Rural News Clips, Aug. 5, 2024
Big money from outside the Big Sky State going to Tester-Sheehy race; Maine keeps most Medicaid patients in unwinding; farm bureaus' reach goes way beyond ag policy
CAMPAIGN FOR RURAL PROGRESS
The Maine Monitor
Geriatrics workforce grant to focus on rural and tribal communities in Maine
Aug. 4, 2024
“A nearly $5 million federal grant recently awarded to the University of New England will be put toward efforts to improve Maine’s workforce supporting geriatric care over the next five years.”
“Efforts will focus on rural regions and the Wabanaki Nations, and include “dream sessions” with tribal health centers.”
“Maine is the oldest state in the country, and the number of Mainers with Alzheimer’s is projected to increase 20 percent between 2020 and 2025. But as of 2021, there were only 46 geriatricians practicing in the state. The need is particularly acute for underserved populations in rural and tribal communities.”
POLITICS AND ELECTIONS
Nebraska Examiner
Charles Herbster named national chair of Trump’s rural coalition
Aug. 4, 2024
“Former President Donald Trump has tapped former Nebraska gubernatorial candidate Charles Herbster on Friday to lead a rural slice of Trump’s 2024 race for the White House.”
“Herbster announced he has been named chairman of its Rural Americans for Trump Coalition. Herbster is a major donor and a friend of Trump’s.”
In 2016, “Herbster led an agricultural and rural committee for Trump. In 2020, he led a Trump group of farmers and ranchers.”
“Herbster this week was already discussing the importance of Trump’s work for rural communities in a push for votes in rural Pennsylvania, a key swing state.”
Mother Jones
Rideshare to Vote? Not So Easy When You’re Disabled (especially if you’re rural)
Aug. 2, 2024
“Scheduling paratransit to the polls is one option—but in rural areas, that can also be more challenging than it should, says Michelle Bishop, manager of voter access at the National Disability Rights Network.”
“RideShare2Vote was founded by Sarah Kovich and her daughter Paola in 2018 in Texas to help Democrats and left-leaning independents vote.”
“In addition to utilizing regular cars, RideShare2Vote rents out accessible vans to take voters to the polls free of charge, including in rural areas. Drivers also receive training to understand voting rights.”
“The organization operates in more than a dozen states—mostly Republican strongholds and swing states. But, again, those plans need to be etched out before voting day—and its budget only lets it take some 12,500 voters to the polls in a given election year.”
The Washington Post
Without Zuckerberg money, limited private funding available for elections
Aug. 2, 2024
“Election officials have long complained they don’t have enough money. Running elections across the United States costs $2 billion to $5 billion a year.”
Election costs “can be particularly challenging for cash-strapped rural communities.”
“Congress allocated $55 million for elections this year, leaving states and local governments to come up with most of the funding they need.”
“In 2020, a group funded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife gave $332 million to local governments to run the presidential election amid a global pandemic, prompting a Republican backlash that led to more than two dozen states banning or limiting private funding for elections.”
“The Center for Tech and Civic Life is again awarding grants this fall — but in much smaller amounts.”
“The $2.5 million it plans to give to small and midsize communities in as many as 19 states totals less than 1 percent of what it spent in 2020. The grants will have nowhere near the nationwide effect they did in the last presidential election but could nonetheless spark controversy.”
WFAE
Politics Monday: Can Democrats make up ground in rural NC?
Aug. 4, 2024
North Carolina “Democrats have struggled with rural voters over the previous decade. According to Carolina Demography, registered Democrats decreased between 2013 and 2023 by 350,000 voters. Republicans increased by 210,000 and unaffiliated voters increased by 960,000.”
“Some have argued whether a voter is registered as a Democrat doesn’t matter as long as organizers can convince some in that group of unaffiliated and others to vote blue.”
Anderson Clayton, a rural North Carolinian who recently took over as chair of the state’s Democratic Party, “has said her party has been guilty of ignoring her people in the past. That said, she claims Democrat policies benefit rural Americans, and the key is better messaging.”
The podcast examines “Anderson’s efforts, why Democratic support waned in rural areas to begin with, and what the future of the party in these areas looks like.”
