The Brownfields Program, funded through the EPA, helps towns across Montana redevelop contaminated buildings into new areas for economic development. Since 2016, when Anaconda and several nearby towns became eligible ...

Challis, Idaho is a small town, where mining and ranching are the main economies - but with employment and revenue down, the town is turning to recreation to bolster the economy. A collaboration between the Great Basi...

While many rural towns have struggled to retain residents and jobs, Philipsburg, Montana has enjoyed a newly bustling downtown because of tourism brought to the town by businesses with long-term advertising and renewa...

Indian Health Service, the Native American Health federal agency, has not always been an ideal health program due to lack of funding and lack of flexibility to each tribe. More tribes are opening their own clinics in ...

Historically there has been stigma and pushback to bilingual and immigrant programs, but some counties are starting to embrace diversity as key to economic development. Greater diversity spurs innovation, entrepreneur...

Truth or Consequences is a town facing many growth barriers such as an aging population and low average income. Entrepreneurs are seeing an opportunity to develop businesses in this town which is helping to revolution...

The oceans are acidifying at an alarming rate due to human-influenced climate change, and the effects are proving detrimental to our food chain and the marine ecosystem - especially shellfish, which are literally crum...

Historically, farming has been very difficult in Alaska, making certain food products very expensive, and leading to a lack of locally grown food. However, due to climate change and new technology, farming is increasi...

The indigenous tribe of Seri living in the Sonoran Desert and the Gulf of California. The group has been able to adapt to this unfriendly conditions. As the climate changes the tribe is adapting by using their knowled...

In Wyoming, the economic development is closely linked to the coal industry. 40% of the coal is being mined in this state, however, the industry is declining and many people are losing their jobs. To adjust to this ch...

A local energy cooperative in Colorado, Delta Montrose Electric Association, is spurring economic development through renewable energy. The program has allowed Delta County to diversify energy sources, and has become ...

A number of problems continue to challenge rural agriculture in the western United States. These include connecting people who grow the food with the people that need to eat the food, food waste worsening greenhouse g...

In 2011, the Colorado Education Initiative (CEI), an education advocacy and research organization, launched the Colorado Legacy Schools project. The program funded innovative ways to increase the number and diversity ...

The Migrant Education Program, which offers educational and social services to migrant worker families in Colorado’s San Luis Valley, is growing in popularity among the valley’s migrant worker population, and has rece...

To develop the next generation of producers, the Young Farmers Coalition non-profit is now pushing Congress and individual state legislatures to take a big step: forgiving farmers’ student loans.

The over-prescription of pain medicine has been a problem in southwest Colorado. Collective efforts of health care providers to standardize opioid prescriptions, clinics to expand recovery programs, and law enforcemen...

Opioid overdoses have increased across the United States and rural areas have more difficult access to receive proper treatment. Narcan or Naloxone is a treatment for opioid overdose that is more accessible now to ru...

An over-taxed basin in Colorado is getting its water use under control through the sub-district project, an innovative user-led solution for solving water problems.

In different regions of the United States, beavers are considered a predatory pest and have been subjected to lethal trapping by Wildlife Services. However, Methow Valley in Washington has initiated a project that sa...

Clean water and healthy ecosystems are becoming increasingly difficult to come by. With floating islands and other inventions, eco-entrepreneur Bruce Kania thinks that biomimicry - such as reconstructing wetlands and ...

After controversy over the removal wild horse populations, the Bureau of Land Management was tasked with the order of protecting wild horse populations. After years of protection, however, the wild horse population ha...