Madelyn Beck
I’m the Mountain West News Bureau reporter at Boise State Public Radio. That means I work with reporters and NPR stations around the region to cover Mountain West issues like public lands, influential court cases and the environment, among many other things.
I grew up on a ranch in Montana, but I’ve reported everywhere from North Dakota to Alaska to Washington, D.C. My last few positions included covering energy resources in Wyoming and reporting on agriculture/rural life in Illinois.
My pre-journalism jobs include (but are not limited to): ranch hand for Icelandic horses, hotel laundress, large caliber brass shell sorter/inventory, salmon processor in Alaska and waitress for a murder mystery dinner theater.
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A multi-state project is working to provide electric vehicle charging stations and corridors to scenic areas around the Mountain West. ChargeWest is working with state agencies in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona to make this a reality. -
The recent flooding around Yellowstone National Park also created challenges for gateway towns like Gardner, Red Lodge and Cooke City in Montana. That includes lost homes and possibly lost livelihoods. For travelers who can no longer access the park through those towns, there’s another Montana entrance: West Yellowstone, the most popular gateway to the park.
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The U.S. Supreme Court has handed abortion decisions to states. That means state supreme courts will likely have to review what abortion rights people have under state constitutions. In the Mountain West, there are already several lawsuits about abortion laws that these state courts have to review. That includes one suit in Idaho and another in Utah, which has led to a temporary stay of that law going into effect.
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U.S. Senators talked about the West’s drought this week and what more they could be doing to address it. About $8.3 billion from the bipartisan infrastructure package is going to water systems, but as some lawmakers noted, water is drying up faster than some projects can get off the ground.
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U.S. life expectancy was already lower than other high-income nations and the gap was widening before 2019. Since then, things have gotten worse. New research found that in 2020, life expectancies here dropped disproportionately for marginalized, racialized populations. Especially for Native American and Alaska Native groups
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Interior Secretary Deb Haaland is launching an Indian Youth Service Corps with new guidelines. The corps was established in 2019 as part of an amendment to the Public Lands Corps Act. Now, Haaland has published actual guidelines. One of its goals is fostering natural resource and land stewardship skills for young tribal members aged 16 to 30, or 35 if you’re a veteran.
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Glacier National Park has re-instituted a mask mandate inside federal buildings, like visitor centers. Officials there say they’re following National Park Service and Interior Department guidance. That is, when the CDC reports a high level of COVID-19 community spread around a park, officials re-institute an indoor mask mandate. Other national parks could bring back mask requirements, too, if rates increase around the West.
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A federal contract to investigate deaths at tribal jails went to a man who had oversight of those facilities during 6 of the deaths. Now, watchdog group Project on Government Oversight is calling on the Interior’s Office of Inspector General to investigate that contract and whether it violated rules regarding former federal employees.
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The National Weather Service released its June outlook today. It doesn’t look great for Utah, Nevada, Colorado or New Mexico. Part of all of those states are expected to have higher than normal temperatures and lower than normal precipitation. Parts of northern Idaho and Wyoming are expected to stay cooler in June with more precipitation, but heat up later in the summer.
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People facing high wildfire risks are more likely to be white, live in pricier homes and have higher incomes. That’s according to new research published in Environmental Research Letters. It suggests that this wealthier group is more likely to face wildfire threats because many of them seek the beautiful views and amenities on the outskirts of bigger cities in the West.