Hungry Horse News
Big money from outside Montana being spent in Sheehy-Tester Senate race
Aug. 2, 2024
“More than $27 million has been spent on political advertising in Montana’s U.S. Senate race through July by political action committees acting independently of the candidates and without spending limits.”
“For now, Republican challenger Tim Sheehy is the primary focus of PAC spending, both for and against.”
“There has been less spent on messaging focused on incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, but that messaging has been mostly negative.”
“Montana Rural Voters (WORC) is a Billings-based PAC that has spent $294,662 on media supporting Tester. The PAC’s donors are exclusively dark money nonprofit groups that do not disclose donors.”
“The biggest of those dark money donors is Sixteen Thirty Fund, which reported $191.5 million in revenue in 2022 and has donated to multiple organizations and causes, including A Better Big Sky, Big Sky Voters PAC, Big Sky 55+, Clean Water Action, Forward Montana, Montana Budget and Policy Center and Montana State AFL-CIO.”
“A Better Big Sky, based in Missoula, is also the second-largest donor to Montana Rural Voters at $75,000. Tax filings for the group show donations to Montana Conservation Voters, the Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC), and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana.”
AGRICULTURE
Investigate Midwest
The reach of county, state farm bureaus extends beyond ag policy
July 31, 2024
“Many members of state farm bureaus and the American Farm Bureau Federation [have concerns that the organizations don’t align with their values,] and some have left their local farm bureau for alternative industry groups as a result.” That goes especially for liberals and LGBTQ+ people.
“While farm bureaus across the Midwest lobby for agricultural issues, a seven-month long investigation … found that isn’t where the advocacy stops.”
“A review of campaign finance records, social media, lobbying disclosures, websites, and policy books in nine Midwestern states revealed that state farm bureaus threw their weight behind political and social causes with little or nothing to do with farming.” Those include:
“Election security laws in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, and Wisconsin
State constitutional amendments and/or ballot initiatives in Indiana, Michigan, Missouri and Ohio
Availability of government services for immigrants lacking permanent legal status in Michigan, Wisconsin, Missouri, and amnesty for immigrants lacking permanent legal status in Illinois
Removal of tenure in Illinois, opposition to teaching critical race theory in Indiana, and advocating for teaching abstinence in Missouri
Reading the bible in schools and voluntary prayer in Indiana and Missouri
Recognition of only two genders: female and male, in Missouri”
CLIMATE CHANGE
The Washington Post
Study suggests nearby rural land can cool cities by nearly 30 percent
Aug. 3, 2024
“Rural land surrounding urban areas could help cool cities by up to 32.9 degrees Fahrenheit, an analysis in Nature Cities suggests, hinting at a way to cool increasingly scorching urban areas.”
“Rural areas hold ‘great potential’ for cooling urban heat islands, the researchers concluded, with the biggest impacts occurring within a six- to nine-mile radius of the urban boundary.”
“Rural land in that range can reduce the urban heat island intensity by nearly 30 percent, they found.”
COMMUNITY
The Daily Yonder
Eatery and Event Venue Brings ‘Something Old, Something New’ to Rural Illinois
Aug. 2, 2024
“The Broadgauge building isn’t simply at the geographic center of Petersburg, Illinois. It’s also central to the town’s vibrant community.”
COVID-19
Maine Morning Star
Maine manages to retain most Medicaid enrollees even as pandemic-era protections end
Aug. 5, 2024
“As pandemic-era protections end, Maine has managed to keep almost 70 percent of people formerly relying on state healthcare on Medicaid, a rate better than the national average and many other states.”
“More than 300,000 Mainers have renewed their MaineCare coverage so far … MaineCare is the state’s name for federal Medicaid.”
“Approximately 13 percent of all renewals have been terminated, either due to procedural reasons such as an incomplete form or missing information, or due to enrollees being deemed ineligible. The rest are applications pending manually or automatic renewals.”
“There is no one clear reason Maine successfully kept most people who need MaineCare enrolled in the program, according to John Gale, a senior research associate at the Maine Rural Health Research Center within University of Southern Maine.”
“It’s a combination of factors, I think; manageable population, reasonable policies, a smaller number of enrollees to track down, and an accepting political climate,” he said.
