Molly Messick was StateImpact Idaho's broadcast reporter until May 2013. Prior to joining StateImpact and Boise State Public Radio, she was a reporter and host for Wyoming Public Radio. She is a graduate of Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
Yesterday’s story described the bind some refugees and refugee families find themselves in when they arrive in the U.S. owing thousands of dollars that are supposed to be repaid within four years.
Stepping back from that particular aspect of refugees’ integration, today we’re looking at the composition of Idaho’s refugee population. Continue Reading →
Qusay Alani with Dhiaa and Ahmad, two of his three sons.
The weak economy has exposed shortcomings in a little-known program of the U.S. State Department. Each year, tens of thousands of refugees arrive in the U.S. Most take out federally-funded loans to cover the cost of travel. But in this economy that has left so many without work, refugee advocates and refugees themselves say the travel loan program puts vulnerable people in an impossible bind. Some of those refugees are here, in Idaho.
It’s a sunny, spring afternoon, but the light is dim inside Qusay Alani’s east Boise apartment. He settles into an armchair to tell the story of his family’s long journey from Iraq to the U.S. A neighbor, also Iraqi, translates. “I left Iraq in 1997,” he says. “I went to Jordan.” Continue Reading →
The national mortgage delinquency rate went down in the first quarter of this year. It’s an indication of economic improvement, and Idaho beat the national average.
The mortgage delinquency rate is a measure of how many borrowers are more than two months past due on their home loan payments. According to credit bureau TransUnion, the national rate fell to 5.78 percent in the first three months of this year. It’s the lowest delinquency rate the country has seen since 2009. Continue Reading →
Larry Jones is the Boise Field Office Director for World Relief, one of three agencies that do refugee resettlement in the Boise area.
Tomorrow, we’ll air a broadcast story on a program you’ve probably never heard of. It’s called the International Organization for Migration U.S. Refugee Travel Loan Program.
What is it? In short, it covers the cost of transportation for nearly all refugees resettled in the United States. (For this year, that could be as many as 76,000 people.)
Basically, it’s a revolving loan fund. The loans are interest-free, and the money comes from the U.S. Department of State. In FY2011, the State Department contributed $78.35 million for the transportation of refugees. That money went to the International Organization for Migration, an intergovernmental group headquartered in Geneva. Continue Reading →
Moxie Java was one of the 16 companies to join the state's recent trade mission to China.
Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter is touting the results of last month’s trade mission to China. Fifteen Idaho companies and organizations joined the mission. Half were already doing business in China and went in hopes of expanding their current reach, while others went seeking a foothold in the market.
Gov. Otter says those initial meetings are key. “I think any time they can build a relationship with a company in China that sees the value of their product in that marketplace,” he says, “that’s obviously great potential for the future.”
AMET, Inc., a Rexburg company that manufactures welding control systems, estimates its exports to China will increase by $1.5 million as a result of the mission. Continue Reading →
Fairfield, above, and Twin Falls were among the many communities approved for grant funding.
Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter has signed off on more than $5.5 million in grant awards to Idaho communities.
Otter followed the guidance of the Idaho Economic Advisory Council in his decisions, approving all 18 grant proposals that the council recommended for funding.
Twin Falls will receive $500,000 in federal Community Development Block Grant dollars to upgrade its water system. That’s necessary to support the new Chobani yogurt plant.
Fairfield will also receive a half-million-dollar grant for water system improvements. The full list of grant recipients is available here. Continue Reading →
Early on a weekday morning, single mom Kelly Barker settles in at her computer. Ahead are hours of searching and applying for jobs.
Idaho’s economic picture has begun to brighten, but the state has yet to make up the jobs it lost in the downturn. Many in Idaho have watched their months of unemployment add up. Single mom Kelly Barker is one of them. She just reached an anniversary she’d rather not observe. It has now been a full year since she lost her job. After several months of temp work, Barker is back to the full-time job search, and back to unemployment benefits. This is the latest report in our “Jobless In Idaho” series.
This map shows the proposed sites for Caldwell's pending foreign trade zone.
For the last year, the Caldwell Economic Development Council has been working to establish a foreign trade zone to service Ada and Canyon Counties.
About 50 business people, realtors, local officials and others gathered at the Caldwell Airport today to learn about the potential benefits.
First they had to learn the basics. Just what is a foreign trade zone, and how does it work? The answer to that question can get complicated, and fast. But the basic description is this: a foreign trade zone allows a company in the U.S. to avoid or defer paying customs duties when it imports parts, materials, or even finished goods. That allows U.S. companies to be more competitive in the global economy. Continue Reading →
Job seekers attended a career fair in New York this week.
Thirty states including Idaho saw their unemployment rates fall in March, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Idaho’s rate dipped below 8 percent for the first time in more than two years, landing at 7.9 percent. Furthermore, just three states still have unemployment rates in the double digits, a striking improvement from two years ago. “In early 2010, 18 states and D.C. had double digit unemployment rates,” the Calculated Risk blog notes.
Despite that improvement, lead economic stories in today’s news focus on dimmed hopes that a recovery is underway. Continue Reading →
The going home bill for the Idaho Legislature this year was a measure that cuts the state’s corporate tax rate and the income tax rate paid by the state’s top earners. The individual income tax cut at times was pitched as a way to help small businesses, since many pay taxes through an individual — not corporate — return.
As the U.S. House prepares to vote on a small-business tax cut, NPR’s Tamara Keith offers up this piece about small businesses’ political sway. In a nutshell, Keith’s point is this: “[The] intense focus on small businesses may overstate the economic case. Big businesses actually employ far more people than small ones and, according to government data, the overwhelming majority of small businesses don’t employ anyone at all.” Continue Reading →
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