Texas expected to pay $700 million in penalties to the feds for SNAP errors next year
The federal government is penalizing states for having a high error rate in their payments to food stamp recipients.
How to Find Black Farmers in Your Area and Support Them
It’s no secret that Black farmers make up less than 1% of total U.S. farmers today, significantly less than there were more than a century ago.
For decades, Black farmers have been disproportionately impacted by land loss, loan rejections, and fewer resources than their white counterparts.
Since Donald Trump took office in 2025, his administration has cut severalinitiatives that could have helped some Black farmers — who say they are struggling to hold on — maintain their businesses. Last week, we reported on the impact of the U.S. Department of Agriculture nixing yet another program. The agency eliminated a $300 million grant meant to help underserved producers get access to land, capital and markets. Following publication, Capital B received a lot of questions from readers about how to support, and even locate, Black farmers.
“Can someone send me a couple of Black owned farms so I can support?” One reader asked.
Another inquired, “Who do these farmers sell to so we can support?”
These sentiments echo what Sharon Mallory, executive director of the 2020 Farmers Cooperative, told Capital B when she emphasized communities should buy local.
“That’s my call to action to change your buying behavior. Control where your dollar goes,” she said. “Buy local, buy fresh.”
How to find specific types of Black farmers and growers – ranging from beef to honey, seasonal produce, and herbs
One resource to find Black farmers in your area is the Black Farmers Index, a free resource created by the news outlet Ark Republic to address the supply chain issues during the pandemic.
Where to find the total number of Black farmers — and farms — in your county, state, and across the nation.
The first place to check is the Census of Agriculture, which is a complete count of U.S. farms and ranches. It is conducted every five years by the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service. The most recent Census published in 2022. The data isn’t 100% accurate because 39% of farmers did not complete the form. However, it is the most comprehensive data that exists.
Just click on your state here and dive into the data.
Farmer-led, food or agriculture organizations fighting back against the government or providing direct help to Black producers. (This is not an exhaustive list.)
Coeur d’Alene Tribe Launches Coyote Stories App as Part of Language Revitalization Efforts
The Coeur d’Alene Tribe has launched a user-friendly app to help restore their traditional language, Snchitsu’umshtsn. The app, named Coyote Stories after the Native American mythological trickster, features flashcards with audio pronunciations, illustrations, quizzes and stories read by elders and Coeur d’Alene app developer, Kenny Louie-McGee.
“What I love about it [the app] is that to create an app, most people are like, ‘Oh, it takes 100 developers and millions of dollars,’” Louie-McGee said. “But we’re two people, and we got it done, and that’s all it took.”
Interface of the Coyote Stories App where learners can choose which type of flashcards they want to practice. (Photo by Lyric Aquino, Underscore Native News + Report for America)
Over several years, tribal leaders discussed wanting to tackle a larger project to help engage their citizens in easy-access language programming, said LoVina Louie, natural resources, education and outreach manager for the Coeur d’Alene tribe. When Louie got hired, she reached out to her nephew Louie-McGee, who has a bachelor’s degree in computer science, and they got to work.
“We needed access to our language on a larger scale,” Louie said. “This app is a gateway for all of our people to be able to stand up and say who they are and introduce themselves in their language.”
For Louie, the teaching of coyote and his stories were an important part of growing up and giving her guidance on life.
“Coyote stories are such a huge part of our teachings and our stories. Everything we ever learned as children, we learned because of what coyote did,” Louie said.
Louie-McGee, who also serves as the public relations and digital media director for the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, spent months building the project, filling it with tens of thousands of lines of code.
To create the content for the app, Louie-McGee worked with the tribal language program, which had a catalog of around 1,000 Snchitsu’umshtsn words. The department also had videos of elders telling stories such as “Coyote and the Man,” “Four Smokes” and “How We Got the Chipmunk.” But for the stories that had no one to tell them, Louie-McGee stepped in and recorded the rest, hoping to provide resources for the next generation.
“The best way for our people, our language and our culture to not die is to put it in a database,” Louie-McGee told Underscore Native News.
