service to their citizens. With passage of legislation in North Carolina, 19 states have restrictions that make owning and operating broadband networks nearly impossible for cities, Melissa Maynard of Stateline reports. The trend slacked off in recent years, hitting a plateau of 15 states in the middle of the last decade, but has resumed with Republican control of more legislative chambers.

North Carolina's new law does not prohibit municipal broadband, but has complex rules that municipals must follow: paying the state an amount equal to what private providers pay in corporate income, sales and use and franchise taxes; and restricting financing to revenues from broadband services, prohibiting the use of other city funds, Maynard reports.

Supporters of this legislation, like Melissa Buscher, vice president of communications for Time Warner, argue municipals receive an unfair advantage over the private sector by not paying taxes and controlling "everything from 'pole attachments' to the permitting process for access to public rights-of-way." Brian Bowman, public-affairs director for the city of Wilson, N.C., which has made broadband available to its citizens, calls the legislation "a de-facto ban on municipal broadband." A city could build a network but could never operate it, he told Maynard. (Read more)

Weekly newspaper does a special health section and mails it to everyone in its home county

Special sections on health are good for community newspapers and their readers. Health-care providers have money for advertising in such sections, and a section focused on health can have more impact on readers than individual, occasional stories.

Based on a pilot project it oversaw in 2007, the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues began recommending to rural newspapers that they schedule health sections as part of editions that are mailed to every postal customer in a paper's home county, a standard circulation-building technique. If a newspaper wants to help improve the health of its community, why not reach everyone in the community?

Last week, one Kentucky newspaper did that. The Adair County Community Voice of Columbia included a 10-page broadsheet section on health in an edition that was mailed to everyone in the county. And though it got no advertising from the local public hospital, with which it has been embroiled in an open-meetings dispute, it did get ads from hospitals in other counties.

Newspapers can mail up to 10 percent of their annual circulation to non-subscribers in their home county at subscriber rates, and can sell "sponsored circulation" to pay the extra cost of printing and postage for the extra copies. The 2007 pilot project with another Kentucky weekly, The Berea Citizen, found that non-subscribers said they were more likely to subscribe if the paper regularly included health information. For a copy of the report on the project, click here. The health section is not online, but PDFs of its pages are posted on the Institute website in a 4.4 MB file, here.

U.S. appeals court: High-school sports associations can bar live videostreaming of tournaments

"The association that oversees Wisconsin high school sports can limit who streams its games live on the Internet even though most of its member schools are funded by taxpayers, a federal appeals court ruled yesterday," The Associated Press reports. The decision by the Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago "could have First Amendment implications for news-media outlets nationwide."

Many rural newspapers have found videostreaming of high-school sports a popular feature that builds traffic and advertising for their websites. "Other athletic associations and newspaper groups have been closely watching the Wisconsin case, and the decision could lead to litigation in other states," AP notes.

The court ruled that the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association can grant exclusive rights for live streaming of its tournaments. The WIAA "said it couldn’t survive without being able to raise money by signing exclusive contracts with a single video-production company for streaming its tournaments," AP reports. It won at the trial-court level, and unanimously among a three-judge panel of the appellate court.

In their ruling, the judges said the exclusive contracts don't prevent limited coverage of tournaments by other media. The association allows other media outlets to have up to two minutes of live video coverage of a game. “Nothing in the First Amendment confers on the media an affirmative right to broadcast entire performances,” the panel said. (Read more)

Rural hospitals get more help recruiting doctors

Critical-access hospitals will get help recruiting physicians to their rural areas through an expanded loan repayment program that is part of President Obama's new jobs initiative for rural America.

The initiative is called the National Health Service Corps, Alexandra Wilson Pecci of HealthLeaders Media reports. The 1,300 critical-access hospitals can use federal loans to recruit new physicians. A press release from the White House states the addition of one primary care physician in a rural community generates about $1.5 million in annual revenue and creates 23 jobs annually.

Critical-access hospitals must be in rural areas, 35 miles from another hospital or 15 miles from another hospital in mountainous terrain, according to the Rural Assistance Center. The average CAH creates 107 jobs and generates $4.8 million in payroll annually, the White House says.

The jobs program also includes an agreement that will "link rural hospitals and clinicians to existing capital loan programs to help them buy health IT software and hardware and jump the typical rural hospital hurdle of limited access to capital and lower financial operating margins," HealthLeaders Media reports.

