Pa. court will decide if Marcellus gas should be redefined as a mineral, voiding leases

Marcellus shale gas drillers and landowners must wait for a lower court to determine whether thousands of drilling leases are legitimate, following the Pennsylvania Superior Court's ruling that oil and gas ownership rights are unclear, Jim Polson and Mike Lee of Bloomberg report.

This ruling comes following a legal dispute in which the defendants argue shale gas is contained within rocks and should be considered part of the mineral rights, despite the state's century-old practice of considering oil and gas rights separate, Bloomberg reports.

"The case may take as long as two years" to make its way through the lower court, Davide Fine, attorney for K&L Gates LLP said in a phone interview. Meanwhile, many gas and oil companies "may need to check the title to thousands of oil and gas properties they've leased," David Poole, general counsel of Range Resources Corp. told Bloomberg.

Ken Komoroski, attorney with Fulbright & Jaworski LLP in Pittsburgh, suggests a trade association or gas producer petition the Supreme Court to expedite the appeal process, Bloomberg reports.

Federal nutrition program may mean higher lunch prices for most school districts

Schools may have to raise lunch prices as a result of the child nutrition bill signed last December after President Obama's latest attempt to provide free meals to school children in poor areas failed. The bill, calling for more fresh produce and less whole milk in school cafeterias, requires districts to raise prices to cover the cost of meal preparation. The changes will happen next school year and will make the national average paid for lunch $2.46, Fernanda Santos of The New York Times reports.

This increase marks the first time since 1946, when the school lunch program started, that the federal government has involved itself with lunch prices. Under the $10 billion program, the government reimburses districts $2.72 for free meals, $2.32 for reduced-price meals and 26 cents for the full-price version. Along with proceeds from meal and snack sales, this money is put into a larger pot, but the range of what schools across the country charge for lunch varies greatly in order to make meals affordable for all students.

The undersecretary of agriculture for food, nutrition and consumer service, Kevin Concannon, oversees the school lunch program. He told Santos the price increase will allow districts to make adjustments in order to serve kids healthier meals. Some school officials see it differently. Eric Goldstien, who is in charge of New York City Schools' food program, said the bill might make more parents completely skip paying lunch fees, already a problem for districts that have to absorb the unpaid fees, which can reach into the millions of dollars.

There's also a worry that families whose income is just above a threshold for their children to receive free or reduced-price meals may be saddled with a larger financial burden in order to pay higher lunch prices, Santos reports. Diane Pratt-Heavener, a spokeswoman for the School Nutrition Association, which represents cafeteria administrators, told Santos: “We could be shooting ourselves in the foot here if we’re not setting prices at a level that parents are able or willing to pay." (Read more)

Rural residents unhappy with president's endorsement of ending Saturday mail delivery

President Obama's endorsement of the U.S. Postal Service's wish to end Saturday mail delivery will affect rural areas the most, Todd Kleffman of The Advocate-Messenger in Danville, Ky., reports.

Local resident Holly Henson told Kleffman people living in the Kentucky town of about 16,000 rely on Saturday mail delivery. She receives prescriptions and vitamins for cancer treatment through the mail and worries delivery could be delayed if the post office is closed on Saturday.

Carolyn Smith, postmistress in Hustonville, a very small town near Danville, told Kleffman that the two hours her post office is open on Saturday morning are busy because people who don't have time to come in during the week do so then. She said if the post office wasn't open on Saturday, "it would make people unhappy." (Read more)

Education Dept. will offer to waive No Child Left Behind Act in return for states' policy changes

President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan will announce tomorrow that they will waive major parts of the No Child Left Behind Act if states "adopt changes that could include the expansion of charter schools, linking teacher evaluation to student performance and upgrading academic standards," Lyndsey Layton reports for The Washington Post. "As many as 45 states are expected to seek waivers."

Many rural schools and districts have had difficulty complying with key components of the law, a bipartisan measure passed early in the presidential term of George W. Bush. Duncan, senators and representatives had been discussing legislation to change the act, but Duncan recently said "There’s a level of dysfunction in Congress that’s paralyzing." Now the administration is effectively rewriting the law on its own, Jack Jennings, president of the nonpartisan Center on Education Policy, told Layton: “It’s a momentous development.”

Republicans question Duncan's authority to grant waivers in return for changes, and one of those who had been working on legislation with him, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., has "filed a bill to restrict Duncan’s ability to issue waivers," Layton reports.

UPDATE, Sept. 23: The Obama Administration said it will approve waivers for "specific NCLB mandates that are stifling reform." They will be granted only if states can prove they are moving schools toward college and career-ready standards, developing new accountability standards and making reforms supporting instruction and school leadership. These factors will be determined based upon an overall index score that tallied through a set list of indicators including things like assessment, yearly progress and teacher and principal readiness. For the administration statement, click here. For a report from Stateline Daily, go here.

On a conference call with Duncan, Kentucky Education Secretary Terry Holiday and Georgia Schools Superintendent John Barge, Duncan said these reforms are intended to "encourage local solutions," and will allow states to decide what is best for their students. He said if he hadn't seen leadership from states like Kentucky and Georgia these reforms would not have happened.

The impact this change will have on rural schools was not discussed during the call, though much was said about identifying "low-achieving" schools, typically those in rural and urban areas where resources are limited, so funding needed to improve achievement could be funneled to them. Duncan said he anticipated the first waivers to be approved late this year and early next. Congressional authorization of more in-depth reforms to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act are pending.

Ohio-based webinar will tell farmers fracking risks

The controversial method of gas-well completion known as hydraulic fracturing continues to draw attention in rural America. The Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association thinks farmers who may lease their land for natural gas and oil should be made aware of the risks involved in fracking. The group will present a free webinar for farmers Tuesday, Sept. 27 at 6 p.m. It will feature analysis from the Ohio Environmental Council about fracking and its impact on the environment. For more information, click here.

Experts on both sides say environmental regulations have little overall effect on jobs

Despite much political rhetoric about "job-killing regulations," they do little overall damage and in some cases create jobs, according to experts, including some with ties to regulated industries. While there are many examples of regulations hurting particular businsses or industries, regulations mostly force jobs to be shifted, reports Marian Wang of ProPublica, an online investigative news service run by Paul Steiger, former managing editor of The Wall Street Journal.

Richard Morgenstern, who was with the Environmental Protection Agency during the Reagan and Clinton administrations and now works for Resources for the Future, a nonpartisan think tank, directed research 10 years ago which found "higher production costs pushed up prices, resulting in lost sales for businesses and some lost jobs, but the job losses were also offset by new jobs created in pollution abatement," Wang writes.

She reports that data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows in the first half of 2011, employers reported regulations caused them to layoff 0.2 to 0.3 percent of their employees, but the data don't factor in the number of jobs created as a result of regulation. This is a very narrow way to determine whether or not a regulation is good or bad, Wang writes, noting that the real measure of a successful regulations is "whether it improves waterways or lengthens lives or protects the public as promised."

