Mountain West News Bureau

Nevada and New Mexico ranked among the worst in the nation for overall child well-being. Montana, Idaho, Colorado and Wyoming graded in the top half of states, while Utah ranked fourth.

U.S. Senators talked last week about the costs of climate change, and potential costs of doing nothing. Some argued we need to focus efforts on local communities and governments. They’re often paying the price when floods take out roads, wildfires pollute waterways or towns run out of water.

A Nevada workforce training initiative focused on rural and Indigenous communities is among a handful of workforce programs in the Mountain West receiving millions of dollars in funding through the Biden administration’s Good Jobs Challenge.

A new report reveals the U.S. cities with the highest rates of home sellers dropping their asking prices, and many of those markets are in the Mountain West.

The Boston-based student was on a trip with the Lander, Wyo.-based National Outdoor Leadership School, or NOLS. The case is the first fatality caused by a lightning strike in Wyoming in more than ten years.

One of the nation’s most closely watched primaries is in Wyoming. Liz Cheney hopes to keep her seat in Congress, but she alienated many of the state's Republicans by voting to impeach President Trump. And that’s created a dilemma for Democrats in one of the state’s few solidly blue areas. Should they change parties to vote for her in the primary?

Colorado Rep. Joe Neguse (D), a chief sponsor of the bill, says the package confronts the effects of climate change in the West.

A paper out of the University of Utah shows that plume heights are increasing more than 300 feet every year in mountain ranges in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona.

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced a new $1 billion grant program this week to help communities facing wildfire risks. Grants for wildfire protection planning or outreach can be up to $250,000. Affiliated infrastructure and resilience projects can get grants of up to $10 million.

Officials in New Mexico recently celebrated the purchase of about 54,000 acres to create its largest state-owned recreation area, and it’s one of the biggest public land acquisitions in the U.S. this year.