EDUCATION
The Hechinger Report
How could Project 2025 change education?
July 23, 2024
“The proposals in the 2025 Presidential Transition Project — known as Project 2025 and designed for Donald Trump — would reshape the American education system, early education through college, from start to finish.”
“The conservative Heritage Foundation is the primary force behind the sprawling blueprint, which is separate from the much less detailed Republican National Committee 2024 platform, though they share some common themes.”
“Project 2025 calls for eliminating the Office of Head Start, which would lead to the closure of Head Start child care programs that serve about 833,000 low-income children each year.
The program plays “an outsized role in rural areas and prioritize enrolling a certain percentage of young children with disabilities who often struggle to find child care elsewhere.”
The project would also “prioritize funding for home-based child care rather than ‘universal day care’ in programs outside the home.”
“That funding would include money for parents to stay home with a child or to pay for ‘familial, in-home’ care, proposals that could be appealing to some early childhood advocates who have long called for more resources for informal care and stay-at-home parents.”
In other words, they want to incentivize women to stay out of the workforce.
There’s a lot more in the article, including proposals that are pro-voucher, would scale back free school meals, would convert federal funds for disabled children to “‘no-strings’ block grants to states and institute something similar to education savings accounts, and rescind a policy that evaluates whether schools disproportionately enroll minorities in special education and how much minority children are disciplined.
GROCERIES
New Hampshire Public Radio
Dollar General stores now sell fresh produce. Could it improve rural food access?
Aug. 2, 2024
“Dollar General is one of the country's fastest-growing grocery stores. It has more locations selling fresh produce than Walmart, and that's a big help for people in rural food deserts.”
“Now well more than 5,000 of its stores sell fresh onions, bananas, even avocados. The produce section is tiny compared to a Walmart's, but it's still packed with variety.”
That said, the mere presence of dollar stores tends to drive independent rural grocers out of business.
And “some workers have not even been given enough hours to keep their workplaces clean and safe. Dollar General reached a $12 million settlement last month with federal regulators over safety violations, like blocked fire extinguishers and emergency exits. So with how difficult and costly fresh produce can be,” the trend may not last.
But the chain is doing this because rural customers want it.
Arkansas Advocate
Inaugural food assistance program offers grocery relief to Arkansas families
Aug. 5, 2024
“A new federal food assistance program, Summer EBT, provides eligible children with $120 on a pre-loaded card to purchase groceries during a critical time of the year when students lose reliable meals at school. Thirteen states chose not to participate in the new program.”
Those states are: Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and Wyoming.
“Arkansas has one of the highest food insecurity rates in the nation and is one of about three dozen states that opted into the inaugural food aid program, which is modeled off a similar service implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
“More than 250,000 Arkansans automatically qualified for the Summer EBT program because they received other assistance or were on the free and reduced lunch program.”
HEALTH CARE
The Mendocino Voice
Examining the rural need for helicopter membership
Aug. 4, 2024
Ambulances often can’t get to rural communities in time, so many seniors sign up for memberships with helicopter companies to get them to a hospital in a hurry.
The medivac helicopter from any company will pick up a patient, but a small annual membership fee — $100, for example — means the insurer will cover evacuations from other companies.
Helicopter evacuations can be outrageously pricey, sometimes more than $100,000 because the federal law against surprise billing doesn’t apply. Helicopters are governed by the Federal Aviation Administration.
National Association of Community Health Centers
Goings-on for National Health Center Week, Aug. 4-10
Aug. 4, 2024
Each day has a different focus, including children’s health, health care for the unhoused, and more.
The site has plenty of resources that can be reused for coverage.
Find statewide and local events on the maps.
HUNTING AND FISHING
CIDRAP
Washington state confirms first CWD case
Aug. 2, 2024
“Chronic wasting disease (CWD) was confirmed yesterday in an adult female white-tailed deer found dead in Spokane, Washington. It's the state's first case of CWD.”
“Washington is now the 35th state with documented CWD in wild or captive cervids.”
“CWD is a neurologic disease caused by misfolded proteins called prions and is fatal in infected deer. It poses an ongoing threat to cervids such as deer, elk, moose, and reindeer because it can spread from animal-to-animal and through environmental contamination.”
