High Country News

A new measure of poverty shifts rankings in the West

When determining who is poor, the Census Bureau takes geography into account in its Supplemental Poverty Measure.

by Jonathan Thompson, Dec 10, 2012
The great New Mexican juniper massacre

On public land in New Mexico, firewood-hunters have illegally cut down hundreds of old-growth juniper trees, much to the dismay of the Bureau of Land Management and environmental activists.

by Jonathan Thompson, Sep 16, 2012
The teenagers we're not helping

The West's gay teenagers are too often ignored -- abandoned by their families to live on the streets or in overcrowded homeless shelters.

by Tim Lydon, May 10, 2012
Conservative legislator takes on Wal-Mart

Idaho’s Republican Speaker of the House, Rep. Bruce Newcomb, wants to force Wal-Mart to either provide health insurance for its Idaho employees or reimburse the state for providing Medicaid coverage

by Dan Popkey, Sep 19, 2005
A do-it-yourself Christmas tradition

How do you make Christmas meaningful? Help someone you've never even met.

by Andrea Gelfuso Goetz, Dec 21, 2011
Times are tough all over

Where's the compassion for the poor bullied 1 percent of the world -- the rich people who just aren't as rich as they ought to be?

by Jaime O'Neill, Oct 20, 2011
The painful beauty of love

Melanie Rae Thon's short stories, gathered in her collection In This Light, paint a desolate and tender picture of the West.

by Kathleen Yale, May 15, 2011
Rural Education 2.0

Tiny Vilas, Colo., thought it was a great idea to open an online school and enroll at-risk students from far-away Denver – but neither the students nor the school district ended up scoring well at report card time

by Samuel Western, Apr 30, 2007
Problems in Paradise

The brutal murder of a Japanese tourist shines an unwelcome spotlight on the social problems plaguing Arizona’s beautiful but troubled Havasupai Reservation

by John Dougherty, May 28, 2007
The persistence of a golden time in the West

Seventy years after the publication of Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, migrant workers still roam the West, eking out a tough living in its orchards and farm fields.

by David Frey , Apr 24, 2009