Inclusive Art
For Louie-McGee, the code writing and reading stories wasn’t the difficult part of the project — that was designing elements to engage children with the app’s content.
“This piece captures the special bond between a young girl and her aunty. They are dressed similarly because when you have an amazing aunty, you naturally want to be just like her,” said Coeur d’Alene artist Valerie Adrian. (Photo courtesy of Valerie Adrian)
“We have to start creating those types of media that our kids will just watch over and over and over,” he said. “But I think this is a start.”
The app features a cartoon coyote that Louie-McGee made, which syncs up with his words as he tells stories such as “The Trickster’s Path” and “Conditions in Mythological Times.”
Louie-McGee knew visual design was going to be a large part of the success of the app. Originally, he and Louie tested AI-generated imagery for the app, but tribal officials wanted to see artwork created by tribal members, leading them to hire Coeur d’Alene artists.
Valerie Adrian is known in Coeur d’Alene as an entrepreneur, mental health advocate, and, largely, as an artist. Adrian, who also uses dance to express herself artistically, said she recently fell in love with digital art when she had her son four years ago. After suffering from mental health issues post birth, Adrian lost herself for a bit of time until she found digital art and began to create it as a coping mechanism.
“I discovered combining positive self-affirmations and the way I feel into art pieces helps me cope with whatever I’m going through,” Adrian added.
Adrian, who worked on 15 different digital art pieces for the flashcards, said she’s thankful for the opportunity to help restore the Snchitsu’umshtsn language. While she was creating art and reviewing flashcards in the app, she began learning pieces of her language — something she’s struggled with in the past.
“This piece captures the special bond between a young girl and her aunty. They are dressed similarly because when you have an amazing aunty, you naturally want to be just like her,” said Coeur d’Alene artist Valerie Adrian. (Photo courtesy of Valarie Adrian)
“We have language classes here which are awesome, but it’s more convenient to have it in your hand whenever you want,” Adrian added. “And you can actually hear the person saying the word correctly, so you know you’re actually saying it right.”
While flipping through flashcards, Adrian said she wanted Coeur d’Alene tribal members to feel represented and to see themselves in her art. From head scarves to traditional plateau-style fringe dresses, boys with braids and cradle boards, Indigenous people of all ages can be seen throughout the lessons, making Adrian feel proud to share her work.
“I feel lucky. This is going to be around for my children’s lives and throughout their children’s lives,” she said. “And it’s awesome to know that the future generations can look back on this and know who the artist is. It makes me proud.”
Future generations
When he came home from college, Louie-McGee had a goal — to use his degree to help his people and revitalize their culture. His first project, which didn’t come to fruition, was a video game about stickgame, a traditional Indigenous game.
Interface of the Coyote Stories App where learners can listen to stories. (Photo by Lyric Aquino, Underscore Native News + Report for America)
“I knew I wanted to do something for at least our people,” Louie-McGee said. “That was my first goal: to make a game. And then I started falling in love with making apps.”
With the lengthy catalog of Snchitsu’umshtsn words at his disposal, Louie-McGee is excited to continue making flashcards and quizzes for future use. As the app continues to grow and fill with content, he and Louie hope to add components such as sentence structure and grammar.
“We can get our kids, who are on phones and tablets 24/7 already, we can give them a tool to connect them to our tribe and to learn our language so our language doesn’t die,” Louie said. “We want the kids to be able to say ‘hi, good morning,’ and ‘how are you?’ So we definitely want to move into that next process of sentences.”
As Louie-McGee continues to spread the word about his app to other tribal nations, he hopes they, too, will build something like Coyote Stories to revitalize Indigenous languages. As of now, the Shoshone-Paiute Tribes are working with Louie-McGee to develop a similar app for their community.
This western Maine mountain town is desperate for more housing
A viewpoint from atop Little Bigelow Mountain provides an open view of Carrabassett Valley and Sugarloaf Mountain. Photo courtesy Aislinn Sarnacki.
Daniel O’Connor is aReport for Americacorps member who covers rural government as part of the partnership between The Maine Monitor and the Bangor Daily News, with additional support from BDN and Monitor readers.