“The disease isn't known to infect humans, but officials recommend not eating meat from a sick animal and using precautions when field-dressing or butchering cervids.”
LAND RIGHTS
Black By God
Faith group partnering with local farmers on land return initiative
July 15, 2024
“As Central Appalachia continues its transition away from a coal-based extraction economy, several obstacles continue to slow that process – not the least of which is land access.”
“With nearly two-thirds of all privately owned land in McDowell County, WV, held by ten out-of-state companies, the long, exploitative cycle of absentee land ownership continues to stunt any hopes of local economic self-determination.”
“However, a new land access initiative championed by the local faith community in partnership with Economic Development Greater East (EDGE) is looking to change that.”
MENTAL HEALTH
The Texas Tribune
How a lack of supervisors keeps new mental health workers from entering the field
Aug. 5, 2024
“Supervised clinical hours are considered an essential part of the mental health field. They allow students to learn on the job while the supervisor, known as a preceptor in the medical field, assumes the risk of liability. However, only a limited number of mental health providers seem willing to take on this responsibility.”
“The most common response [in a survey] from mental health providers about why they aren’t interested in serving as supervisors for individuals working toward licensure is that there is too much liability, not enough time, and it is not worth paying for the training or the loss of client time.”
“The survey also included responses from mental health providers who previously were supervisors who mentioned they couldn’t do it anymore due to extra responsibilities, too much paperwork, their agency's internship program not being restarted since the COVID-19 pandemic, and it is too risky during a time when demand is this high for services.”
“This can be a particular problem in rural areas where there might only be two to four mental health providers in a region. And there might only be one authorized supervisor in the county.”
REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS
NBC News
Cost of stocking birth control strains family planning clinics in some states
Aug. 3, 2024
“A renewed spotlight on protecting access to birth control may not help women who are already struggling to find affordable contraception in some states with the strictest abortion laws.”
It has “become increasingly difficult to do in Alabama, along with other rural Southern states including Mississippi and Texas.”
“There was hope that when the Food and Drug Administration approved the first over-the-counter birth control pill in 2023, the $20-a-month cost would help.”
“Opill is stocked at stores nationwide, including certain Target, Walmart, Walgreens and CVS locations … but over-the-counter birth control pills haven’t reached many women in rural areas.
Rural women often don’t have access to grocery stores, broadband to order the pills online, or timely mail delivery.
South Dakota Searchlight
State Supreme Court revives legal challenge to abortion-rights ballot measure
Aug. 2, 2024
“An anti-abortion group won the latest round in a court battle over South Dakota’s abortion-rights ballot question.”
“The Life Defense Fund is attempting to disqualify the measure from the Nov. 5 ballot.”
“A circuit court judge in Minnehaha County dismissed the group’s lawsuit last month. But on Friday, the state Supreme Court reversed that decision and sent the case back to the circuit court for further proceedings.”
CNN
As Iowa’s maternity care deserts continue to grow, doctors say the state’s new abortion ban will only make matters worse
Aug. 5, 2024
“Iowa enacted a law last week banning abortion once fetal cardiac activity can be detected, around six weeks into pregnancy, before many people even know they’re pregnant.”
“The law includes exceptions for rape, incest and medical emergencies that threaten the life of the mother, and fetal abnormalities that are incompatible with life.”
“Iowa has the lowest per capita ratio of OBGYN providers to Medicare beneficiaries in the nation, according to a 2022 study.”
“Health care leaders are sounding the alarm that the constraints placed on them by the new abortion law could drive maternity care providers out of state and deter new ones from coming in, at a time when Iowa desperately needs them.”
That’s what’s happened in other states with such bans, including Idaho.
“The state is predominantly rural, with more than 10% of its population living below the poverty line.”
RURAL ORGANIZING
The Daily Yonder
Young Americans Returning to Rural for More than Just Holiday Dinners
Aug. 5, 2024
“Grassroots organizers and policy makers in states like Kansas, Nebraska, and New Hampshire are working hard to attract and retain younger generations choosing rural communities as their homes.”