Cutting through "job-killing" rhetoric is key to understanding that. As Roger Noll, co-director of the Program on Regulatory Policy at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, told Wang: "The effect of regulation on jobs has nothing to do with the mess we’re in. The current rhetoric about regulation killing jobs is nothing more than not letting a good crisis go to waste." (Read more)

Why new roads take years: environmental and historical concerns, politics, economics and more

It took Kentucky 14 years to replace this road.

Ever wonder why it takes so long to build a new highway? Sean Slone of The Lane Report in Kentucky takes almost 4,000 words to tell us, but he makes it an easy read. It's the first part of the magazine's look at the state's "complex and labyrinthine road construction process." Next month's will be about the "dozens of revenue sources" that can be used to build roads. Outside the money, the process differs relatively little from state to state, especially if federal funds are involved, so Slone's report is a good reference for those not familiar with the details of highway planning, design and construction.

The process "is composed of at least six smaller processes, each with its own challenges, requirements and procedures," Slone writes. "Each contributes to the lengthy overall timeframe, some more than others. Projects all must follow a similar linear progression of required milestones (particularly when federal funds are used), but each also is unique and subject to an array of delays, setbacks, renegotiations, unexpected discoveries and changing priorities."

One of the most time-consuming elements is the study process required by the National Environmental Policy Act of 1970. "The linear nature of the NEPA process takes projects that could otherwise be approved in two or three years and makes them be approved in seven or 10 years, or sometimes never,” Phil Logsdon, assistant director for environmental analysis at the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, told Slone.

“The NEPA process is an incredibly burdensome process that is so slow and so costly that for 20, 25 or 30 years public officials at all levels of government, Republicans and Democrats, urban and rural, everyone has tried to determine how the NEPA process can be made more efficient. And I suspect 20 years from now we’ll be talking about it as well. We need to be able to do more things simultaneously.” (Read more)

UPDATE, Oct. 25: The second part of the series "explores the maze of requirements attached to federal money and issues created by dozens of tightly restricted revenue source. Part 2 also presents reform options being considered," The Lane Report says.

Congress will end direct payments to grain and cotton farmers, USDA economist says

Farmers are enjoyng record exports and high prices, but those successes make them more vulnerable to cuts to agriculture subsidies, reports veteran congressional correspondent David Rogers of Politico. Direct cash subsidies from taxpayers total about $5 billion a year, much of it going to households earning more than $100,000 a year, making them an easy target that Congress will eliminate, a Department of Agriculture economist told Rogers.

Last April's 10-year House Republican budget called for agriculture cuts of $30 billion. On Monday, President Obama proposed a 22 percent cut, including an end to direct payments and an $8 billion cut in crop insurance. Rogers says those two proposals mean that change will happen, and agriculture's challenge will be to transition smoothly and maintain a "safety net." The going in Congress may not be so smooth; Rogers notes clashes have already occurred between leaders of the House and Senate agriculture committees on one side and the 12-member deficit "super committee," who Rogers says are not "equipped to write agriculture policy."

Advocates for subsidized crops are showing up at political fundraisers, trying to earn support for their industry. Some, such as the National Cotton Council, have written plans that doen't include direct payments. Corn interests have written a plan relying on insurance-premium subsidies. One thing is sure, USDA economist Keith Collins told Rogers: "The argument for direct payments is their economic neutrality . . . but their downside is the same as their upside: They are unrelated to price and production, and thus income. They get made even in boom times. In this budget environment, they are going to be eliminated." (Read more)

Students who need funding are less appealing to some financially squeezed universities

As tuition at higher education institutions continues to climb, Tamar Lewin of the New York Times reports on a survey by Inside Higher Ed, an online resource for higher-education professionals, that reveals college admissions officers are now actively avoiding recruiting students who require financial aid, thus excluding many from poor and middle-class homes.

More than a third of the 462 admissions and enrollment directors at four-year colleges and universities said they worked harder the previous year to enroll students who could pay full price without assistance. Many admitted the poor economy was driving their decisions. Meanwhile, one-fourth said they felt pressure from trustees or development officers to admit certain applicants. “We certainly have standards, but there needs to be awareness that when the economy starts to crumble, the standards may start to go out the window,” David Hawkins, director of public policy and research at the National Association for College Admission Counseling, told Lewin.

The top priority for admissions officers at four-year institutions was to recruit international students who pay higher tuition, but at community colleges, officers reported being most concerned with providing financial aid to low and middle-income students, and were more focused on cuts to state funding than whether or not students can pay without financial aid, Lewin reports. (Read more)

Feds' money for tutoring required by NCLB seems ineffective; schools want to spend it differently

School districts across the country are finding that taxpayer-funded tutoring required by the federal No Child Left Behind Act has not helped their schools, and in rural areas where tutoring services are not readily available, districts have found it consistently difficult to comply with NCLB standards.

Julie Hubbard of The Tennessean reports that the tutoring provision was added to NCLB as a way to help low-income students in schools that fail to meet testing benchmarks for three or more years. This forced districts to set aside 20 percent of federal funding for tutoring services. Jack Jennings, president and CEO of the Center on Education Policy, told Hubbard that only about a fifth of students qualifying for tutoring actually apply to receive it, and what tutors teach doesn't line up with what students encounter in the classroom. Only one of four research studies showed tutoring had a positive effect.

Tennessee is one of three states whose education departments are asking the federal Department of Education to let them use money set aside for tutoring services in other ways that have been proven to help students, such as instituting longer days. Education Secretary Arne Duncan has written a draft waiver proposal that would give districts discretion in how they spend this money, but House Republicans oppose the plan because they say parents should have options and tutoring allows private industry to be involved in schools. (Read more)

Breaking down Obama's deficit-reduction speech: Parts were misleading and confusing

Glenn Kessler of The Washington Post believes certain statements from President Obama's speech about taxes and spending on Monday may be "misleading and probably confusing" for many Americans, so he breaks down major points from the speech and examines the facts behind them.

Obama claimed his plan would cut $2 in spending for every $1 gained in revenue. Kessler says that depends upon how you define the "baseline for spending." He reports that Obama is including $1.09 trillion in savings from ending the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, but this same measure was included in Obama's February budget and he never intended to spend this money in the first place. An unnamed administration official argued to Kessler the earlier budget was never enacted, so this still counts as a cut.

