Local Motion

This week on Local Motion, KVNF's Gavin Dahl speaks with data journalist Sandra Fish who is covering campaign spending this election for The Colorado Sun, and Colorado College professor Corey Hutchins who writes for Columbia Journalism Review and publishes a must-read newsletter each week

On this edition of Local Motion, we’ll discuss two Delta County ballot measures. Delta County residents are being asked to vote on a Back the Badge measure that would institute a special public safety tax to help fund law enforcement. And the  towns of Paonia and Cedaredge are each considering allowing sales of medical and recreational marijuana, and taxing those sales to create additional revenue. 

On this edition of Local Motion we hear a debate produced as part of Colorado Decides by PBS12, CBS4, and The Colorado Sun. Proposition 117 would establish a requirement of voter approval before the state can collect new enterprise funds of a certain size. 

On this week’s edition, we’re taking a look at how the school year is going so far. The COVID-19  pandemic has upended so much of our daily life, and that’s especially evident in education, where schools, teachers, parents and students have had to adjust to new procedures, changed expectations and different ways of learning.

On this week's edition of Local Motion we hear highlights from the first two episodes of Wildish, a new podcast from High Country News. Host Anna Coborn learns about federal mustang management in the not-so-wild west, introducing us to wildlife managers, landowners, and wild horse advocates. The Wild Horse and Burro Program could soon reach a breaking point. You can learn more about the series here.

Colorado’s North Fork Valley is well known for its small farms, producing some of the state’s finest fruits, vegetables, and meats. KVNF visited one such small farm earlier this summer,  DeerTree Farm near Hotchkiss. It’s owned by AJ and Nicole Carrillo, a couple in their early 30s.

Colorado's Commissioner of Agriculture, Kate Greenberg, talks with KVNF's Kori Stanton on August 26th, 2020. Greenberg gives KVNF listeners an  update on what's going on at the Colorado Department of Agriculture in the middle of the pandemic and answers questions from Western Slope farmers, ranchers and producers.

This week's program is a special documentary from Making Contact. In LA 50 years ago, 30,000 mostly Chicanos peacefully protested the disproportionate number of Latinos dying on the frontlines in Vietnam. They came from across the country to also protest substandard education, racism, police violence, and other issues negatively affecting Latinos. What started out as a peaceful march ended with an attack by riot-clad police, 400 arrests, and the deaths of four people. 

Passionate hyper-local reporting in the public interest can come at a cost.  For Erin McIntyre, co-publisher of The Ouray County Plaindealer, critical reporting on defiance of county health measures during the pandemic led to retaliation from a local business.

This week on Local Motion, KVNF's Gavin Dahl speaks with Delta County librarian Sarah Smith and Montrose County librarians Elizabeth Cook and Amy Dickinson about getting creative to serve kids this summer. Though libraries were forced to close for several months by the coronavirus pandemic, area libraries found ways to help kids keep busy, improve literacy, and stay connected.

This week on Local Motion we’ll hear interviews with a Black pastor from Lake City, Colorado and an ethnic studies professor from CU Boulder. The pastor, Brendan McMillan, is the only Black religious leader in his small mountain town, but he and his family were not invited to a recent Black Lives Matter protest. McMillan and associate professor Hillary Potter discuss the Black Lives Matter movement and racial issues with KVNF's Laura Palmisano.

This week's Local Motion is a special program from independent producer Katie Semro, Parenting During the Pandemic. It includes the voices of 20 parents on the highs, the lows, the unexpected, and the unforgettable of this time. Katie spoke with parents from all over the US as well as the UK, Mexico, and Singapore in this piece. 

More than three-quarters of Western Slope residents say that affordable housing is a serious problem in their community, ranking it above crime and infrastructure as a concern. In this edition of Local Motion, which originally aired July 15, 2019 and was updated in July 2020, we delve into the housing crisis, and talk about how it affects communities and families across the KVNF listening area.

This encore edition of Local Motion focuses on mental health. Originally aired Sept. 24, 2019, it was updated in July 2020 with information about mental health issues during the pandemic. Many Western Slope residents struggle with depression, anxiety, substance abuse and even thoughts of suicide. The Surgeon General of the U.S. has said that one in four people experiences some form of mental illness, and the rates of those illnesses are highest in the American West. KVNF's Jodi Peterson interviews various mental health experts about what assistance is available.