STAT
Medicare scrambles to keep prescription drug plan premiums stable ahead of elections
Aug. 5, 2024
“Medicare officials are offering private insurers big subsidies to keep premiums for prescription-drug plans stable as the elections approach.”
“The Inflation Reduction Act, passed by Democrats in 2022, made several changes to Medicare’s drug benefit, known as Medicare Part D.”
“All were aimed at lowering drug prices and drug costs for both seniors and the federal government. The most well-known policies cap annual out-of-pocket drug costs for seniors, limit their monthly insulin costs, and direct Medicare to negotiate drug prices.”
“The law also made changes to Medicare Part D that matter to insurers but aren’t well-known to the general public.”
“Among them, insurers now must pay a much greater share of seniors’ catastrophic drug costs, which are out-of-pocket costs that exceed $2,000, starting next year. The federal government used to cover the vast majority of those costs.”
_______________________________
Aug. 2, 2024
“Election officials have long complained they don’t have enough money. Running elections across the United States costs $2 billion to $5 billion a year.”
Election costs “can be particularly challenging for cash-strapped rural communities.”
“Congress allocated $55 million for elections this year, leaving states and local governments to come up with most of the funding they need.”
“In 2020, a group funded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife gave $332 million to local governments to run the presidential election amid a global pandemic, prompting a Republican backlash that led to more than two dozen states banning or limiting private funding for elections.”
“The Center for Tech and Civic Life is again awarding grants this fall — but in much smaller amounts.”
“The $2.5 million it plans to give to small and midsize communities in as many as 19 states totals less than 1 percent of what it spent in 2020. The grants will have nowhere near the nationwide effect they did in the last presidential election but could nonetheless spark controversy.”
WFAE
Politics Monday: Can Democrats make up ground in rural NC?
Aug. 4, 2024
North Carolina “Democrats have struggled with rural voters over the previous decade. According to Carolina Demography, registered Democrats decreased between 2013 and 2023 by 350,000 voters. Republicans increased by 210,000 and unaffiliated voters increased by 960,000.”
“Some have argued whether a voter is registered as a Democrat doesn’t matter as long as organizers can convince some in that group of unaffiliated and others to vote blue.”
Anderson Clayton, a rural North Carolinian who recently took over as chair of the state’s Democratic Party, “has said her party has been guilty of ignoring her people in the past. That said, she claims Democrat policies benefit rural Americans, and the key is better messaging.”
The podcast examines “Anderson’s efforts, why Democratic support waned in rural areas to begin with, and what the future of the party in these areas looks like.”
Hungry Horse News
Big money from outside Montana being spent in Sheehy-Tester Senate race
Aug. 2, 2024
“More than $27 million has been spent on political advertising in Montana’s U.S. Senate race through July by political action committees acting independently of the candidates and without spending limits.”
“For now, Republican challenger Tim Sheehy is the primary focus of PAC spending, both for and against.”
“There has been less spent on messaging focused on incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, but that messaging has been mostly negative.”
“Montana Rural Voters (WORC) is a Billings-based PAC that has spent $294,662 on media supporting Tester. The PAC’s donors are exclusively dark money nonprofit groups that do not disclose donors.”
“The biggest of those dark money donors is Sixteen Thirty Fund, which reported $191.5 million in revenue in 2022 and has donated to multiple organizations and causes, including A Better Big Sky, Big Sky Voters PAC, Big Sky 55+, Clean Water Action, Forward Montana, Montana Budget and Policy Center and Montana State AFL-CIO.”
“A Better Big Sky, based in Missoula, is also the second-largest donor to Montana Rural Voters at $75,000. Tax filings for the group show donations to Montana Conservation Voters, the Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC), and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Montana.”
AGRICULTURE
Investigate Midwest
The reach of county, state farm bureaus extends beyond ag policy
July 31, 2024
“Many members of state farm bureaus and the American Farm Bureau Federation [have concerns that the organizations don’t align with their values,] and some have left their local farm bureau for alternative industry groups as a result.” That goes especially for liberals and LGBTQ+ people.
“While farm bureaus across the Midwest lobby for agricultural issues, a seven-month long investigation … found that isn’t where the advocacy stops.”