A few days before announcing the jobs program, the White House Rural Council released a report that outlined recent investments in rural healthcare access. Those include placing more than 2,600 clinicians in rural communities and providing distance learning and telemedicine services to more than 2,500 rural healthcare and educational facilities. It also highlighted an investment of 500 projects across the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs health care system that support rural health care. That includes 404 community-based outpatient clinics and 48 outreach clinics in rural areas.

On average, rural counties had 62 primary care doctors for every 100,000 residents in 2008, compared to 79.5 primary care doctors in urban areas, the Rural Council report said. (Read more)

Quake's impact depended on location, geology; cats had inkling; rural nuclear plant had close call

The rare earthquake that rattled the Eastern U.S. Tuesday was felt by some and not by others, but cats seemed to get a hint of it in advance, according to news reports in the rural mid-Ohio Valley (southeast Ohio and west-central West Virginia).

A staffer at the West Virginia University extension office in Parkersburg, W.Va., told the News & Sentinel newspaper, "I thought my world was coming to an end. ... Everything was shaking, our chairs moved and other things moved." Another local person was taking a late lunch in the highlands just southeast of the city center, and said, "

I was up on Blennerhassett Heights and didn't feel a thing."

A geology teacher at Marietta College, just upriver from Parkersburg on the Ohio side, told the paper that whether someone felt the quake depended on the geology under their particular building. "It's a function of the geologic material under a building," geologist Wendy Bartlett said. "Most of Marietta is built above bedrock, so the quake would be felt less than in an area like Parkersburg that's mostly located over floodplain material."

It seems the "some felt it, some didn't" phenomenon wasn't just among human residents of the region. The director of the local humane society in Parkersburg, Mary Ann Hollis, said the cats at the shelter started acting strange prior to the quake, but not the dogs. "The cats about an hour before were freaking out," Hollis said. "I really do think the cats picked it up." (Read more)

Blogger Paxus Calta, who lives in the Twin Oaks community just five miles southwest of the quake's epicenter of Mineral, Va., in Louisa County (Wikipedia map), writes: "I have lived in San Francisco and Santa Cruz for almost 10 years and this was the wildest ride I have had. The community rallies in these types of circumstances. We form effective little committees, the first of which went around and made sure all the members were accounted for and that everyone was okay."

The Central Virginian, the weekly newspaper in the county seat of Louisa, reports that schools in the county "are closed until after Labor Day to assess damage sustained at each school." The paper paraphrased Dominion Power officials as saying "that the two reactors at North Anna Power Station have been safely shut down. In March, they cited the earthquake rating of the plant at approximately 6.0." The quake was rated at 5.8 or 5.9. The nuclear facility (at upper right of MapQuest image) was built in conjunction with the impoundment of Lake Anna. It is about five miles from the epicenter near Mineral (purple pin on map; click on map for larger version). UPDATE, Sept. 1: Reuters reports the quake rattled and moved nuclear-waste containers at the plant, recalling warnings that environmental groups made when the plant was proposed in the late 1960s, Peter Galuszka of the Bacon's Rebellion blog writes on The Washington Post's website.

USDA and Council on Foundations agree to work together to help the rural economy

Many rural advocates have bemoaned the shortage of philanthropy in rural America. The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Council on Foundations recently signed a memorandum of understanding to encourage economic growth in rural America through creation of new sources of capital, job opportunities, workforce investment strategies, and additional resources, the USDA announced in a release.

USDA and the council will survey existing economic opportunities, link complementary resources and coordinate common agendas, in an effort to improve the quality of life in rural America by providing basic services and giving businesses the tools necessary to compete and create jobs. "While the government can provide critical assistance," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said in a speech to philanthropists last month, "more can be done if the government more effectively partners with the philanthropic community and the private sector."

Among government efforts to help rural economics, President Obama also announced the U.S. Small Business Administration and USDA will host conferences on rural private equity and venture capital nationwide to connect private equity and venture capital investors with new rural businesses. (Read more)

Dairy lawsuit, freshly revived, at center of farming's cultural-economic divide and political debates

Last Friday U.S. District Judge Ronnie Greer of Nashville nullified the $140 million settlement agreement between Dean Foods and a group of Southeastern dairy farmers, furthering the debate on the government's role in agriculture, Agri-Pulse reports, saying the case is at "the heart of farming's cultural divide" between small and large farmers and the ruling is a microcosm of the basic dispute about the role of government in agriculture." (Agri-Pulse image)

Greer's decision upheld a decade-old precedent regarding class-action lawsuits, set in the landmark case between cattle growers and a meatpacker. The precedent says class actions cannot proceed when some members of the class "benefit from the same acts alleged to be harmful to other members," Agri-Pulse reports.