Officials in western Maine town of Eustis are seeking ways to expand the local housing supply, and they’re the first to join a new initiative by a major state nonprofit.
The town is the first to host officials from GrowSmart Maine to discuss its new “Housing Forward Communities” initiative, which is based in Franklin County and aimed at building community consensus in favor of new housing projects.
The nationwide housing shortage has spiked property values and taxes across the state. As the tourist economy drives new growth in northwestern Maine, Eustis, where most properties sit empty for much of the year, has little housing available.
“If somebody wanted to move to town, they’re not going to find a place,” Town Clerk Rachel Williams said. “And they’re really not going to find … an affordable place.”
The donor-funded program aims to host community conversations around housing, create a local “housing action committee” and help the town draft resolutions guiding future planning decisions.
Rent in Eustis has more than doubled in just a few years, according to data in the state’s housing portal compiled from Zillow and the U.S. Census Bureau. The median rent in the town, which lies near the ski resort at Sugarloaf but an hour’s drive from the nearest major service center in Farmington, was $916 in 2024. It was about $450 in 2019.
Vacancy rates are also dropping, according to census data. In 2014, more than a quarter of rentals were available. In 2024, that number was 5.3%. It’s similarly hard to find a permanent home in the town, with 4.5% of owned homes vacant and for sale in 2014 compared with none in 2024.
The town’s thirst for more housing has come up repeatedly at local meetings as the limited tax base has strained budgets. In minutes from a February town meeting in which officials discussed a proposed school budget increase, the exchange is summarized by saying educators “have cut where they can.”
“We need more housing,” the minutes read.
Williams said that it’s difficult to find workers in Eustis. Stratton Lumber, the local sawmill, has had to hire workers from far away as a result. A manager there directed questions from a reporter to the mill’s owner, who could not immediately be reached for comment.
Voters in nearby Kingfield killed a housing project in 2024 that was planned for a 7-acre plot behind Dollar General, putting it among the towns that have resisted attempts to build more housing. GrowSmart Maine’s new program for Franklin County aims to preempt similar cases.
“There is often local resistance to new proposals,” GrowSmart Maine’s Associate Director Harald Bredesen said. “The purpose of this program is to kind of have discussion first … so that the community doesn’t have to say yes no to a particular proposal, but rather, can kind of help shape the kinds of proposals and attract, maybe, the kinds of developers that they want.”
Manure Digesters Help Cut Methane — But They Also Leak
California, the United States’ top dairy producer, is heavily investing in manure digesters to curb methane emissions from its dairy farms. These systems are touted for breaking down cattle manure and other organic matter in an oxygen-free environment, capturing methane and converting it into clean energy.
But new research suggests these systems are leaking methane, a potent greenhouse gas — sometimes in volumes large enough to limit their climate benefits. Analyses from other researchers have also suggested that manure digesters are less effective than earlier, more optimistic analyses estimated, and need to be paired with other strategies for curbing greenhouse gas emissions from the dairy industry.
Researchers tracked methane emissions at 98 California dairies from 2016 to 2024 using satellite and airborne observations, comparing levels before, during and after manure digesters were installed. While methane emissions fell by 25% on average, the digesters themselves emerged as the largest source of emissions post installation, the study found. The research was published in Environmental Research Letters on March 24.
The findings highlight the need to monitor manure biodigesters, where they are used, and quickly alert operators to methane leaks. “When they leak or they don’t work effectively, they can create large amounts of methane that might turn it into a greenhouse gas problem, instead of a solution,” Alyssa Valdez, a PhD candidate at University of California, Riverside and the lead author of the study, tells Sentient.
Despite this concern, Valdez sees manure digesters as a useful tool when closely monitored, just not a standalone solution to the dairy industry’s contribution to the climate crisis.
Digester Leaks
Methane — which traps heat far more effectively than carbon dioxide over short periods of time — makes up 12% of the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions. In California, around 71% of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions come from livestock, mainly methane emissions from cattle digestion and manure management. Cutting methane at its source “can actually make a big impact and it might be a change we see in our lifetime,” much faster than some other climate solutions, Valdez says.