“A review of campaign finance records, social media, lobbying disclosures, websites, and policy books in nine Midwestern states revealed that state farm bureaus threw their weight behind political and social causes with little or nothing to do with farming.” Those include:
“Election security laws in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, and Wisconsin
State constitutional amendments and/or ballot initiatives in Indiana, Michigan, Missouri and Ohio
Availability of government services for immigrants lacking permanent legal status in Michigan, Wisconsin, Missouri, and amnesty for immigrants lacking permanent legal status in Illinois
Removal of tenure in Illinois, opposition to teaching critical race theory in Indiana, and advocating for teaching abstinence in Missouri
Reading the bible in schools and voluntary prayer in Indiana and Missouri
Recognition of only two genders: female and male, in Missouri”
CLIMATE CHANGE
The Washington Post
Study suggests nearby rural land can cool cities by nearly 30 percent
Aug. 3, 2024
“Rural land surrounding urban areas could help cool cities by up to 32.9 degrees Fahrenheit, an analysis in Nature Cities suggests, hinting at a way to cool increasingly scorching urban areas.”
“Rural areas hold ‘great potential’ for cooling urban heat islands, the researchers concluded, with the biggest impacts occurring within a six- to nine-mile radius of the urban boundary.”
“Rural land in that range can reduce the urban heat island intensity by nearly 30 percent, they found.”
COMMUNITY
The Daily Yonder
Eatery and Event Venue Brings ‘Something Old, Something New’ to Rural Illinois
Aug. 2, 2024
“The Broadgauge building isn’t simply at the geographic center of Petersburg, Illinois. It’s also central to the town’s vibrant community.”
COVID-19
Maine Morning Star
Maine manages to retain most Medicare enrollees even as pandemic-era protections end
Aug. 5, 2024
“As pandemic-era protections end, Maine has managed to keep almost 70 percent of people formerly relying on state healthcare on Medicaid, a rate better than the national average and many other states.”
“More than 300,000 Mainers have renewed their MaineCare coverage so far … MaineCare is the state’s name for federal Medicaid.”
“Approximately 13 percent of all renewals have been terminated, either due to procedural reasons such as an incomplete form or missing information, or due to enrollees being deemed ineligible. The rest are applications pending manually or automatic renewals.”
“There is no one clear reason Maine successfully kept most people who need MaineCare enrolled in the program, according to John Gale, a senior research associate at the Maine Rural Health Research Center within University of Southern Maine.”
“It’s a combination of factors, I think; manageable population, reasonable policies, a smaller number of enrollees to track down, and an accepting political climate,” he said.
EDUCATION
The Hechinger Report
How could Project 2025 change education?
July 23, 2024
“The proposals in the 2025 Presidential Transition Project — known as Project 2025 and designed for Donald Trump — would reshape the American education system, early education through college, from start to finish.”
“The conservative Heritage Foundation is the primary force behind the sprawling blueprint, which is separate from the much less detailed Republican National Committee 2024 platform, though they share some common themes.”
“Project 2025 calls for eliminating the Office of Head Start, which would lead to the closure of Head Start child care programs that serve about 833,000 low-income children each year.
The program plays “an outsized role in rural areas and prioritize enrolling a certain percentage of young children with disabilities who often struggle to find child care elsewhere.”
The project would also “prioritize funding for home-based child care rather than ‘universal day care’ in programs outside the home.”
“That funding would include money for parents to stay home with a child or to pay for ‘familial, in-home’ care, proposals that could be appealing to some early childhood advocates who have long called for more resources for informal care and stay-at-home parents.”
In other words, they want to incentivize women to stay out of the workforce.
There’s a lot more in the article, including proposals that are pro-voucher, would scale back free school meals, would convert federal funds for disabled children to “‘no-strings’ block grants to states and institute something similar to education savings accounts, and rescind a policy that evaluates whether schools disproportionately enroll minorities in special education and how much minority children are disciplined.
GROCERIES
New Hampshire Public Radio
Dollar General stores now sell fresh produce. Could it improve rural food access?
Aug. 2, 2024
“Dollar General is one of the country's fastest-growing grocery stores. It has more locations selling fresh produce than Walmart, and that's a big help for people in rural food deserts.”