The president also said the American Jobs Act would not add to the national debt, but that is untrue in the short-term. Kessler found the bill would add $303 billion to the deficit, but would slowly start to decrease it around 2013 and pick up speed in subsequent years. Kessler notes that those future numbers are all estimates and would depend on decisions of future Congresses. (Read more)

Severe drought in the Southern Plains could stretch into a multi-year event

La Nina, the weather phenomenon that cools the Pacific and warms the center of North America, is causing a year-long drought in the Southern Plains, and its return could prolong the toughest season farmers say they've ever seen.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the drought could become a multi-year event. Brian Fuchs, a climatologist with the National Drought Mitigation Center, told Tiffany Stecker of Environment & Energy News that recovering from severe droughts is a slow process, and the fear is that a multi-year drought would have dire consequences on farmers in the Southern Plains. Here's an interactive map illustrating the drought:

The drought has already caused damage in several states and is keeping farmfor the year ers from planting crops at the proper time. Stecker reports that Texas agriculture has already suffered $8.7 billion in losses, with $2.3 billion in the state's leading cash crop, cotton. Growers in Oklahoma report being 15 to 20 inches short of rain for the year and wheat farmers are finding it difficult to plant at all. (Read more)

Telemedicine helps rural hospitals use drug to prevent death and disability from strokes

Telemedicine may be a cost-effective way for rural hospitals without adequate neurology staff to gain the ability to treat stroke patients with a clot-busting drug that is little used in rural areas, a new study in the peer-reviewed journal Neurology suggests.

By comparing the costs and quality-adjusted life years of patients who were treated with telestroke, a new telemedicine technique for strokes, with those treated through standard care, researchers found "the cost of telestroke over a person's lifetime was less than $2,500 per quality-adjusted life year," WIAT-TV CBS 42 in Birmingham, Ala. reports.

Only 2 to 4 percent of stroke patients now get tPA, a clot-busting drug that can prevent death and disability if administered in the first few hours following a stroke, "with the lowest percentages in rural areas largely because there aren't enough stroke experts with experience using tPa," Jennifer J. Majersik, researcher at the University of Utah School of Medicine, said in an interview. If reimbursement rates and high equipment costs improve, "Telestroke has the potential to greatly diminish the striking disparity in stroke care for rural America," Majerik added. (Read more)

Topix seems to enjoy dragging small towns into the gutter; here's our invitation for it to get out

We reported early this year that local forums run by Topix were both revealing and creating problems for rural places; today The New York Times picked up on the story and got down to the nitty-gritty, with examples from several small towns. Kansas City-based reporter A.G. Sulzberger, son of publisher Arthur Sulzberger, went to the Ozark town of Mountain Grove and Dee's Place, a local hangout where "people are not happy" about Topix:

A waitress, Pheobe Best, said that the site had provoked fights and caused divorces. The diner’s owner, Jim Deverell, called Topix a “cesspool of character assassination.” And hearing the conversation, Shane James, the cook, wandered out of the kitchen tense with anger. His wife, Jennifer, had been the target in a post titled “freak,” he said, which described the mother of two as, among other things, “a methed-out, doped-out whore with AIDS.” Not a word was true, Mr. and Ms. James said, but the consequences were real enough. Friends and relatives stopped speaking to them. Trips to the grocery store brought a crushing barrage of knowing glances. She wept constantly and even considered suicide. Now, the couple has resolved to move.

Sulzberger writes that the concerns about Internet bullying and privacy are familiar, "but in small towns there are complications. The same Web sites created as places for candid talk about local news and politics are also hubs of unsubstantiated gossip, stirring widespread resentment in communities where ties run deep, memories run long and anonymity is something of a novel concept."

UPDATE: The story quotes Christian Sandvig, an associate professor in communication and media at the University of Illinois, as saying “Something about rural culture seems to make people want to have conversations in public.” But on the Huffington Post, Sandvig writes, “There are problems. Yet it's not clear to me that these are rural problems.” And the Daily Yonder says the Times should have noted Speak Your Piece, a feature of The Mountain Eagle in Whitesburg, Ky., in which anonymous, phoned-in comments are published after being filtered by the weekly's staff.

Topix has found "an unexpected niche in communities of a few hundred or few thousand people — particularly in what Chris Tolles, Topix’s chief executive, calls 'the feud states.' One of the most heavily trafficked forums, he noted, is Pikeville, Ky., once the staging ground for the Hatfield and McCoy rivalry."

That's about enough, Mr. Tolles. You and your newspaper paymasters (Gannett Co., the McClatchy Co. and Tribune Co.) are hereby invited to take your foul product out of rural America. And perhaps newspapers in towns where Topix draws many readers should ask themselves if that's partly because they don't turn over enough rocks and/or run vigorous editorial pages that inspire responsible debate.

Illinois officials are out to get the Asian carp, and hunger, simultaneously

Asian carp keep swimming to the surface of the news, as people along the Great Lakes and the Illinois River try to decide how to deal with the invasive fish. To keep them out of the lakes, perhaps ruining their fisheries, officials have tried to use electric shock; now others are placing the fish on "invasivore" dinner menus. In Illinois, the state Department of Natural Resources hopes the fish can be removed from the Mississippi, Illinois and Ohio rivers and served in food banks and kitchens across the state.

Pamela King of Greenwire reports that the campaign, Target Hunger Now, builds off the 30-year-old Illinois Sportsmen Against Hunger program in which hunters donate a portion of their venison harvest to poor families through independent processors and distributors. Through Target Hunger Now, the state agency contracts anglers to catch Asian carp and handles processing and distribution.

Tracy Smith, director of a partner organization to Target Hunger Now, Feeding Illinois, told King the public has been receptive to the idea of eating Asian carp. The fish are rich in protein, a nutrient often overlooked by struggling families during hard times. However, a spokesman for the agency told King this solution is a short-term one; they are looking for a way to completely eradicate the fish.

CNN discovers that rural communities rely on themselves to help students achieve

Rural schools face issues and problems that their urban counterparts don't, pushing schools in rural areas to rely on community support to help students achieve, reports Sally Holland, education producer for CNN. (Photo: East Hickman School in Tennessee, from the Hickman County Times)

Though less than a fourth of Americans are now classified as rural, Department of Education data shows that over a third of U.S. public schools are in rural areas and they have about a fourth of the nation's students. But those numbers mean rural schools tend to have fewer students, and funding usually depends upon enrollment numbers. And low funding can mean low pay that complicates teacher recruitment and retention.

On the other hand, "One of the advantages of a rural area, is that everybody knows everybody and helps support everybody," Greg Ray, superintendent of the Mediapolis School District in southeast Iowa, told Holland. While the district has too few students to have a class in Chinese, Ray found a local Chinese native to teach an online course for it and other small districts.

Despite their challenges, Holland reports that rural high schools match the graduation rates of suburban high schools. Kris Amundson of Education Sector, a nonprofit that says it is working to change education policy to benefit students, told Holland that high graduation rates in rural areas are due largely to a "tremendous commitment" from the community to encourage students to get through high school. But that doesn't necessarily mean more rural kids are going to college, Amundson said. Only 17 percent of adults in rural areas have a college degree. Holland reports that students with college-educated parents are more likely to attend college themselves. (Read more)

Activists in college towns hope to make them 1st Ky. places with fairness laws outside major cities

There are two Kentuckys: rural, where very few gay and lesbian people live; and urban, where 2010 Census found more than 10 same-sex couples per 1,000 households, compared to the state average of 7, reports Jacalyn Carfagno of WEKU News in her two-part series about the state's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

LGBT people living in rural areas are obvious targets, Carfagno reports, citing an incident in Hazard in which two gay men were asked to leave a public pool, and one in Harlan where a lesbian couple reported being beaten by a group of men because of their sexual orientation. The latter incident caused the Kentucky Equality Federation, a non-profit promoting equality for LGBT people, to designate seven mountain counties in southeastern Kentucky a "special operating region" in which to "raise awareness about hate crimes based on sexual orientation and the group’s mission, intercede on behalf of victims of discrimination and hate crimes," Ralph Davis reports in the Hazard Herald.

