News from rural America.

This week, we’re starting with an update on state governments’ efforts to regulate data centers. Daily Yonder reporter Julia Tilton drops by to tell us about the fate of an Illinois bill, called the POWER Act, which aimed to limit water usage for data centers and increase transparency. Then, Daily Yonder reporters Madeline de Figueiredo and Anya Petrone Slepyan head to far West Texas, where the Trump administration is enacting controversial plans to build 500 miles of border wall through the Big Bend region. Next, we learn about Rural Assembly Everywhere, a virtual gathering taking place in July, which will connect rural leaders, innovators, and community members across the country. And reporters Julia Tilton and Claire Carlson fill us in about efforts to fight coastal erosion in Washington, whilst standing in – where else – a cranberry bog. Our featured musician is Gabe Mangold, a heavy metal guitarist out of Del Norte, Colorado.

TRANSCRIPT

Hey, I'm Jared Eby, the host of Yonder Radio.

Every week we bring listeners to rural conversations with national reach.

This week we're bringing back Julia Tilton.

She stops by to talk about the fate of an Illinois bill called the POWER Act, which aimed to limit water usage for data centers and increase transparency.

Then, daily Yonder reporters Madeline DeFiguredo and Anya Patron-Slepian, they head to far west Texas where the Trump administration is hoping to build 500 miles of border wall through the Big Bend region.

We learn about Rural Assembly Everywhere, a virtual gathering taking place in July, which will connect rural leaders, innovators, and community members across the country.

Oh, and reporters Julia Tilton and Claire Carlson fill us in about efforts to fight coastal erosion in Washington whilst standing in, where else?

A cranberry bog.

All this with our featured musician Gabe Mangold, the heavy metal guitarist out of Del Dorte, Colorado, and he brings it.

Tune in for all of that on Yonder Radio.

Yep.

Thank you.

Yonder Radio, Rural Conversations with National Reach.

Hi, my name is Jared, and we have a lot to do today.

This is what you're going to get, okay?

It's enlightening.

Get comfortable.

Of course, Julia Tilton, she's been out and about throughout America.

She has a data center update.

And then we go on a big, deep dive on the Big Bend border wall.

We have that story.

We're also going to talk about rural assembly everywhere and what that means.

And there comes a time in every young boy's life who is landlocked in a dry state where he discovers where cranberries come from.

We'll do that.

And we have heavy metal music from Gabe Mangold and he brings the brutal riffage to you.

But first, it is the truth delivered from Daily Yonder News editor Jan Patolsky.

What is going on in rural America?

Hi, Jared.

This week we start with ABC News and a report on financial protections and vulnerabilities of rural communities due to flooding.

Using recent Michigan floods, ABC reported on some research that exposed how across the country, rural communities are often far more vulnerable to those risks due to outdated and not entirely complete FEMA floodplain maps.

One of the research companies discovered that while the maps include risk from rivers and creeks, they do not include the risk from climate change-related weather events, such as outsized rainfall.

When you include that part into your maps, it turns out that the number of communities at risk almost doubles.

From High Country News, white salmon fighting for free mail, which I thought was a thing.

What's happening?

Well, in White Salmon, Washington, residents are still trying to get their PO boxes for free.

That's a service that should be available to a community if the post office is unable to run deliveries.

Now, obviously, that happens most often in rural and frontier communities.

That service is often lacking.

It's very important for rural communities because they don't only use it for letters.

It also delivers medications and ballots in many cases.

According to a federal report from 2018, U.S. has more than 21 million P.O. boxes.

Only about 1.3 of them is free, and that costs the post office $39 million a year.

According to some researchers cited in the story, instead of thinking about the Postal Service as a business, Maybe a better framework would be to look at it as a public infrastructure.

And from the Colorado Sun, Rural is Rad.

What is this initiative?

Rural is Rad is a collective of now more than 50 brands that got together to try and amplify rural innovators in the outdoor business and industry space.

What they do is they get together and try to attend trade shows, create opportunities to showcase their wares outside of their smaller communities.

But recently, they are planning on opening an actual physical hub in Gunnison where folks will be able to store and manufacture some of the goods.

They are also trying really hard to make connections between investors and consumers and the companies easier for those involved with Rural Is Rad.

Melian Botolsky Is Rad.

Daily Yonder News editor from the Daily Yonder Newsroom.

Thank you so much.