While the Dean Foods case is currently unsettled – scheduled to go to trial Sept. 13 – Greer's "ruling is an important vindication for the notion that it's legitimate to have a full-requirements contract in the dairy industry or a formal contract for hogs or cattle even if some farmers won't, or can't meet the terms of the agreements and don't benefit," Agri-Pulse reports. The ruling may also show why Department of Justice anti-trust lawyers have been criticized for their lack of action against consolidation and integration of the livestock and meatpacking industries following last year's nationwide public hearings.

The Department of Agriculture's proposal to more closely regulate livestock and poultry marketing to protect small farmers is facing opposition from growers who support similar contract arrangements that will become more difficult with government involvement. USDA support of organic and small farms generates controversy, as some see "the administration as favoring" these farmers when policy disagreements arise with conventional and commerical-scale producers, reports Agri-Pulse, a Washington newsletter that is subscription-only but offers a four-week trial subscription.

Electronic emergency services at rural hospitals help patients, reduce transfers, save money

Electronic emergency services are bridging the gap between understaffed rural hospitals and specialist-saturated urban centers. One example is St. Michael's Hospital Avera, a 25-bed critical access hospital in Tyndall, S.D. It is one of about 60 rural hospitals that has signed up with Avera e-Emergency Services, a hospital-based telemedicine emergency support service.

From its operations hub in Sioux Falls, Avera emergency physicians like Dr. Brian Skow, right, and emergency-trained nurses help rural providers 24 hours a day, The Rural Assistance Center's Candi Helseth reports. They do everything from offer treatment advice to initiate diagnostic testing. "I didn't have any idea this existed," patient Leonard Hajek said. "The nurse pushed a button and just like that this doctor is on a TV screen talking to me."

The technology seems to be paying big dividends in patient care. It has reduced patient length of stay, patient transfers to tertiary-care hospitals and has saved money.

In Northern California, Sutter Health, the first health-care organization to connect a rural hospital to an electronic ICU, has likewise seen improvements in patient outcomes. "Deaths related to sepsis have decreased 28 percent system-wide and ICU patients' lengths of stay have decreased by 15 percent from 2007 to 2010," Helseth reports.

Rural physicians also appreciate the extra help and having access to a second opinion. "It means there is another doctor instantly available who I can consult and who is going to be helping if I need it. It makes me feel like I'm not as isolated practicing here," said Dr. Jill Kruse, family medicine physician at St. Michael's Hospital.

"Medicine isn't meant to be practiced in isolation," said Deanna Larson, vice president of Quality Initiatives and eCARE Services. "There are physicians who want to practice in rural areas but all of a sudden, they're everything to everyone and it's impossible to know every facet of medicine. They need access to peers for support. They also need time to sleep and see their families." (Read more)

USPS takes 25 Alaska post offices off its possible-closure list; all are off the road system

The U.S. Postal Service has spared 25 Alaska post offices from closure, at least for now, removing them from the list of more than 3,500 that may be shut this year as part of the service's effort to reduce its multi-billion-dollar deficits.

The move doesn't necessarily offer hope for threatened post offices in other states, because, as is so often true, Alaska is a special case. All 25 spared offices are off the road system, reports Andrew Sheeler of the Fairbanks News-Miner. Another 11 in the state remain on the list.

U.S. Sens. Mark Begich and Lisa Murkowski had voiced concerns about the impact of post-office closings. "Murkowski noted many of the communities are dependent on their post office for more than just mail," Sheeler writes. "Such needs run the range from medicine to absentee ballots, as well as groceries and supplies." (Read more)

As economic worries deepen, news outlets need to return to the facts, or the best expert opinions

Concern over the economy has risen to the point that it calls for commentary and background in news outlets that usually focus on local matters. One of the best servcies these outlets can perform is to get past the partisan and ideological arguments and offer a reliable set of facts (or at least the consensus of expert opinions) for readers, listeners and viewers.