Gays and lesbians in rural Kentucky lack protections of anti-discrimination "fairness" ordinances passed in urban centers of the state. In Berea, a college town of 13,000 where the state's Bluegrass region meets Appalachia, the city council has rebuffed activists' request to include LGBT people in a broader human-rights ordinance that is awaiting passage. Peter Smith of The Courier-Journal reports the activists have planned a rally today to urge the council to add sexual orientation to the list of protected minorities. If they prevail, Berea would be the only Kentucky city outside Northern Kentucky, Lexington and Louisville to have such an ordinance. (Read more) UPDATE, Sept. 21: The council voted last night for a human rights ordinance and commission to enforce it, but not to include sexual-orientation discrimination. Some council members said that would be considered later. For Smith's update, click here. For an on-the-scene report from Greg Kocher of the Lexington Herald-Leader, go here. (Herald-Leader photo of protesters by Mark Cornelison)

Berea is in Madison County; the county seat of Richmond, a larger town and home to Eastern Kentucky University, has declined to pass a fairness ordinance. This Friday 17 businesses on or near Main Street will "show support for local anti-discrimination protections in employment, housing, and public accommodations based on perceived sexual orientation and gender identity," Business Lexington reports.

Obama deficit plan would cut farm subsidies, let Postal Service end Saturday mail delivery

President Obama's deficit-reduction plan includes major cuts in agriculture programs, $33 billion over 10 years. It would eliminate direct payments to farmers and reduce subsidies to crop-insurance companies. It would also authorize the U.S. Postal Service to deliver mail only five days a week; USPS wants to eliminate Saturday delivery, an idea opposed by rural interests and newspapers.

While his overall proposal to the joint congressional committee formed to reduce the national debt is unlikely to pass, Obama's proposal sets markers for the negotiations and his re-election campaign. "The proposals provide a road map for cutting farm spending," writes Philip Brasher of the Gannett Washington Bureau. Obama said he "remains committed to a strong safety net for farmers, one that protects them from revenue losses that result from low yields or price declines, and strong crop insurance programs. But there are programs and places where funding is unnecessary or too generous."

On direct payments to grain and cotton farmers, recently been targeted by budget cutters, Obama said taxpayers continue to subsidize "farmers who are experiencing record yields and prices," and noted that "more than 50 percent of direct payments go to farmers with more than $100,000 in income." He added, "Economists have shown that direct payments have priced young Americans out of renting or owning the land needed to enter into farming."

Obama also proposes to cut conservation funding by $2 billion over 10 years, citing "the dramatic increase in funding (roughly 500 percent since enactment of the Farm Security and Rural Investments Act of 2002)," which he said has created redundancies and "difficulties in program administration." The agricultural cuts are on Pages 17 and 18 of the PDF proposal.

In addition to authorizing five-day mail delivery, on Page 23, Obama would address the USPS deficit by restructuring the funding of its its retiree health benefits, refund almost $7 billion it has paid into the system recently, allow the service "to offer non-postal products and increase collaboration with state and local governments" and allow it "to better align the costs of postage with the costs of mail delivery while still operating within the current price cap, and permit USPS to seek the modest one-time increase in postage rates it proposed a year ago." For opposing statements from Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and a mailers' lobby, click here. For a story from The Associated Press, click here.

At the Interior Department, money would be gained with a fee on non-producing oil and gas leases, reform hardrock-mining leases and other measures, listed on Pages 31-32. For the White House summary sheet of the entire plan, click here.

Drug-induced deaths, fueled by prescription-drug abuse, exceeded traffic fatalities in 2009

For the first time since such data were compiled, drug-induced deaths outnumbered traffic fatalities in the United States in 2009, largely due to the increase in prescription-drug abuse, the Los Angeles Times reports today.

Using Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data, reporters Lisa Girion, Scott Glover and Doug Smith found that drug deaths totaled 37,485 in 2009, the last year for which the data are available. They calculated that deaths from pain and anxiety drugs have increased 284 and 256 percent, respectively, since 2000.

Prescriptions can help those who need the medicine, but can also fuel a black market of drug trafficking. The Times reports that the most commonly prescribed medication in the nation is hydrocodone, or Vicodin, which has been prescribed more than top cholesterol drugs and antibiotics.  The other most commonly abused prescription drugs are OxyContin, Xanax, Soma and a newcomer to the list, Fentanyl, 100 times more powerful than morphine.

The reporters write that these drugs are now causing more deaths than heroin and cocaine combined, and their analysis found the types of people dying from overdoses constitutes a wide range: from teenagers to working men and women who become addicted after taking the medication for job-related injuries. Public health officials are using this report to call attention to the growing prescription drug abuse problem, which those officials label an epidemic. To view an interactive map illustrating the rise in drug deaths by state, click here. New Mexico topped the list, followed closely by West Virginia. (Read more)

Scientists say water systems probably can't filter fracking chemicals; pattern of illness found

A group of scientists has determined that municipal water systems cannot filter chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing of natural-gas wells, or "fracking." In a letter to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the scientists said "It will be practically impossible" for drinking-water systems to protect against the chemicals, which include benzene, toxic metals, radioactive materials and surfactants and organic biocides.

Brian Nearing of the Albany Times Union reports that 59 experts from 18 states and seven other countries signed the letter. The state has proposed to ban fracking near watersheds that provide drinking water to New York City and Syracuse, but other watersheds would not have such protection. Cornell University ecology professor and letter signer Robert Howarth told Nearing that if the risk for watersheds providing water to New York City was too high, so was the risk for any watershed in the state. The NYC watershed, in the Catskill Mountains, is especially pristine.

In the wake of the letter's release, Abraham Lustgarten and Nicholas Kusnetz of ProPublica completed a review of government environmental reports, private lawsuits and interviews with many residents, physicians and toxicologists in four big gas-drilling states and found that cases of respiratory infections, headaches, neurological impairment, nausea and skin rashes, all believed to be caused by some aspect of fracking, have been occuring for the last decade in Colorado and Wyoming. Similar cases are just beginning to pop up in Pennsylvania, where drilling of the Marcellus Shale has recently increased. However, Lustgarten and Kusnetz write that the extent and cause of the problems is unknown, as neither states nor the federal government have tracked reports of such illnesses or investigated how drilling can affect human health. They also looked at Texas. (Read more)

Miner takes on coal company to protect the safety of himself and his fellow miners

Charles Scott Howard is an underground coal miner who earned the reputation of "whistleblower" in Letcher County, Kentucky, for his refusal to allow any activity that might endanger himself and his fellow miners while underground to go unchecked. For this conviction, the 30-year mining veteran has been disciplined, fired and "branded a troublemaker" for going above his superior's heads to report safety violations.