Thanks, Jared.

That was Jan Patalski, news editor for the Daily Yonder.

And now we have regular updates on data centers across America.

And the person that does it, Julia Tilton, reporting along with Alana Newman.

Now it's in Illinois.

What is the latest with data centers there?

So my coworker, Alana Newman, and I have been following the Illinois Power Act throughout this 2026 legislative session.

Earlier in the session, there was a lot of enthusiasm for passing regulation on data centers.

But ultimately, as lawmakers told us in June, it just wasn't quite time yet.

The lawmakers weren't quite ready to pass this pretty substantial bill that would regulate data center development in the state of Illinois.

And so the feeling is that lawmakers will return to the POWER Act, which stands for protecting our water and energy resources this fall during the veto session, which begins in November.

Roughly seven out of 10 voters want regulations.

So the constituency is saying, you know, we would like to see something like the POWER Act.

Has there been any governmental response?

At the federal level, no.

While there have been some bills proposed by lawmakers in Congress, there really hasn't been much movement on this issue at the federal level.

And instead, the regulation has been left by and large to the states.

At the Daily Yonder, we have covered a number of other attempts to regulate data centers.

You and I have talked before on the radio about what happened in Maine with LD307, which was a bill that passed the Maine state legislature to put an 18-month moratorium on data centers.

That bill was ultimately vetoed by Maine Governor Janet Mills.

And so it just speaks to this trend of state lawmakers trying to take action to catch up with the rapid acceleration of development of data centers, but policy ultimately moving slower than the development of data centers themselves.

Well, and we see in Illinois that Governor Pritzker, he offers a moratorium on tax incentives, but that hasn't stopped development.

No, that hasn't stopped development.

And as one of the advocates that we spoke with at Prairie Rivers Network, which is an environment focused nonprofit in central Illinois, spoke to us after the the Power Act failed to pass the Illinois General Assembly.

And essentially, I thought put it quite plainly when he said the time between now and when lawmakers take up this bill again in veto session is just additional time for data centers to get approved without any kinds of regulations on the books for them to adhere to in the state of Illinois.

Is it your understanding that something like the Power Act is something that A, can pass and B, would be a blueprint for other states?

It certainly seems like from our interviews with policymakers and also environmental advocates that there's a real hope.

And I think that the roadmap released by Governor Pritzker's office after the Power Act failed to pass speaks to this, that Illinois could be a leader certainly in the Midwest region on data center policy.

But that really remains to be seen because Illinois has yet to pass any kind of regulation on data centers.

Across the country, you have reported that 7 out of 10 voters do not want data centers in their area.

I mean, we've seen some bureaucratic response, but have you seen in any of your reporting any corroborating bureaucratic response to 70 percent of Americans saying they don't want data centers?

Yeah, it's interesting.

So that 70 percent of Americans are seven in 10 Americans that don't want a data center in their area comes from May Gallup polling across the country.

And so, you know, still relatively recent.

And I think the answer to your question really remains to be seen, particularly as we get closer to the November elections, November midterms.

Certainly data centers seem to be a more potent political issue, especially as we're seeing rising energy prices and a general concern about the strain on natural resources that data centers bring to communities.

And so how lawmakers and policymakers and those running for office choose to address that, I think, is something that we will be watching in the coming months.

And what do you find with proponents, the active campaigners of something like the Power Act?

Are they dispirited?

Are they hopeful?

Are they seeing that something could happen for the communities they represent?

Yeah.

So my coworker, Ilana, and I spoke with House Leader Robin Gable.

She was one of the co-sponsors of the Power Act.

And despite it not passing this legislative session, she seemed rather optimistic that some type of regulation on data centers will get done.

But she stressed to us that these kinds of bills that are sort of the first of their kind to do this kind of regulation on a relatively new or growing industry just take a while for, you know, a broad consensus to get behind.

And so in the span of the five months in the Illinois General Assembly session, it just wasn't enough time for that broad consensus to decide to take action, but that we might see action later this year, if not in the following legislative session.

So there will be time for, you know, I hate to say sides.

I don't I see less sides here more than just community conversation.

And maybe I'm wrong.

Maybe I'm being too idealistic.

But so there is time now for the conversation to get to a point where maybe there will be a culmination of regulation or not.

Yeah, and it sounds like at least for policymakers in Illinois, the plan is to engage with different kinds of stakeholder groups this summer.