The nonprofit, nonpartisan, investigative news service ProPublica did that last week, laying out a series of "economic myths" and giving the contrary facts. For example, the percentage of income taken by taxes has been going down lately, not up; the stimulus package did not fail, but it fell short of its goals, and more than a third of it came in tax cuts. Read more and share.

Obama on bus tour: 'Democrats need to show up in rural communities'

President Obama's bus tour in rural Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois last week, preceded by creation of the White House Rural Council and its issuance of a report, showed that rural voters remain part of the electoral calculus of a man who may be America's most urban president. (Associated Press photo)

Obama doesn't need "the traditionally conservative rural vote," Phillip Hayes, a former Senate agriculture subcommittee staff director, writes for Politico. "He only needs to keep Republican support low enough that the traditionally left-leaning urban vote can put him over the top."

"Obama did better in rural America in 2008 than any Democratic presidential candidate since Bill Clinton," veteran farm journalist Jerry Hagstrom writes for Ag Week. "That was because Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the Republican candidate, had opposed both the Farm Bill and ethanol [subsidies] and because the Obama campaign focused more on rural America than most Democratic candidates have."

Hayes says Obama borrowed a page from George W. Bush's 2000 playbook by forming "a team of agricultural advisers from the farming community to monitor the heartland’s pulse." (Read more) That was evident last week, at meetings that featured groups representing "smaller farmers, minority farmers and other rural Americans who are more likely to vote Democratic than Republican," Hagstrom writes. "The White House said that 125 rural leaders had been invited to the forum and that 26 states were represented."

Hagstrom's 2,342-word report is a good summary of the tour, during which Obama repeated his support for a cap on farm subsidies. "Caps are not popular with the large farmers who produce most of the nation’s food, but they are popular with small farmers who think that the subsidies help the big farmers expand and compete unfairly for land," Hagstrom notes.

"Several participants complained about too much regulation from the Environmental Protection Agency and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission," Hagstrom reports. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack "noted that he had encouraged EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, who was not part of the bus tour, to see more of rural America, which she has done. Vilsack suggested 'maybe people who are doing regulating need to do a better job of communicating.' Traveling to rural communities 'is an eye-opening experience,' he said. 'There just isn’t enough of that.'" (Read more)

Our favorite report from the tour was Obama's interview with Doug Burns of the Daily Times Herald in Carroll, Iowa. The two became acquainted (2007 photo) during Obama's caucus campaign, in which he targeted rural newspapers, and that shows in the interview transcript.

Burns asked Obama if the Supreme Court needs a rural justice, and the president called that "a great question" and said, "I’d like to see more diversity of experience on the court." Asked why recent elections have seen rural voters go more Republican, Obama told Burns, "I think that there are cultural issues. There have been times in the past at least where some of these social issues or wedge issues made rural communities suspicious of Democratic candidates. But I also think that Democrats need to show up in rural communities. I may not win every rural community but I tell you what, I’m certainly going to lose them if people don’t feel like I’m paying attention to ’em." (Read more)

Kansas paper finds state's farmers have gotten very little from annual Farm Aid concert

Farm Aid, the annual concert held to help family farmers continue farming, was held in Kansas City Aug. 13, prompting the Lawrence Journal-World to ask how much has gone to help farmers in Kansas, a state strongly identified with farming. It turns out that Kansas farm interests have received only about 0.2 percent of the $36 million Farm Aid has raised since 1985, the newspaper's Sarah Henning found. The main reason, Henning suggests, is a lack of applicants from the Sunflower State. (Read more)

Farm Aid may give grants only to non-profit organizations that apply for funding, Fox 4 in Kansas City reports. Unfortunately many farmers don't apply. With five applications this year, "we have more grant applications from Kansas groups than ever, Jennifer Fahy of Farm Aid, told Fox 4. Farm Aid does more than give money to farmers; it helps them by "working on issues of credit which is hard to come by for farmers" and "raising awareness about the need for help," Fahy added. (Read more)

EPA 'environmental justice' tour of Eastern Kentucky rankles coal industry and its allies

Environmental Protection Agency officials met with leaders and other residents of four Eastern Kentucky communities last week to discuss the environmental impact of coal mining on their communities. Residents and leaders voiced concerns about water quality, air pollution and economic conditions, but the coal industry supporters criticized what the agency called an "environmental justice" trip, calling it "one-sided and anti-coal", Erica Peterson of WFPL Radio in Louisville reports.