Perhaps his most famous safety violation report came four years ago when he testified to the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration, reports Dave Jamieson of the Huffington Post. This particular hearing concerned mine seals which were intended to avoid explosions. Howard showed the panel of MSHA officials a video of mine seals from the mine in which he was working at the time, owned by Cumberland River Coal Co. The video showed mine seals that were cracked to the point where water was coming through them. MSHA immediately sent inspectors to the mine. (Photo by Jamieson)

Jamieson reports that Howard abides by his personal code of "safety first" at great personal risk. He has filed five whistleblower-discrimination complaints against his company in five years. He's lost his job twice allegedly because of his safety complaints and had to be reinstated to work by a federal judge both times. However, he never loses his lawsuits, Jamieson writes; he either wins or settles, and only the latter reluctantly. (Read more)

Removing dams benefits environment and spawning fish; also creates tourism jobs

More deteriorating dams are being removed from streams in most of teh nation, Juliet Eilperin of The Washington Post reports. The main reaosns are aging infrastructure and declining fish stocks, and most see the rivers as more economically viable without the dams are gone, hoping tourism will increase.

Eilperin writes that 241 dams were removed between 2006 and 2010, a 40 percent increase over the previous five years. Most were in the East and Midwest, and had been major power sources in communities supported by textile and paper mills. Many state and local governments are trying to decide what to do with old dams. Most of America's 80,000 dams were built more than 50 years ago. It's often cheaper for local governments to remove dams than restore them.

Some detractors say taxpayers shouldn't have to pay for removing dams they do not own, but removal can bring benefits for both wildlife and humans, Eilperin reports. Not only can spawning fish better navigate their way upstream, but in some cases, like in Clarksburg, Mass., dam removal saved the town from flooding during Hurricane Irene. Previously, the Briggsville Dam had raised a river's level to the overflow point during heavy rains.  and others - mostly in the Pacific Northwest - who consider dams viable hydroelectric energy producers. (Read more)

Down economy hits small, rural libraries; conference teaches them how to garner money

Small, rural libraries have an advantage over larger libraries and it has everything to do with their size. They enjoy strong connections to the people, including local government officials, of the communities in which they operate, and are oftentimes the center of these communities. This was the overarching theme at the Association for Rural and Small Libraries annual conference this month.

The conference emphasized the importance of rural libraries to their respective communities, and focused on the economic concerns many small libraries across the country are currently facing. Advocacy and funding have become central concerns, reported Miguel Figueroa of American Libraries Magazine. As a result, some programs at the conference included grant writing, endowment building and working with boards of trustees.

The conference also made technology a focus, introducing a program called "Pushing the Limits," which the National Science Foundation is trying to bring to 100 small libraries across the country. Attendees of the conference were also encouraged to make their libraries community-centered by building partnerships with local organizations, schools and workforce commissions.

White House Rural Council report a campaign document, Nonprofit Quarterly writer says

In June, President Obama created the White House Rural Council, saying it would help his administration better address issues in rural America. Last month, the council released a report, "Jobs and Economic Security for Rural America," essentially a talking paper for a wide range of administration initatives. Most rural advocates might be disappointed in the report, which is "basically a campaign document, not a blueprint for laying out problems and calling people to action," writes Rick Cohen, national correspondent for the Nonprofit Quarterly.

The report doesn't mention non-profits or foundations, and Obama didn't mention them or public-private partnerships in a speech in Peosta, Iowa, at what was billed as the White House Rural Economic Forum. Cohen writes that the speech was more of a hackneyed attempt to garner votes than an effort to enlighten people about rural America's problems and how to fix them. (2009 photo)

"A forum plus 'commitments' that involve no new laws and no new resources, just repositioned or retargeted dollars, as he said in his speech, don’t do much, and the words feel like American exceptionalism cheerleading, not a solid response to the poverty of rural America," Cohen writes. He adds that of America's 200 poorest counties, 192 are rural. (Read more)

Proposed broadband connectivity plan has states concerned; rural phone rates may rise

Many states' regulators and the Federal Communications Commission are at odds over the Broadband Connectivity Plan proposed by six of the biggest phone companies serving rural areas. The proposal by AT&T, Verizon, CenturyLink, Frontier Communications, Windstream and FairPoint Communications, addresses intercarrier compensation and the Universal Service Fund, which the FCC wants to reform in hopes of expanding broadband networks to rural areas, Kim Hart of Politico reports. (Associated Press photo)

Some state regulators say "the proposed plan pre-empts their role in regulating how phone companies operate in their territories," in violation of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, Hart reports. State commissioners plan to plead their case to the FCC and lawmakers in Washington next week.

Historically, states have taken the lead in determining intrastate rates, the fees local carriers pay to connect to long-distance carriers, while the FCC has managed interstate rates. The new proposal would set the default rate at $0.0007 per minute for all calls, regardless of distance, doing away with "a fundamental piece of state regulators' authority" and significantly cutting revenues "rural companies rely on to serve remote regions," Hart reports. As a result, rural customers may see price increases. (Read more)

Bad weather spurs farmers' desire for better crop insurance, but none dare call it climate change

A recent string of crop-destroying weather has helped spur farmers to ask for more federal crop insurance, making disaster relief a top priority in the 2012 Farm Bill, perhaps at the expense of direct subsidies. However, as they ask for more insurance, farmers and their lobbies don't acknowledge climate change as a possible cause for the troublesome weather and aren't attempting to adapt to it, Jean Chemnick of Greenwire reports in The New York Times.

Kansas corn growers have had to deal with both drought and flood this year, and the executive director of the Kansas Corn Commission, Jere White, told Chemnick that climate change is not discussed when his group talks policy. He said the increased interest in crop insurance has more to do with the fundamentals of farming than climate change. Richard Krause, senior director for congressional relations for the American Farm Bureau Federation, told Chemnick that increasing crop insurance would be a way to "fill the gap" if Congress stops direct subsidy payments to farmers through spending cuts.

However, Brian Murray, director of economic analysis at the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University, told Chemnick that federal insurance programs protect against disaster with no guarantee of payment, while subsidies do guarantee a minimum return on investment. He suggested that farmers are using crop insurance as a way to adapt to increasingly extreme weather without discussing climate change, even though adapting to weather and climate is part of being a farmer.

Jim French, an agriculture advocate for Oxfam America, told Chemnick that farmers could better prepare for extreme weather if they would be willing to acknowledge climate change, adding that a cap-and-trade bill would help fund these adaptation efforts by paying farmers for agricultural practicies that keep carbon from entering the atmosphere. The only farm lobby that has accepted climate change as the reason for extreme weather patterns is the liberally oriented National Farmers Union, which backed legislation during the last Congress to cap industrial greenhouse-gas emissions. (Read more)

'Bob-white!' Call of the quail heard less often; farmers, hunters, conservationists try to help

The familiar call of the bobwhite quail might have become a thing of the past in the Eastern U.S. had farmers, bird watchers, hunters and conservationists not come together to save the ground-dwelling fowl. Still, its numbers have plummeted since the 1960s, by 75 percent in Tennessee alone, reports Anne Paine of The Tennessean. That's a drop of about 3 percent a year.