To address the methane problem, many states, including California, have turned to manure biodigesters. Microbes inside these biodigesters break down organic materials and produce biogas, mainly methane and carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere, while methane is captured and piped away to generate electricity, heat or fuel.
As of May 2025, California had 243 dairy manure biodigester projects in use or development, many funded by the state. The state’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard program has also helped drive expansion by rewarding fuels with lower carbon intensity than gasoline and diesel, such as biofuel. Some critics say the program entrenches industrial-scale livestock operations, while others argue that accounting methods can make digesters appear more effective than they really are.
Most of the state’s dairy cows and Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) are clustered in the Central Valley. Valdez, who lived there for years, was struck by the air pollution and food insecurity in one of the country’s most productive agricultural regions. Her asthma meant that she struggled on days with poor air quality. That experience shaped her research focus: greenhouse gas emissions from dairies and manure management strategies. “There’s some cracks in the system that I really want to investigate,” she realized.
Her study found that methane emissions fell in about two-thirds of dairies after manure digesters — specifically covered lagoons — were installed. Covered lagoons are earthen pits where manure is stored and sealed with covers that capture the methane they release.
However, after installation, manure digesters became the “most persistent emitters” — representing 47% of plumes — compared with other on-farm sources such as lagoons, gas-handling systems and structures that house cows, according to the paper. While leaks were rare, they were also exceptionally potent: some exceeded 1,000 kilograms of methane per hour. By comparison, emissions from open lagoons typically ranged from 20 to 100 kilograms per hour.
Methane emissions from manure digesters can come from several sources. A California Air Resources Board analysis found that some came from leaks, some from intentional venting when systems exceed capacity or during processing and some during maintenance.
Another key finding of the study is the spikes observed in methane emissions during construction, Valdez says. Researchers observed higher and more frequent methane releases during installation than before or after. Though temporary, the construction phase can disrupt manure management and create new pathways for methane to escape. Digging lagoons and installing covers can also disrupt manure flow. Valdez suggests monitoring this period closely and ensuring it does not drag on.
There is a climate case for addressing methane leaks, but it makes economic sense too. “Leaks are also bad for the pockets of those who want to fund and build digesters,” Valdez says, noting that a digester company expressed interest in her findings.
The findings of the new study align with other research on digesters’ role in climate mitigation. A working paper from the World Resources Institute and a peer-reviewed study from Johns Hopkins University published last year suggest that while digesters can reduce odor and some methane, there are also ongoing concerns about leaks and increased emissions of ammonia and other pollutants.
Overhyped Solution or Useful Tool?
The benefits of manure digesters are “vastly overstated,” argues Brent Kim, one of the authors of the John Hopkins paper. He says that even a 25% reduction in methane emissions may give an inflated picture, since it only addresses one part of dairy’s climate footprint: manure management. Digesters do not address most greenhouse gas emissions from dairy, he says — such as those from land use, growing feed crops, raising animals and spreading manure.
“The additional greenhouse gas emissions from larger herd sizes further undercut the already-modest reductions from digesters,” Kim says. His previous research similarly notes that investments in manure digesters can support the expansion of large-scale animal agriculture and fossil fuel infrastructure, both of which are linked to environmental and public health harms.
Kim adds that the buildout of digesters “diverts resources away from proven climate solutions and incentives growth in an industry in need of wholesale reform.”
Valdez argues against dismissing the technology entirely, though she believes that they should be part of a diverse set of tools for reducing dairy emissions. “Digesters have to be paired with other solutions and you have to continuously monitor them,” she says.
Hollister council dissolves besieged department after public outcry
Recent outcry from community members and business owners regarding the city’s difficulties in the building permit and inspection processes has led the Hollister City Council to dissolve the Community Development Department and eliminate three positions.
While several community members voiced their support for the move, affected employees spoke against the move at the April 6 Hollister City Council meeting.
City Manager Ana Cortez, who took over the top administrator position in February, said the department’s reorganization would bring $936,000 in annual savings to the city.
“I’m confident that as we move forward we will begin to see improvements in customer service, improvement in timelines, improvement in being able to deliver and being able to deliver consistent information,” Cortez said.