Stanley Sturgill, a Lynch City Council member and former federal mine inspector, told the officials from EPA Region 4 in Atlanta, "If you're concerned, you're branded that you're against coal, any way, shape, form or fashion. We have tried to get that point across – we're not. We're strictly against surface mining; we're for underground mining." For more from Anders Eld of the Harlan Daily Enterprise, click here.

U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Somerset, and Charles Baird, chairman of Pikeville-based Coal Operators and Associates, were among those criticizing EPA for its lack of notice. The officials offered to meet with industry representatives for an hour on Friday, "but many members of the mining industry were at a conference in Lexington," Peterson reports. To read statements from industry supporters, via a story from WYMT-TV in Hazard, click here. For a reply from Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, go here. For a Lexington Herald-Leader editorial, here.

Use of corn for ethanol is predicted to exceed use for animal feed for the first time

Ethanol plants are predicted to use 200 million more bushels of corn than the nation's livestock and poultry producers, according the U. S. Department of Agriculture's Crop Production and Supply/Demand report. This is the first time ethanol use estimates are larger than feed estimates, University of Missouri Cooperative Media Group reports for Southwest Farm Press. "That's a first-time-ever type of change," Ron Plain, economist for University of Missouri Extension said. "For forever, feed was the largest single use of corn."

Sustained high corn prices caused many farmers to reduce livestock and poultry numbers to cut costs and get a better price, reducing meat production forecasts for next year, the media group reports. "You have to go back to 1955 to find a smaller amount of corn to be fed to livestock in the U. S. That is going to make things tough for the livestock and poultry industries," Plain said. (Read more)

A new USDA report tracks the expansion of corn production in the last decade and the effect on other crops and land use.

Midwest, Plains economy slowing down, new survey suggests

A survey of bankers in rural parts of Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming shows economic slowdown for this region, The Associated Press reports. "The overall Rural Mainstreet index for the region dipped below 50 for the first time this year, hitting 49.3 in August," the story says.

Despite healthy farm income, hiring has declined among rural businesses and "bankers are losing confidence in the economy," Ernie Goss, lead surveyor and economist at Creighton University told AP. Thirty-five percent of those surveyed believe the U. S. will be in another recession by year-end. (Read more)

Railway removes some coal dust information from website

BNSF Railway, shipper of Powder River Basin coal in the Northwest U. S., has removed information from its website following the recent debate about coal dust, according to Eric de Place of Sightline Daily. The website provides a snapshot of the most important environmental, social and economic news affecting the Northwest. The item part of the site's research series, 'The Dirt on Coal'. (The Bellingham Herald photo by Philip Dwyer)

de Place provides a screenshot of the original BNSF's 'Coal Dust Frequently Asked Questions' and reports that he original website said "500 pounds to a ton of coal can escape from a single loaded car" and dust accumulations between rails can undermine track structure and cause derailments or result in fires. The new website does not have this information. (Read more)

Alaska Native corporation will close its chain of six rural weekly newspapers in August; UPDATED

UPDATE, Aug. 19: Edgar Blatchford, veteran journalist and associate professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage, has purchased the last two, of six, Alaskan newspapers scheduled to end publication on Aug. 31. "I appreciate Calista's commitment to rural journalism and I'm excited about the possibility of the Seward Phoenix Log and The Tundra Drums," Blatchford told The Cordova Times. "I see tremendous potential in working with local people." (Read more) Earlier, The Arctic Sounder, The Dutch Harbor Fisherman and The Bristol Bay Times were sold to Jason Evans, chairman of Sitnasuak Native Corp., and his wife, Kiana Peacock, president of an International Association of Machinists union local and chief shop steward for employees of Alaska Airlines, reports the online Alaska Dispatch.

UPDATE, Aug. 3: The editor of The Cordova Times, Jennifer Gibbins, is buying the paper, thus keeping alive the oldest one in the chain. The other papers' last editions have been set for the week of Aug. 15, but "The company said it continues to entertain offers for the individual publications," the Alaska Dispatch reports.

The Alaska Native corporation that has published a chain of six weekly newspapers in rural Alaska for 19 years is liquidating its newspaper company after failing to find a buyer, leaving most of the rural communities without a local news outlet.