New KVNF reporter and news host Gavin Dahl speaks with KZMU Moab station manager Serah Mead about serving the public during a pandemic, new music discovery, and the uniqueness of freeform radio.

This program was originally aired on KDNK.

KVNF talks with Courtney Frazier from the Colorado Agritourism Association and Executive Director of the Colorado Dude & Guest Ranch Association, Suanne Miller from Western Slope Farmstead and Creamery in Paonia, CO and Jayme Henderson and Steve Steese from The Storm Cellar in Hothckiss, CO.

Mosquitoes aren't just annoying -- their bite can transmit diseases to humans and animals, including West Nile virus.

This edition of Local Motion was originally aired on KDNK's "Immigrant Stories" program. Host Walter Gallacher interviews John Goodwin, a career peace officer and retired professor of Criminal Justice at Colorado Mountain College. John reflects on his life, the death of George Floyd and the importance of community centered police work.

This is an encore presentation of a program that originally aired on May 29, 2019.  "Be a student of fire." That's just part of the advice that Colorado's first all-female wildland fire crew received at a training camp in late May, 2019. Last summer, the women worked on conservation projects and help fight forest fires in the area around Grand Junction.  KVNF spoke to several of the crew members, their instructors, and a couple of longtime female firefighters, and updated the program with a June 2020 interview.

This edition is a special interview from KDNK in the Roaring Fork Valley. Recovering newspaper journalist and Pulitzer Prize finalist Susan Greene joins KDNK's Gavin Dahl to discuss her latest column in The Colorado Independent, "Denver Police agreed to First Amendment training.

Here in Western Colorado, we love our pets. More than two-thirds of us have at least one dog or cat. Many of our pets come from animal shelters, which not only find homes for unwanted pets, they also help reduce pet overpopulation and educate people on animal care.

In the middle of the pandemic small businesses are having to pivot quickly and discover new ways to offer services and products to their customers. KVNF talks with Chelsea Rosty, Director of Business Innovation & Tourism for the city of Montrose, CO and DART about how local businesses are creatively navigating through COVID.

In this edition, we discuss medical approaches to COVID-19, both traditional and alternative. To provide information about prevention and treatment from an alternative point of view, we talk with Rebecca Hitt of  Blue Dragon Acupuncture and Apothecary, and Gwendolynn Diaz of Origins Health. For the more traditional Western medicine perspective, we talk with Dr. Drew Bolton at Montrose Memorial Hospital. 

KVNF's Kori Stanton talks with Paonia, CO native, Naomi Sikora from her hotel in New York City. Naomi left Colorado in mid March to work at a hospital in Manhattan.

  The pandemic has taken a huge toll on area businesses, as retailers have shut down, hair salons and gyms have closed, and bars and restaurants have drastically curtailed operations or closed entirely. As Colorado begins to ease up on restrictions, all these businesses are trying to rebound, but face huge challenges in recovering. On this Local Motion we discuss economic recovery with representatives from Mesa County, Delta County and Montrose.

As we near the end of a typical school year, KVNF talks with an 8th grader, a local mom and two teachers from Delta County School District about their experience with distance learning in the midst of a global pandemic.

It’s no secret that the COVID-19 pandemic, and the anxiety and economic difficulties it’s causing are affecting our state of mind. Kaiser Family Foundation reports that nearly half of adults across the country say that worry, stress and depression related to the coronavirus are hurting their mental health.

This live edition of Local Motion featured two COVID-19 survivors discussing their experience with the disease, and a physician working on a COVID-19 unit at Montrose Memorial Hospital.

This live edition of Local Motion featured Ouray County, Town of Ouray, and Town of Ridgway officials answering questions from listeners about the COVID-19 response. 

This edition of Local Motion features Delta County and Montrose County officials, answering questions from listeners about the COVID-19 response.

Included are Robbie LeValley, Delta Count administrator, Karen O'Brien, Delta County Public Health Director, Dr. Susan Bright, and Montrose County media relations manager Katie Yergensen.