“Now well more than 5,000 of its stores sell fresh onions, bananas, even avocados. The produce section is tiny compared to a Walmart's, but it's still packed with variety.”
That said, the mere presence of dollar stores tends to drive independent rural grocers out of business.
And “some workers have not even been given enough hours to keep their workplaces clean and safe. Dollar General reached a $12 million settlement last month with federal regulators over safety violations, like blocked fire extinguishers and emergency exits. So with how difficult and costly fresh produce can be,” the trend may not last.
But the chain is doing this because rural customers want it.
Arkansas Advocate
Inaugural food assistance program offers grocery relief to Arkansas families
Aug. 5, 2024
“A new federal food assistance program, Summer EBT, provides eligible children with $120 on a pre-loaded card to purchase groceries during a critical time of the year when students lose reliable meals at school. Thirteen states chose not to participate in the new program.”
Those states are: Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and Wyoming.
“Arkansas has one of the highest food insecurity rates in the nation and is one of about three dozen states that opted into the inaugural food aid program, which is modeled off a similar service implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic.
HEALTH CARE
The Mendocino Voice
Examining the rural need for helicopter membership
Aug. 4, 2024
Ambulances often can’t get to rural communities in time, so many seniors sign up for memberships with helicopter companies to get them to a hospital in a hurry.
The medivac helicopter from any company will pick up a patient, but a small annual membership fee — $100, for example — means the insurer will cover evacuations from other companies.
Helicopter evacuations can be outrageously pricey, sometimes more than $100,000 because the federal law against surprise billing doesn’t apply. Helicopters are governed by the Federal Aviation Administration.
National Association of Community Health Centers
Goings-on for National Health Center Week, Aug. 4-10
Aug. 4, 2024
Each day has a different focus, including children’s health, health care for the unhoused, and more.
The site has plenty of resources that can be reused for coverage.
Find statewide and local events on the maps.
LAND RIGHTS
Black By God
Faith group partnering with local farmers on land return initiative
July 15, 2024
“As Central Appalachia continues its transition away from a coal-based extraction economy, several obstacles continue to slow that process – not the least of which is land access.”
“With nearly two-thirds of all privately owned land in McDowell County, WV, held by ten out-of-state companies, the long, exploitative cycle of absentee land ownership continues to stunt any hopes of local economic self-determination.”
“However, a new land access initiative championed by the local faith community in partnership with Economic Development Greater East (EDGE) is looking to change that.”
MENTAL HEALTH
The Texas Tribune
How a lack of supervisors keeps new mental health workers from entering the field
Aug. 5, 2024
“Supervised clinical hours are considered an essential part of the mental health field. They allow students to learn on the job while the supervisor, known as a preceptor in the medical field, assumes the risk of liability. However, only a limited number of mental health providers seem willing to take on this responsibility.”
“The most common response [in a survey] from mental health providers about why they aren’t interested in serving as supervisors for individuals working toward licensure is that there is too much liability, not enough time, and it is not worth paying for the training or the loss of client time.”
“The survey also included responses from mental health providers who previously were supervisors who mentioned they couldn’t do it anymore due to extra responsibilities, too much paperwork, their agency's internship program not being restarted since the COVID-19 pandemic, and it is too risky during a time when demand is this high for services.”
“This can be a particular problem in rural areas where there might only be two to four mental health providers in a region. And there might only be one authorized supervisor in the county.”
REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS
NBC News
Cost of stocking birth control strains family planning clinics in some states
Aug. 3, 2024
“A renewed spotlight on protecting access to birth control may not help women who are already struggling to find affordable contraception in some states with the strictest abortion laws.”
It has “become increasingly difficult to do in Alabama, along with other rural Southern states including Mississippi and Texas.”
“There was hope that when the Food and Drug Administration approved the first over-the-counter birth control pill in 2023, the $20-a-month cost would help.”
“Opill is stocked at stores nationwide, including certain Target, Walmart, Walgreens and CVS locations … but over-the-counter birth control pills haven’t reached many women in rural areas.
Rural women often don’t have access to grocery stores, broadband to order the pills online, or timely mail delivery.