Calista Corp. said Alaska Newspapers Inc. is unprofitable and will stop publishing some time next month. ANI publishes The Cordova Times on Prince William Sound, The Seward Phoenix Log on the Kenai Peninsula, The Dutch Harbor Fisherman in the Aleutian Islands, The Bristol Bay Times in Southwest Alaska, and The Tundra Drums in the Yukon-Kuskokwim River Delta (the corporation's service area), The Arctic Sounder in Northwest Alaska and the North Slope, and First Alaskans magazine. Richard Mauer of the Anchorage Daily News, in a comprehensive story, notes that The Cordova Times is 97 years old.

About three years ago, the company brought its field reporters into its Anchorage office, occasionally sending them out to their coverage areas, then re-stationed reporters in (from west on Google map) Unalaska, Bethel, Seward and Cordova. It started a content-sharing agreement with Alaska Dispatch, an online publication founded in 2008 and funded since 2009 by Alice Rogoff, former chief financial officer of U.S. News & World Report. The Dispatch's Craig Medred writes, "Newspapers in rural Alaska have been struggling like those elsewhere as news increasingly moves to the Internet." He notes the withdrawal of the Daily News to its home area, and lists the other dailies in the state and their owners, none based in Alaska.

"We genuinely hope the communities affected by this will find a new media voice to tell their stories," Calista CEO Andrew Guy said in the corporation's announcement.

UPDATE, July 25: The undersigned gave an interview about this story to Mike Mason of KLDG Radio in Dillingham, on Bristol Bay. For streaming audio, click here. For download, here.

Advisory panel endorses fracking, with caution

Continued use of hydraulic fracturing in natural-gas drilling has been approved by a U. S. Department of Energy advisory panel "as long as companies disclose more about their practices and monitor their environmental impact," Juliet Eilperin of The Washington Post reports. (Associated Press photo by Ralph Wilson)

The panel's report encourages better monitoring of fracking, as the practice is called, and the development of "best practices" across the industry, Eilperin reports."The group offered a different approach to overseeing fracking,"John Deutch, a chemistry professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who chaired the advisory panel, said in an interview. "You measure, you disclose what you measure, and use these measurements to improve the way you operate in the field and reduce your environmental impact."

The report, which a New York Times editorial endorsed as a "sensible" middle ground between environmentalists who would ban fracking and energy interests that see no threat, is separate from the Environmental Protection Agency's study on the environmental and public health effects of fracking. (Read more)

Rural military participation overstated, but higher than urban

The White House is reporting rural residents, which represent 17 percent of the population, provide 44 percent of military personnel. Bill Bishop, editor of the Daily Yonder says this number is vastly overstated. "Rural communities are providing far more of their young to military service than the cities," Bishop writes. "But the percentage of rural residents in the military is still much less than half of what Vilsack and the White House and the White House Rural Council assert."

The White House appears to have grouped numbers from two different sources together despite any obvious relationship, Bishop reports. The 17 percent rural population figure is from the U.S. Census Bureau, and it appears the 44 percent is from a 2005 Washington Post story. (Read more)

White House spokesman Matt Lehrich admits the 44 percent is from the Washington Post story, but would not would not explain why the White House continues to use the statistic without verifying it with the Defense Department, Howard Berkes of NPR reports.

Suggesting the overstated number is inconsequential, Lehrich told Berkes, "Regardless of how you do the math, the point we were making is clear and important: Rural Americans are serving at a disproportionate rate and are an integral part of our military." (Read more)

Local television station goes off-air without explanation

TV 43, most recently known as Source 16, in Hopkinsville, Ky., aired its last local news coverage on Aug. 5th. The newscast marked the end of a 26-year tradition. The station, once owned by The Kentucky New Era, was acquired by NewWave Communications in April 2010. (Read more)

Little else is known about the closure, as "officials from the station and NewWave Communications . . . did not return requests for comment," The Kentucky New Era reports.

Weekly newspaper publisher remembered

Following the unexpected death of Clyde Briggs (right), 60, former publisher of The Johnstown Breeze, former co-workers paid tribute to Briggs by writing about him. Five journalists and former journalists salute their mentor in this unique collection of stories that provides a glimpse into the practices of one small weekly newspaper. Briggs owned from 1980 to 1997 with his wife Ardis Briggs. (Read more)

Mountaintop-removal documentary criticized for narrow focus

The CNN documentary "Battle for Blair Mountain" is being criticized for its 'jobs vs. environment' approach "

The headline on the web piece is your first sign that the piece needs some help: 'Steady job or healthy environment: What would you choose?'," Kate Shepperd of Mother Jones argues. Matt Wasson of Appalachian Voices questions the jobs vs. environment focus and suggests the focus "is devoid of any actual analysis of whether that frame is appropriate." (Read more)