Cortez said a “vacuum of leadership” and “use of poor practices” led to a loss in trust in the department.
“The community has spoken very clearly on what is expected,” she said.
The positions being eliminated are the community development director/assistant city manager Rod Powell, building official Gabriel Martinez and the cannabis affairs manager Maria Mendez.
The positions being eliminated are the community development director/assistant city manager, a building official position and the cannabis affairs manager. These were held, respectively, by Rod Powell, Gabriel Martinez and Maria Mendez.
The three employees will be placed on a re-employment list and receive a 30-day notice, according to the staff report in the agenda.
Since November, BenitoLink has reported community members’ accusations that staff were obstructing or delaying projects in the permitting process and adding requirements after each inspection.
With the elimination of the department, the city will move its planning services under the supervision of the parks and recreation department; cannabis under the police department; the permitting desk under finance; and building inspections under public works.
To address employees’ concerns over the city’s vision, Cortez said she began holding meetings with departments in April, the same approach she took when she held a town hall with community members to express their concerns about the city’s services.
“Yes, there will be an angry table because employees will be angry,” she said. “I know that, but that comes with the job.”
Among the employees who spoke out against the plan was Mendez, who questioned whether the decision was budget-driven or a reaction to political pressure, referencing the staff report which states that the city faces “crisis of public opinion.”
Mendez, who has been with the city for 20 years, said that at the recent workshop the city hosted, community members did not bring up complaints about the cannabis affairs department.
However, Ashley McPhail, CEO of Faultline Manufacturing, accused the cannabis department of losing her documentation and being a “ghost town department” because it was difficult getting information.
Mendez said she learned the city was considering eliminating her position when the agenda was published on April 3 and that she was concerned about the lack of communication with staff.
“Decisions like these are more [than] decisions, they are about trust, integrity and most importantly the values we hold as a community,” she said.
A community member identified as “Andres” questioned Cortez’s process of eliminating the positions and said it could lead to lawsuits and severances, referencing Cortez’s employment history in Carnation, Washington, in which the Snoqualmie Valley Record reported she resigned months after a third-party arbitrator ordered the city to reinstate four unionized employees with full back pay in a wrongful termination case.
The newspaper also reported she left with a $120,000 severance package.
Before that, Cortez had resigned as the city manager for Helena, Montana, weeks after she was placed on administrative leave following staff complaints involving harassment. Although she was cleared of the allegations, an outside investigation recommended the city work on improving communications between Cortez and staff.
Community member John Coulter said he supported Cortez’s reorganization.
“It’s what has to be done. We’ve all suffered,” he said. “You hear about the employees saying ‘what about the employee,’ but they are the ones who caused the suffering that is going on and it’s through incompetence.”
Two other community members raised concerns about the qualifications of current parks and recreation and public works department directors to oversee planning and building.
Former Hollister city councilmember and planning commissioner Carol Lenoir said she had expected the city to hire new people at the embattled departments rather than shifting them to other departments.
“That’s a lot of stuff you have to know and a lot of agencies you have to work with,” she said.
Other council actions
The Hollister City Council also rescinded resolutions that named a street and park after Cesar Chavez. Both are located in the southeast area of the city.
The move followed previous discussions the council members held after allegations surfaced of sexual misconduct by the farmworker civil rights leader.
The city will conduct outreach in the community for potential replacement names before the City Council acts to remove the Avenida Cesar Chavez signs.
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The town of Jay in the eastern Adirondacks is becoming a hot spot, in more ways than one.
After years of unsuccessfully trying to convince carriers that the hamlet of Au Sable Forks and much of the Ausable River Valley is a communications dead zone, the town, in conjunction with the Essex County IT department and the Lake Champlain Regional Planning Board, has worked out a hack that basically turns the town’s three hamlets into wifi hotspots.
“I got sick of beating my head against the wall with Verizon,” said Jay Supervisor Matt Stanley. “And it’s tough for a for-profit company, which Verizon is, to come in and make profit in a town of 2,500 people. I can’t control that. I can control our public Wi-Fi network, and if you’re driving through the area and your cell phone’s not working, you’ll be able to stop in the town of Jay and have Wi-Fi everywhere.”
