Dr. Jennifer Petrie, 40, knew she wanted to be a rural, family physician since she was in high school in Lewiston, Idaho. Her office at the Emmett Medical Center is cluttered with photos of her kids, their drawings, and stacks of patient charts.
Emmett, Idaho resident Rebecca Smither (left) talks with Dr. Jennifer Petrie (right). Petrie is a graduate of the WWAMI program and now practices in Emmett.
Dr. Petrie checks the progress of Rebecca Smither’s pregnancy.
Dr. Ted Epperly is the Program Director of the Family Medicine Residency of Idaho.
Dr. Jennifer Petrie sees patients at the Emmett Medical Center four days a week.
Five-month-old Olivia Vandermate gets examined by Dr. Petrie during a recent check up. Petrie was Olivia’s delivery doctor and has taken care of her since.
Dr. Jennifer Petrie has known since she was a high school student in Lewiston, Idaho, that she wanted to be a rural family physician.
Petrie works at the Emmett Medical Center, less than an hour’s drive north of Boise. She sees patients four days a week in her small, sparse examining room here and also works the emergency room shift a couple times a month at the neighboring hospital.
Dr. Petrie is a generalist. She didn’t want to choose a high-paying specialty. For her, seeing all kinds of people was the most appealing thing about being a doctor. Continue Reading →
The wind farm on Edith and Richard Kopp's land was completed last year.
If you look at a map of where wind development has taken off in Idaho, you’ll notice an area near American Falls. There, in the rolling agricultural land of southeast Idaho, Edith Kopp stands on a high hillside. She gazes out with satisfaction at more than a dozen turbines, turning steadily.
“This is a pretty constant wind,” she says. “They’re all going!”
One North Idaho town — Potlatch — is honing its pitch to attract the gun industry and jobs. Local economic development official BJ Swanson is key to the effort. Not long ago, Swanson drove through an overgrown patch of ground on the outskirts of Potlatch, population 800. It’s a humble spot, but in it she sees the town’s future and its past.
Jim Tiede and Hans Hayden in Power County, in southeast Idaho.
Some of Idaho’s most fertile farm ground has been hit by the drought that’s crippling crops nationwide. Farmers who have deep wells and irrigation are faring well. Those who don’t aren’t. It’s one indication of the very different economics of dry-land and irrigated farming.
Farmer Hans Hayden says this spring wheat field is an almost total loss.
In Idaho’s arid, high desert, the drought has a mixed effect. There’s a big divide between farmers with deep wells and irrigation, and those without.
Hans Hayden is a rare find: a talkative farmer. He likes to explain things. But when it comes to the wheat he planted this spring, there’s not much to say. This field needed rain it didn’t get.
Chelsea Schulz started her college path to become a teacher, now she’s preparing for her job as a mechanic tech with Western States Equipment.
Part of the class works on a project together.
CAT Academy student Bobby Bailey gets instructions from Miller.
CAT Academy student Bobby Bailey works on a class project.
Toby Miller has worked at Western States for 18 years. He was raised on a ranch near Boise.
A group of CAT Academy students work on a welding project.
Eleven students will complete the summer session of Western States’ training program. Thirty one people have completed it in the last year.
Toby Miller and Quintin Edwards watch students wrap up a classroom demo.
Quintin Edwards was laid off from his construction job in 2009. He plans to work in Western States’ shop near Coeur d’Alene
Even with thousands of Idahoans out of work, one Boise-based company can’t find enough employees. Western States Equipment needs mechanic techs, jobs that by definition fall into the middle-skills category.
About half of all Idaho jobs fall into this group: jobs like mechanics, welders, police officers, or air traffic controllers. These are jobs where you need more than a high school diploma, but less than a college degree.
According to the National Skills Coalition, not quite half of Idaho’s workers are trained for these jobs. While many Idaho schools are ramping up efforts to train workers, the pipeline isn’t full yet, so one Idaho business has taken training into its own hands. Continue Reading →
Justin and Chris Black, outside the rustic home that serves as Chris Black’s cow camp
Black describes the lay of the land on his family’s ranch in the Owyhees.
The Blacks walk through the corral gate on their way to catch and saddle their horses.
Chris Black rides toward a small group of cattle seven miles from his cow camp.
Slowly, Black moves the cattle toward a different grazing area.
Mark Mahon explains how to tell the difference between a Douglas Fir and a Ponderosa Pine.
Mahon is a fourth generation logger. He hopes his own son, now in eighth grade, will follow him into the business.
Freshly cut logs line a newly cut road on the private land Mahon’s company has been hired to manage and thin.
While modern logging relies on large and expensive machines, these remain the basic tools of a logger’s trade.
After the Council School District lost its shop program, locals donated time, goods and services to start it up again.
On a Friday evening, Council’s small downtown bustles, but its main street is marked by vacant shop windows.
In Idaho, the timber and ag industries are heavy hitters.  They play big roles in the state’s history and identity. But the recession has dealt them different hands, dividing rural Idaho into winners and losers. StateImpact Idaho takes a look at two industries, two counties, and two economic fates.
Rancher Chris Black and his son, Justin, manage a thousand head of cattle on 135,000 acres in the foothills of southwest Idaho’s Owyhee Mountains. They spend most of their time miles apart – miles from anyone, in fact – working cattle. But this day is a little different. They’re walking to the corral not far from the small solar and propane-fueled house where Chris Black lives on and off from April through November. Continue Reading →
Dick Vinson began logging at 16, when he was a high school junior in Polson, Montana. Now 75, he’s trying to start up a sawmill in Emmett, Idaho.
Much of the area where Boise Cascade used to operate is fenced off and boarded up.
Judging by a faded sign next to its front door, this building once housed administrative offices for Boise Cascade’s local mill and beam plant.
The new Emerald Forest Products mill is just getting started. Here, logs await a machine called a debarker.
Once cut, boards are stacked according to size.
Three generations of mill workers: Ray Flowers, his daughter Debbie Flowers, and his grandson Casey Heideman
Emmett, Idaho, where farmer Vaughn Jensen raises corn, wheat, alfalfa hay, clover seed and cattle
Stories about mill towns tend to go something like this: generations of families work at the local sawmill. Then, the mill shuts down, taking hundreds of jobs with it. Emmett, Idaho is one of those towns. Boise Cascade closed its mill here in 2001. But that’s not where this story ends. Instead, it picks up with a Montana entrepreneur and millions in stimulus funding.
Kelly Barker, in the backyard of her Meridian home.
For months now, our “Jobless in Idaho” series has followed people here in Idaho as they search for work against hard odds. Kelly Barker, a single mom from Meridian, had been out of work for the better part of a year when we met her last winter. Since then, she’s made do with a combination of temp work, food stamps and unemployment benefits. In April, those benefits were running out.
Chad and Samantha Boucher made offers on home after home, only to be outbid. At last, they had good luck. They're packing up their apartment and moving into their new home soon.
Broker Dave Ferguson stands in front of a house in Caldwell, a good 45 minutes from downtown Boise. The five-bedroom home is in a quiet spot, shrouded in trees. In this case, that’s not a selling point. Ferguson points upward.
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