Initiatives have been started in Tennessee that many hope will rejuvenate the state's bobwhite population. Paine reports that farmers are starting to allow tall, native grasses, the natural bobwhite quail habitat, to grow along their fences; state officials have shortened the quail hunting season from 14 to 11 weeks; and Tennessee is now one of 25 states participating in the National Bobwhite Conservation Initiative.

Though some believe wild turkeys, raccoons and skunks are to blame for the lack of quail, the loss of tall, native grasses is the main reason for the bobwhite's decline, Paine writes. Replacing such habitat can attract other birds, such as prairie warblers and loggerhead shrikes, and pollinators such as bees and butterflies that thrive among the same grasses. Paine reports that there are programs, like the federal Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program, which pays much of the cost of such measures. (Read more)

Facing Sept. 30 deadline, Congress works to keep money flowing to national-forest counties

Congress has started work on legislation to "reauthorize or replace the Secure Rural Schools program, which pays millions of dollars annually to counties with large portions of nontaxable federal lands to help fund schools, roads, emergency services and forest restoration. The program expires at the end of the month," reports Phil Taylor of Environment & Energy News.

The House Natural Resources Committee has a draft proposal that would "boost logging, mining and other uses on national forests to help Western counties fund schools and create new jobs," Taylor writes. The plan "seeks to revive logging as a principal means of funding county programs." The program was started to replace revenues from Western logging that was curtailed mainly for environmental reasons.

In the Senate, a spokeswoman for the Energy and Natural Resources Committee told Taylor that senators of both parties are working on the issue as well as extending payments in lieu of taxes, which play a similar role in national-forest counties in the East. (Read more, subscription required)

Senators file bill to ban farm-dust regulation, ask EPA to back its statements by endorsing it

Federal officials say they have no plans to regulate dust from farms, but some of their statements and actions appear to have created much skepticism, if not disbelief. Some Republican senators have introduced a bill to prohibit such regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency, which is proposing to tighten general standards for dust.

Sens. Mike Johanns of Nebraska and Charles Grassley of Iowa wrote EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson asking her to endorse their bill, "given your previous statements, which appear to be completely consistent with this legislation." The bill would prohibit regulation of farm dust unless there was scientific proof that it causes harm, reports Elise Viebeck of The Hill.

The uncertainty may stem from EPA's attempts to reduce dust in Maricopa County, Arizona, which includes Phoenix. In February, the agency found that the county had failed to limit dust to currently allowable levels. "EPA is proposing 53 measures in the Maricopa area to reduce dust. Many of these measures impact agriculture," lawyer-farmer Gary Baise of Illinois wrote for Farm Futures.

EPA has been regulating farm dust in the desert county since 1996. Here is a report about it. In June, EPA complimented the county for its new dust-abatement handbook. Recently the county suffered huge dust storms.

USPS says it wants to close most sorting centers

"Snail mail is about to get even slower." That's how Patrick Rizzo of MSNBC summed up today's announcement by the U.S. Postal Service that it would move to close more than half of its regional mail-sorting facilities. "The moves will mean first-class mail will no longer reach most customers the day after it was dropped in the mailbox," Rizzo wrote.

Ed O'Keefe of The Washington Post notes, "Lawmakers are considering four competing legislative proposals that would generally grant USPS the flexibility to end Saturday mail deliveries, close post offices based on market conditions and recalculate how much it pays annually into federal retirement, health-care and workers compensation accounts."

The Postal Regulatory Commission recommended in March, after testimony from the National Newspaper Association and the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, that the postal service conduct more research on the impact of five-day delivery on rural areas.

New report finds rural roads in dismal shape; state groups seek ways to fund work

The nation's rural roads have been neglected and are in dire need of repair, according to a recently released transportation study conducted by The Road Information Program. TRIP is a Washington-based non-profit charged with studying the condition of the nation's highways.

The report outlines the importance of sound transportation systems in rural areas and details the state of rural roads in each state. Key findings of the report include numbers of rural non-interstate traffic deaths, the percentage of major rural roads in poor condition and the highest share of rural bridges rated structurally deficient.

According to the report, Pennsylvania has the most rural bridges rated structurally deficient. Out of its more than 4,000 bridges, 28 percent were deficient. Seventeen percent of its rural roads were rated as being in poor condition. Jonathan Silver of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazaette reported that these issues have added significance considering the state has the third largest rural population, 2.8 million.

West Virgina ranks as the third worst in the nation in rural road fatalities, almost double the rate of other types of roads, The Associated Press reports. The report notes 27 percent of the state's rural roads are in poor condition, meaning they are damaged with rutting, cracks and potholes that call for replacement of roads that can't be resurfaced.

In Missouri, groups such as the Missouri Transportation Alliance are looking for ways to fund rural road improvement, like state gas tax or sales tax increases. However, Josh Nelson of The News Leader in Springfield reports that MTA spokesperson Bill McKenna said federal highway spending is a likely target of the 12-member congressional deficit "super committee." Silver writes that Pennsylvania state highway officials have urged Congress to create a six-year funding plan that would focus on rural infrastructure. So far, though, Congress has not passed any such measure. To see the TRIP report, entitled "Rural Connections: Challenges and Opportunities in America's Heartland," in its entirety, click here.

W.Va. jail overcrowding leads to increase in violence against local corrections staff

Following a trend in overcrowding of jails across the country, West Virginia's rate of inmate assaults on regional jail staff and inmate-on-inmate assaults has increased exponentially over the past year. Inmate-on-inmate assaults in the state's 10 regional jails rose 40 percent, from 496 to 695, while inmate on worker assaults increased 87 percent, leaving 58 correctional officers injured.

West Virginia's Regional Jail Authority executive director, Larry Parsons, told Phil Kabler of the Charleston Gazette that jails are now housing almost 2,000 more inmates than they were designed to hold, and that understaffing has become a problem; 92 correctional officer positions are open.

Corrections Commissioner Jim Rubenstein told Kabler that a backlog of Division of Corrections inmates are housed in local jails. Rubenstein noted that prisons have not seen a rise in inmate violence. He also said the high rate of inmate-on-staff violence could be attributed to the incidents of verbal abuse and inmates throwing objects at workers that they are required to report. (Read more)

Harlan County, Ky., opens a mountain zipline

The construction of outdoor attractions has been on the rise in rural regions of the country eager to reap economic benefits of tourism. In Eastern Kentucky, one community hopes to draw visitors by capitalizing on the mountains that surround the town with a zip line called "Black Mountain Thunder." (Harlan Daily Enterprise photo by Anders Eld)

Anders Eld of the Harlan Daily Enterprise reports the zip line, located at the Evarts trailhead in Baileys Creek, was opened by the Harlan County Outdoor Recreation Board today, in what officials are calling a "soft opening." The grand opening will happen in October. It was designed and built by professional zip-line designer Robert Nickell. (Read more) For coverage following opening day, click here.