Town of Jay Supervisor Matt Stanley in downtown Au Sable Forks. Explorer file photo by Eric Teed
“Stopping” is key. Three thousand cars pass through Au Sable Forks on any given day, a share of which are traveling from the northeast—Plattsburgh, Montreal, Vermont—to recreate in the Adirondack Park. And typically, they zip right through.
Jay advocates hope motorists will stop to connect. Right now, there are three spheres of public Wi-Fi in Au Sable Forks: the Community Center, Grove Road park and Riverside Park next to the Tops supermarket.
“Once you connect your phone, no matter which one you go to, it’s all got the same wireless network, so your phone automatically recognizes it and jumps right on,” Stanley said. “If you’re in a pinch and you need to make a call, go down where the rivers meet.”
The town plans to build out the system from there.
Adding a visitor center, EV chargers
The Ausable River Valley Business Association, in conjunction with the town and the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism (ROOST), is opening a visitor center on the ground floor of the Tahawus Cultural Center in Au Sable Forks.
“From my perspective the visitors center will liven up Main Street by bringing a vacant store front to life, where we can help promote our region and area activities, along with our businesses,” said ARVBA President Knut Sauer. “It will help us tell the story of the Ausable River Valley—our businesses, our people, our natural beauty, and our opportunities. We’re thrilled to be opening our doors and to welcome a part‑time manager who will help us make this a vibrant and helpful hub for everyone who stops by.”
The town is also adding electric vehicle chargers in Jay and Upper Jay, where kiosks will tell the story of Jay—although again, the ubiquitous QR codes that provide further information will have to wait until there is Wi-Fi.
A game-changing moment for Jay
The utility of Wi-Fi, and its importance in the modern world, can manifest in interesting ways.
At a meeting in Upper Jay with the Adirondack Innovation Initiative (A2i) in mid-March, Stanley told the tech-savvy crowd that when the ice jam on the East Branch of the Ausable River broke, Stanley was in Florida, where his daughters attend school. No matter.
“I was able to watch the flooding, communicate with all the emergency personnel and declare a state of emergency from Florida while I was down there for parents’ weekend,” Stanley said. “And that’s all because of the tech side of stuff that we can do.”
To spread the signal through the hamlet, the town will beam signal from one utility pole to another by way of small-cell nodes.
A fiber installed by the Development Authority of the North Country on the east side of the East Branch will carry signal to the covered bridge in the hamlet of Jay and then on to Upper Jay. There won’t be push notifications alerting motorists to Wi-Fi’s availability, so the town will depend on signage to spread the word.
“The more reasons we can get people to stop and get out of their car in the town of Jay, the better it is going to be for us to create tourism and economic development for our town,” Stanley said. “This is, in my opinion, a pilot program that, once people can see what we’re doing, can be a model for other rural communities.”
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How much more wind energy might Wyoming see? It’s complicated.
Entering election season, some Wyoming candidates are embracing President Donald Trump’s hard-line opposition to wind energy, which he has described as “a blight on our country,” while vowing his administration is “going to try and have no windmills built in the United States.”
Republican candidate for Wyoming’s lone U.S. House of Representatives seat and sitting Secretary of State, Chuck Gray, has declared “woke wind is wrong for Wyoming” and that wind turbines “have been terrorizing the landscape for too long.”
Reid Rasner, also vying for Wyoming’s U.S. House seat, has said, “I stand with President Trump, I oppose windmill expansion and I will fight to make America energy dominant again,” while chiding Gray for past votes in favor of wind energy as State Board of Land commissioner.
To date, there are about 1,500 wind turbines spinning in the state with a generating capacity of approximately 3,700 megawatts — that’s about 25% of Wyoming’s total electrical generation capacity, according to multiple sources compiled by WyoFile.
This map depicts average annual wind speeds in the U.S. (National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
What’s yet to come depends on multiple factors, and tracking which projects are moving forward and which have stalled is challenging because there’s no single source or clearinghouse for up-to-date, Wyoming-specific information.