South Dakota Searchlight
State Supreme Court revives legal challenge to abortion-rights ballot measure
Aug. 2, 2024
“An anti-abortion group won the latest round in a court battle over South Dakota’s abortion-rights ballot question.”
“The Life Defense Fund is attempting to disqualify the measure from the Nov. 5 ballot.”
“A circuit court judge in Minnehaha County dismissed the group’s lawsuit last month. But on Friday, the state Supreme Court reversed that decision and sent the case back to the circuit court for further proceedings.”
CNN
As Iowa’s maternity care deserts continue to grow, doctors say the state’s new abortion ban will only make matters worse
Aug. 5, 2024
“Iowa enacted a law last week banning abortion once fetal cardiac activity can be detected, around six weeks into pregnancy, before many people even know they’re pregnant.”
“The law includes exceptions for rape, incest and medical emergencies that threaten the life of the mother, and fetal abnormalities that are incompatible with life.”
“Iowa has the lowest per capita ratio of OBGYN providers to Medicare beneficiaries in the nation, according to a 2022 study.”
“Health care leaders are sounding the alarm that the constraints placed on them by the new abortion law could drive maternity care providers out of state and deter new ones from coming in, at a time when Iowa desperately needs them.”
That’s what’s happened in other states with such bans, including Idaho.
“The state is predominantly rural, with more than 10% of its population living below the poverty line.”
WFAA
New Mexico buys ads inviting doctors to relocate, citing Texas' abortion ban
Aug. 5, 2024
“Advertisements published in the Dallas Morning News and Fort Worth Star-Telegram this morning asked North Texas medical professionals to consider moving to nearby New Mexico amid Texas' abortion bans.”
“The ads, which feature an open letter from New Mexico Gov. Lujan Grisham, urge Texas doctors to consider moving to New Mexico if they can not tolerate Texas' restriction on abortion access. Similar ads were published in the Houston Chronicle, San Antonio Express-News and Austin American-Statesman.”
The Associated Press
After the end of Roe, a new beginning for maternity homes
Aug. 2, 2024
“There has been a nationwide expansion of maternity homes in the two years since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and the federal right to abortion.”
“There are now more than 450 maternity homes in the U.S. … many of them are faith-based.”
“As abortion restrictions increase, anti-abortion advocates want to open more of these transitional housing facilities, which often have long waitlists.”
“It’s part of what they see as the next step in preventing abortions and providing long-term support for low-income pregnant women and mothers.”
“The reasons for the surge in interest in maternity homes are complex and go beyond narrowing abortion access … unaffordable housing, paychecks cut by inflation and higher birthrates in some states have all contributed.”
“The heyday of American maternity homes came during the three decades before Roe v. Wade.”
“In what became known as the ‘Baby Scoop Era,’ more than 1.5 million infants were surrendered for adoption. Many unwed pregnant women and girls were sent to live in maternity homes, where they were often coerced into relinquishing their babies.”
Another AP article goes more into the “checkered legacy” of maternity homes.
RURAL ORGANIZING
The Daily Yonder
Young Americans Returning to Rural for More than Just Holiday Dinners
Aug. 5, 2024
“Grassroots organizers and policy makers in states like Kansas, Nebraska, and New Hampshire are working hard to attract and retain younger generations choosing rural communities as their homes.”
SAFETY NET PROGRAMS
STAT
Medicare scrambles to keep prescription drug plan premiums stable ahead of elections
Aug. 5, 2024
“Medicare officials are offering private insurers big subsidies to keep premiums for prescription-drug plans stable as the elections approach.”
“The Inflation Reduction Act, passed by Democrats in 2022, made several changes to Medicare’s drug benefit, known as Medicare Part D.”
“All were aimed at lowering drug prices and drug costs for both seniors and the federal government. The most well-known policies cap annual out-of-pocket drug costs for seniors, limit their monthly insulin costs, and direct Medicare to negotiate drug prices.”
“The law also made changes to Medicare Part D that matter to insurers but aren’t well-known to the general public.”
“Among them, insurers now must pay a much greater share of seniors’ catastrophic drug costs, which are out-of-pocket costs that exceed $2,000, starting next year. The federal government used to cover the vast majority of those costs.”