Report lists benefits, pitfalls of Marcellus fracking

A report done for New York state officials says natural-gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale region that uses hydraulic fracturing, in which high volumes of water, sand and unknown chemicals are forced into deep, dense shales to release gas, could create 37,000 jobs and generate $31 to $185 million a year in state income taxes for New York. (Click on map for larger version)

The report for the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation also outlines some pitfalls of drilling in the largely rural south-central and southwestern areas of the state, which the report says are likely to become the "epicenter of the expected hydrofracking activity over the next 30 years," Mireya Navarro of the New York Times writes. The  downsides include large-scale industrial activity, heavy truck traffic, more spending on police and fire protection, and higher housing prices, responding to demand.

The report has become part of a broader draft document that environmental regulators will use to identify risks and propose rules to allow fracking with horizontal drilling for the first time in the state, writes Navarro. The state still plans to ban fracking in most watersheds supplying drinking water, but Navarro reports that areas on the Marcellus Shale could have tens of thousands of wells. (Read more)

Senate bill would resume federal inspections of horse slaughterhouses; ban originated in House

The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee says the Appropriations Committee is moving a bill that would allow the U.S. Department of Agriculture to inspect horse slaughterhouses, in an effort to restore the bottom to the horse market and reduce abuse, neglect and abandonment of horses.

Congress denied USDA funds for such inspections in 2007, ending the American industry that supplied horsemeat for human consumption to Japan and Europe. Montana Sen. Max Baucus cited the Government Accountabilty Office study that found the ban at least partly responsible for a decline in horse sales and prices and an increase in abandonment and neglect.

"Many animal welfare organizations have opposed any move to resume horse slaughter, saying it often results in inhumane shipment and painful deaths and is not the only alternative to preventing neglect," the Los Angeles Times reports. "The Humane Society of the United States said in a report that 92 percent of horses slaughtered are in good condition. The Times adds, "The ban resulted in a more than 600 percent increase in the number of horses being shipped to Mexico, where animal welfare groups say facilities are often horrific."

The ban arose in the House, which voted this year to keep it in place, but after a relatively close vote on its Appropriations Committee.

Rural development spending draws critics, then the story about them draws another

"The Obama administration is investing billions of dollars to promote economic development in rural areas by bringing broadband service and small-business financing to regions with chronic poverty and high unemployment," Ron Nixon reports for The New York Times. "But critics say the administration has little to show for its efforts, which highlight the difficulties of creating jobs in remote areas. They say the money has gone to areas where it is not needed, to promote broadband where it already exists and for industrial parks designed to attract business and jobs that may never materialize."

Nixon notes that the rural poverty rate is higher than the national average, but the Daily Yonder notes that Nixon names only two critics: "One is from the conservative Cato Institute, which is philosophically opposed to most government spending and one isn't so much a critic as an analyst," on the topic of broadband. The Yonder also notes that Nixon "mentions one project," a Mississippi industrial park. "We would agree that industrial parks are probably not the best way to spend development money in either rural or urban settings." (Read more)

Nine Amish men jailed for refusal to use slow-moving-vehicle signs and pay fines and costs

Nine Amish men are now being sent to jail for not paying fines and court costs levied against them after they refused to display orange triangle signs on the back of their horse-drawn buggies in Graves County in far Western Kentucky, reports Peter Smith of The Courier-Journal in Louisville. (Photo by Smith)

The men appealed their 2008 misdemeanor convictions in June, but the state Court of Appeals said religious practices can't supersede the rights and safety of the public at large. Smith reports that Graves District Judge Deborah Hawkins Crooks sentenced the men to between three and 10 days in jail for refusing to pay fines ranging between $148 to more than $600. The length of their sentences depended on their respective fines.

The men belong to a strict Amish sect, Old Order Swartzentruber, that forbids wearing bright colors or trusting man-made symbols in their safety. The men agree that complying with the law and paying the fines would be a violation of their beliefs. One of the men, Levi Zook, told Smith, "I don’t think it’s right to put somebody in jail for practicing their religious beliefs ... but that’s what we’ll do if that’s what it takes to abide by the biblical laws."

The men have appealed to the Kentucky Supreme Court, but the court has not decided whether or not to hear their cases. Meanwhile, Crooks told Smith that trial dates have been set in the coming months for several other Amish men, who have other pending charges, including some of those now serving sentences. (Read more)

UPDATE, Oct. 10: Two more members of the sect were convicted, Smith reports.

Obama proposes billions to repair schools, with rural emphasis; Republicans skeptical at best

President Obama has included a provision in his proposed American Jobs Act that would pour billions into public schools across the country, with a special emphasis on rural schools. According to a White House fact sheet, his proposal would amount to a $25 billion investment in infrastructure for 35,000 public schools. An additional $5 billion would be provided to community colleges.

The fact sheet cites a backlog of school maintenance and repair projects totaling between $270 to $500 billion, and says overstretched districts in the nation's poorest areas have to defer repairs, forcing students and teachers into overcrowded classrooms with little or outdated technology in buildings that average 40 years old.

The money would allow districts to upgrade facilities, make renovations and emergency repairs, upgrade "greening" and energy efficiency, complete asbestos abatement and removal, participate in modernization efforts to build new science and computer labs, upgrade technology infrastructure in our schools, and make upgrades to continue shared spaces as adult vocational and job development centers.

Almost 40 percent of the money would go to the 100 largest high-need schools, or those with the most students living in poverty. The remaining 60 percent of funds would be given to states to disperse. The amount each state gets will be determined by its share of funding from Title I, the main federal program for school in poor areas. They would have to distribute the funds by September 30, 2012 and give priority to rural districts.

Some Republican leaders have denounced Obama's overall proposal, saying he should roll back regulations that they say "kill American jobs" if he wants to keep people working. Andy Sullivan of Reuters reports that House Republican Leader Eric Cantor said he wouldn't support the proposal because it's "akin to the stimulus bill," and he didn't think the American people would want it.

To read the fact sheet, and see a chart outlining the amount of money to which each state is entitled, the number of jobs these projects are likely to create and the amount community colleges in each state could receive, click here.

U.S. poverty rate increases to 15%; some of the more rural states have the highest rates

The percentage of Americans living in poverty is now the largest since 1959, when the Census Bureau first started tracking the poverty rate. There are now 46 million people living in poverty, bringing the rate up to 15.1.

Mississippi has the highest poverty rate at 22.7 percent, followed closely by Louisiana, the District of Columbia, Georgia, New Mexico and Arizona. Hope Yen of The Associated Press reported that the recession, which left millions of Americans grappling with long-term unemployment, is to blame. The poverty rate rose faster from 2007 to 2010 than in any previous three-year period since the early 1980s.