The Trump administration’s order to halt wind project permitting on federal lands has no bearing on development proposed for state and private lands. While there’s much debate at the state and local level about where to locate and, sometimes, whether to permit wind and other utility-scale renewable energy projects at all, it’s hard to size up exactly how much more wind development is on the horizon for Wyoming.
“We need to improve the process and transparency,” Cheyenne area resident Wendy Volk said.
Patchwork and moving targets
The Wyoming Industrial Siting Council holds a wealth of information, but only regarding qualifying projects: those exceeding $240 million in construction costs and with significant socioeconomic impacts. Landowners and county officials hear from many other developers about potential projects that haven’t yet entered the county, state or federal permitting process. Plus, many of the renewable energy and other industrial projects on the council’s docket continually change in size, scope and timing.
“You have an applicant for a permit and he’s telling the Industrial Siting Council, ‘We’re going to need to delay our project. We might resize our project.’ Or, what they’re not saying is they potentially may never build the project,” Volk told WyoFile.
The council has sent out at least eight public notices so far this year regarding amendments to various projects. The Settler Wind Project in Converse County, for example, was granted a request to change its construction start date from August 2025 to November 2027. The Dinosolar Solar Energy Project in Natrona County was granted a request to reduce the size of the project from 440 megawatts to 240 megawatts and to delay construction from April 2024 to March 2029.
One megawatt is enough electricity to power about 750 homes.
This chart depicts the growth of wind and solar energy in the U.S. (U.S. Energy Information Administration)
It’s not just the siting council that has incomplete and ever-changing information, Volk said. Residents are left to navigate fluctuating planning and permitting processes at the county, state and federal level. Some state-level officials have confided in her, Volk said, that the volume and ever-changing information is overwhelming and difficult to understand. Some have even suggested she generate a comprehensive map of existing and proposed renewable energy projects herself.
“Is that my job?” the real estate agent said.
Volk recently helped launch a petition that, in part, asks Wyoming officials to pause renewable energy permitting to conduct a “cumulative, landscape-level impact analysis.”
“Wyoming residents expect transparency, accountability and an honest conversation,” Volk continued. “When projects stack up across a region, impacts multiply — even when each project claims compliance in isolation. My biggest concern is transparency. But let’s look at that cumulative impact. And how can you look at the cumulative impact of a 150-mile corridor if you don’t even have a map?”
Inherently arduous
The tangle of multiple authorities, moving targets and changing scope of projects — not to mention market realities like supply chain interruptions — is not a nefarious divide-and-conquer strategy, Power Company of Wyoming Communications Director Kara Choquette told WyoFile.
“There’s just a lot of permitting processes that are difficult to match up with the reality of what it’s like to develop a wind project,” Choquette said. “It’s really hard to predict. The timeframe on all of those permits have to be linked together.”
She pointed to a Wyoming wind energy permitting flow chart on page 84 of this document.
Choquette said she speaks from experience. The $3 billion, 732-mile-long TransWest Express transmission line to bring electricity from Power Company of Wyoming’s Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project in Carbon County to the southwest took some 15 years to permit.
“It’s difficult to permit and develop a big energy project,” Choquette said.
Federal and state officials gathered in Carbon County June 20, 2023, to celebrate the launch of the TransWest Express transmission project. (Dustin Bleizeffer/WyoFile)
Further muddying the picture of potential renewable energy development in Wyoming are legal entanglements.
Citing a court ruling, the Wyoming state lands board in February began the process of invalidating two wind leases it had approved last year — one related to the Pronghorn H2 Clean Energy Project in Converse County and one for the Sidewinder Clean Hydrogen Project in Niobrara County.
Before the vote, Wyoming State Auditor Kristi Racines said the board — made up of Wyoming’s top five elected officials — had sometimes whiffed on public notices and failed to give the public a proper platform to engage, referring to a December meeting that didn’t allow for a full discussion between the board and concerned residents.
“And so me, personally,” Racines said, “I am here today to tell you that I apologize. I apologize for the mess that this has become.”