Other flaws include the lack of coverage on public health and reclamation issues, Shepperd says. For example, the documentary doesn't cite recent studies linking mountain-top removal to cancer, birth defects, and lung and kidney problems. When the documentary speaks about reclamation, it focuses on appearance rather than the destruction of an ecosystem. (Read more)

Jeff Biggers of AlterNet Blog, credits O'Brien and CNN with outing Army Corps of Engineers's faulty stream mitigation practices in the film but suggests the documentary failed to "tell the other side" of the story by interviewing residents living under the fallout of mountaintop-removal operations.

Ken Ward writes on Coal Tattoo, the documentary presents "a pretty balanced overview of the different sides of the story." It includes statements by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and local residents -- like Chuck Kenney, a history instructor at a West Virginia community college who question mountaintop-removal and its impacts. (Read More)

The misuse of language and images in the documentary, however, are confusing. O'Brien equated conductivity with toxicity in interviewing Linda Dials, a strip miner's wife, about a test on the stream in front of her home. Conductivity indicates toxicity to life in streams but doesn't indicate toxicity to mammals that may drink from the streams. This point was further muddled when Jim Dial explains that they don't see dead deer. In addition, when the documentary points out that the Spruce Mine would bury seven miles of streams, the video showed a river or very large creek, much larger than the streams that would be buried by mountaintop removal.

Historic bridge one of many deemed 'unsafe'

An historic bridge in Shelby County, Ky., may be closed after it was deemed unsafe in a recent state inspection. The bridge is among several cited in a recent state inspection report as having critical structural deficiencies, and similar reports are available in every state.

The Whoda Thot It Bridge was scheduled to be replaced as a part a two-year state plan, but the bridge was subsequently placed lower on the state's priority list, Lisa King of The Sentinel-News reports. An estimated $1.1 million in repairs are needed, and state officials decided the cost was too high for the rural area that the bridge serves. The bridge is named for a Sentinel-News column written by the late Bennett Roach.

Judge-Executive Rob Rothenburger says he has instructed the county road supervisor to be ready to close the bridge Tuesday following the fiscal court meeting, King reports. The length of the proposed closure will be set by the fiscal court and could become permanent pending a public hearing. Officials had hoped to repair the bridge because of its historic value. (Read more)

Study shows less antibiotic-resistant bacteria on organic poultry farms

Poultry farms that switch to organic practices have lower levels of one type of antibiotic-resistant bacteria than conventional poultry farms, according to a new study by the University of Maryland.

The study follows a recent Salmonella outbreak in ground turkey that has been linked to antibiotic-resistant bacteria. However, industry representatives continue to dispute that antibiotic use in agriculture may contribute to antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

(Associated Press photo by Seth Perlman)

For this study, researchers compared 10 conventional poultry farms with 10 farms that recently changed to organic practices and found "a much smaller percentage of bacteria at the organic farms," The Huffington Post reports, "indicating that the use of antibiotics in animals encourages the spread of drug resistant bacteria." (Read more)

Industry groups question evidence linking antibiotic use with the growth of drug-resistant bacteria. "Antibiotics have been safely used on farms, along with other animal drugs, for half a century to treat and control disease in animals and to improve the animal's overall health, allowing for greater productivity," Sherri Rosenblatt, spokeswoman for the National Turkey Federation told Bill Tomson of The Wall Street Journal.

BIG Center poised to grow jobs

A new program designed to assist small businesses could generate almost 125 jobs and nearly $6 million in private investments during its first five years, Katie Roach of WYMT News reports.

The Business Innovation and Growth (BIG) Center in London, Ky., is part of Kentucky Highlands Investment Corporation, which serves 22 counties in southern and eastern Kentucky. The services provided by the BIG Center are designed to accelerate the growth of small businesses and, as a result, create jobs.

"We would like to bring in businesses that are high growth that can bring in jobs," Jim Carroll, the center's director told Roach. "Have them here for a year or two, then graduate them onto renting something back in their home county" and give another business access to the center's resources, Carroll said. (Read more.)

The facility helps small businesses by providing access to office space, training rooms, conference rooms, and other resources for as little as $150 per month.

To read the Times-Tribune, Corbin, Ky., coverage including a listing of start-up companies, click here.