Poverty rose among all racial and ethnic groups except Asians. Hispanics went from 25.3 to 26.6 percent, blacks from 25.8 to 27.4 percent and whites from 9.4 to 9.9 percent. The percentage of children in poverty rose from 20.7 to 22. (Read more)

Gas-drilling foes in Pa. trying local referenda, believed to be the first such votes in nation

"Challengers to natural gas drilling are taking a new approach in Pennsylvania, putting the rights of energy companies to drill in the massive Marcellus Shale basin on the ballot in what are believed to be the nation's first voter initiatives seeking to ban such activity," The Wall Street Journal reports. (WSJ map)

The referenda will be in Peters Township and State College, and maybe Warren. Gas companies argue that state law pre-empts such local legislation. "Such complete bans on drilling have yet to be ruled on by a court in Pennsylvania, but legal experts are doubtful they would survive," Kris Maher writes. A judge threw out a ban in Morgantown, W. Va. Opposition to drilling centers on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in which water, chemicals and sand at high pressure are used to release gas from the deep, dense shale.

Investors see promise in America's farms; some bankers see a possible bubble

Money continues to pour into America's farmland, but not by those who actually till the dirt and plant the crops. The continually rising price of food worldwide and the lack of arable land on which to plant is driving the cost of corn, soybeans, wheat and other crops up, something rich investors who have never planted a seed say makes buying this land a sound investment. (Photo by Joe Raymond, The Associated Press)

In Iowa, the value of farmland has almost doubled in six years, while values of farms in Nebraska and Kansas are up more than 50 percent, reports AP's Bernard Condon. The price of corn in Iowa was at $4 a bushel one year ago. Now, it's at $7. Condon also writes that investors can collect money on farms while they own them, unlike owning other things like gold, art and oil, making land ownership more appealing.

Out-of-state investors are becoming commonplace at farmland auctions, especially in Iowa, where they make up 25 percent of buyers, double the figure from 20 years ago, Condon reports. Marisa Dallman, owner of Kansas Land Brokers, writes for landthink.com that this is the first time she's seen an entire article devoted to farmland, which is usually left out of real-estate industry news, in the National Association of Realtors magazine. She reports that most farmland never sees the open market because it's passed from neighbor to neighbor and down through generations. She also says one sector of investors are buying small tracts of land for possible use in future development opportunities.

There is also a danger that farm prices may be inflated, warns Thomas Hoenig, head of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. He told Condon that current prices may be in an "unsustainable bubble." Others don't see it that way. Perry Vieth, a veteran bond trader and owner of Ceres Partners, a private investment fund, told Condon he is buying for 71 investors. His company owns 65 farms and he has returned 15 percent annually to his investors. (Read more)

Citizens unaware of records they can get, newspaper says in reporting local officials' pay

Most people in rural areas are not aware they can file open-records requests to obtain information they are entitled to see, such as salaries of public employees, reports Dave Boucher of the Kentucky New Era in Hopkinsville, Ky.

In a recent weekend issue of the paper (Aug. 27-28), Boucher reported that he filed 20 records requests to acquire information on city and county employee salaries. Al Cross, director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, told Boucher that public officials in rural places "can feel like a request to know their salary is an invasion of privacy," a feeling that stems from rural community culture in which a public office can be regarded as a private possession.

People simply don't understand what types of information they are entitled to see, Cross told Boucher. According to the Kentucky Open Records Act, any agency that receives at least 25 percent of its funding from public sources is subject to a request, Boucher writes. There are some exemptions, including "unwarranted invasion of personal privacy" and classified information, but salaries are not on that list. (Read more)

Asian carp are still moving toward Great Lakes; canal barrier's voltage to be increased

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will increase the voltage on an electric fence designed to keep Asian carp from traveling into the Great Lakes from the Mississippi River system. Preliminary tests of the fence's power showed the voltage was not high enough to deter the invasive fish from entering the lakes.

Paul Quinlan of Enviropnment & Energy News reports that the three-part barrier will be placed in a Chicago shipping canal to keep the fish from entering Lake Michigan, where a carp was spotted last year. Lawmakers and environmentalist are worried the fish could "wreak havoc on the bottom of the food chain and ultimately destroy the $7 billion sport fishery" in the Great Lakes.

Maj. Gen. John Peabody, commander of the Corps' Great Lakes and Ohio River Division, told Quinlan the voltage will be raised this fall, but will not harm people. The Corps also reported that monitoring has shown small Asian carp are not swimming close to the barrier. (Read more)

Pipeline safety regulators focus on population centers, leaving rural areas more vulnerable

After two recent oil spills, one in Montana and one in Michigan, that released over 885,000 gallons of crude into nearby rivers, much attention has been paid to lack of oversight of the 167,000 miles of hazardous-liquid pipelines that cross the nation's rural areas.

Dan Frosch and Janet Roberts of The New York Times discovered through investigation of federal reports and safety documents that the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, charged with oversight of safety and regulation of the pipeline system, only has 118 inspectors, 17 fewer than federal law authorizes, and does not have the resources to hire more. This is increasingly leaving oversight in the hands of pipeline operators.

Though the pipeline industry reported 25 percent fewer spill incidents from 2001 to 2010 than in the prior decade, there are still more than 100 significant spills every year, Frosch and Roberts write. The agency only requires inspectors to focus on 44 percent of land-based pipelines close to population centers and delicate environmental areas, leaving thousands of miles of pipelines in rural areas to be "loosely regulated and operating essentially on the honor system."

These concerns come close to the State Department's recent approval of the controversial Keystone XL, a proposed 1,661-mile pipeline from Canada to Texas. Paired with a report recently released by the National Transportation Safety Board about a natural-gas pipeline explosion in California that claimed eight lives, the safety of the proposed line and the 40- to 60-year-old nationwide pipeline infrastructure has been brought into question. (Read more)

To see a Times map showing where these spills most frequently occur, along with data about the main causes of these spills, click here.

New rules in Canada would block building of coal-fired power plants without carbon capture

The Canadain government is considering new regulations for coal-fired power plants that will require plants "to emit roughly the same greenhouse gases as natural gas generators," Christa Marshall of ClimateWire reports. The 2020 goal is to have emission rates 17 percent below the 2005 levels, Environment Minister Peter Kent said in a ceremony in Saskatchewan. Coal fuels about 17 percent of Canada's electricity and is responsible for about 13 percent of the country's greenhouse gases.

The new rules, which should take effect in 2015, will require companies constructing new plants to invest in new carbon-capture technologies or avoid coal altogether. Emissions will be limited to 375 metric tons of carbon dioxide per gigawatt of electricity. Analysts say the only way to achieve that level is "with yet-to-be commercialized technology," Marshall writes.

Most of the nation's coal plants would remain in operation past 2020, which has many environmentalists upset. "About two-thirds of current plants would not have to meet the standard until after 2020, and nine would operate past 2030 without constraint", Pembina Institute, an environmental think tank reports. This "would do little initially for climate change," Tim Weis, an analyst at Pembina told Marshall. (Read more; subscription may be required)

The 60-day public comment period will close late next month, but Kent told Rebecca Penty of the Calgary Herald, he does not expect the any substantial changes. (Read more)