From Substack and Facebook to cafés and libraries, residents get information from many places — but rarely local news outlets, says new report
How do you get your news?
A core part of our mission as Charlottesville Inclusive Media is to strengthen our information “ecosystem,” including all the people and groups across our region who amplify and share local news and vital resources. They might work for traditional outlets, like newspapers, or write blogs or Substack newsletters, or even share information on a bulletin board at a community center.
Listening Post Collective conducts these assessments across the nation, hiring local researchers to do surveys, interviews and information mapping.
“Our mission is to partner with communities on building responsive and resilient information ecosystems that reflect local news needs and pathways,” said Jesse Hardman, founder of Listening Post Collective.
“Some of that work is lifting up traditional news organizations, but it also means partnering with trusted information sharers who aren’t journalists. By listening to communities, we see how critical information actually moves, and can better lean into local needs.”
Local researchers Oliver Hale, Sue Frankel-Streit, Sharon Harris, Luna Cortes and Kristina (Ti) Stelling surveyed 316 community members, mapped 75 community information hubs and interviewed 13 local communications experts, including representatives from the NAACP, a the founder of a popular newsletter and the chair of a county Republican committee.
According to the report, people said the top barrier to accessing information was the lack of local news outlets, although residents are trying to fill these gaps with hyperlocal newsletters and Facebook groups. The primary ways respondents reported getting local news was by word-of-mouth through friends and family (55%), then Facebook (48%).
“I asked if there are any sources of news in the community that you don’t trust and they say Facebook. So I asked them where they get their news? Facebook. What do you not trust? Facebook. Maybe there’s a little bit of a problem here,” said Nelson County researcher Oliver Hale, who is quoted in the report.
“Almost every single person I talked to, regardless of age, except for maybe people who are under 20, they all said they get their news from Nelson Knows [Facebook Group].”
The Listening Post Collective researchers surveyed respondents about barriers to accessing information in the community. Credit: Luna Cortes/Listening Post Collective and Kisha Bwenge/Charlottesville Area Community Foundation
“It is interesting that a local newspaper like The Central Virginian has survived, and I think it survived because the Louisa community has a strong investment in their local newspaper,” said Mitch Sasser, editor of the paper, according to the report. He also emphasized the role of a rural editor as all-encompassing.
“I think the idea of an editor conjures up someone who leads their team of reporters and a little bit behind the scenes. But that’s not the reality, I think, as a rural editor. It’s like, ‘Oh, no, I’m kind of responsible for the content each week and responsible for delegating and making sure that there’s something that I can’t do that other people are doing it.”
And although outlets based in Charlottesville and Richmond sometimes cover the four counties, respondents said this coverage can be spotty and lack local context. County governments, despite being close to the issues, were found to be inconsistent about communication. Researchers found that there are hot-button issues that increase demand for local news, such as the construction of data centers.
Local researchers completed surveys and interviews in Fluvanna, Louisa, Madison and Nelson counties. In the upper-right quadrant, Louisa County researcher Sue Frenkel-Streit speaks with Sharon MacDonald, executive director of Louisa County Adult Community Education. On the lower left, Madison County researcher Kristina “Ti” Stelling chats with Bonnie Utz, the managing director of Madison County Library. Credit: Luna Cortes/Listening Post Collective
“Partnering with amazing local researchers in Fluvanna, Louisa, Nelson and Madison counties, we’ve listened on porches, in churches, at libraries, in coffee shops, and local folks have shared what’s missing and ideas they have for reconnecting their neighbors to the news they need,” said Hardman.
“We see local news as essential community infrastructure that keeps central Virginians informed, connected and engaged. It impacts the many important issues that affect our region — from housing to education to economic opportunity — and helps us all make decisions about our daily lives and the future of our communities,” said Eboni Bugg, director of community investment at the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation.
Charlottesville Inclusive Media partners Charlottesville Tomorrow, Vinegar Hill Magazine and In My Humble Opinion radio show will keep helping build local news and information for everyone in central Virginia, while acknowledging the innovative and nimble ways community members have filled the gaps. We’ll see you on the listening tour!
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