There were a number of hearings.

Ilana and I actually got to attend a hearing on water resources while we were in the field reporting on the Power Act earlier this session in April.

But there will be more of those kinds of meetings to have all voices come to the table and weigh in on what kinds of policy they want to see to regulate, again, this fast-growing industry in Illinois.

Which brings up the question, what is next?

Is it going to be looking more into Illinois or where?

I know you're already working on it.

What are you working on now?

I'm working on a project that I am pretty excited about to have some data visualizations showing data center development in rural America by a bunch of different factors.

So we'll have a couple of maps that slice this data center story in different ways.

I'm working on that with our data editor, Sarah Mallott, who's also a Yonder Radio frequent guest.

And so I hope that we'll be able to talk about that at some point, including what we found and some of the challenges with obtaining data on data centers at this point in time.

Did you hear the lilt in Julia's voice when she mentioned data representation?

Because this is the kind of person you want covering these stories. is someone who gets excited about the data.

And so there'll be more of that.

Thank you so much for coming by with an update.

Thanks, Jared.

Once again, that was Julia Tilton.

You can find all her reporting about data centers and much more at dailyyonder.com.

And of course, if you're just kicking back with us, we will have it here as well.

Just like Gabe Mangold, our featured musician this week from Del Dorte, Colorado.

You've heard him on the show before.

We had he and his partner on, Jocelyn Catterson, as they collaborate on their duo, The Beauty and the Horror.

If you haven't looked them up, incredible.

But now, it's Gabe's turn.

The heavy metal guitarist for a number of bands and projects, including Enterprise Earth, Devil Driver, Dead Icarus.

The man has fans.

Gabe, I threw on some Enterprise Earth for my 16-year-old, and it got electric.

You really bring it. there was a time when some metalhead covered in tattoos if they rolled into a small town they wouldn't be welcomed so warmly and here you are in small town colorado how are things going there awesome i mean del nort it's my favorite place in the world um and it's my home where i live with my partner, Jocelyn.

Del Norte has a very unique, eclectic, colorful vibe, honestly.

People young and old of all walks of life, lots of artists and creatives here as well.

A nice, vibrant, growing young community here as well.

We had Paul Fenel on, the owner of the Trade & Post, which as you know, is an incredibly cool music venue in Del Norte on the show in April.

And we heard you played a big show there.

Tell us about that.

Enterprise Earth, we had a show at Trade & Post in December before one of our last tours. is good.

That's something I talked about with Paul Trade Post for a couple of years now, actually, about how like we'd love to get some metal here in the valley because metal bands don't play here.

You know, why would a metal band route through the San Luis Valley?

No, it's an adorable couple with a banjo and a mandolin in the corner of a breakfast place.

Yes, exactly.

So but my experience touring the country and touring in smaller markets, too, when we have the chance, it's like there are metalheads in rural America, a lot of them, actually.

It's just, you know, they got to travel. we got to travel four hours to Denver or four hours to wherever you got to go to see a show to the city.

So we had the show on a Sunday and the show ended up like selling out at Trade and Post.

It was like the first ever sold out show at TNP.

And it was like rowdy and crazy.

Everyone was having such a good time.

When you think about the Rocky Mountains, you think about John Denver conjuring a folk song on a sunrise or with his girlfriend or whatever.

You don't think about Zalm of Agony coming out of a hike. so is it inspiring you is it inspiring the music that you're doing with these bands being where you are in the mountains totally um and actually like psalm of agony was written here the chosen was written here uh the nice thing about del nort is over my years of traveling i just fell in love with rural America and Del Norte, a town of a thousand, 1500 people is extremely rural, but still has all the town stuff you need, you know, and whatnot.

So, you know, even looking out my window right now, you know, the house we're on is like five acres.

It's quiet and peaceful.

You can just walk out into the brush a little bit if you want to.

And the house that Jocelyn and I are building is on 44 acres and we can just walk out the backyard and go for a hike and there's no there well and the best thing there's no noise complaints on a 44 acre parcel well i was uh doing a lot of research on your bands and uh for enterprise earth i thought youtube commenters are going to likely be pretty judgmental like if you're not bringing it oh they are and oh no no they love you man rate rageblade 66 now when you see a user handle Rageblade66 usually isn't positive.

I really dig Travis' vocals, but no doubt about this, I love hearing it instrumentally, which that's you.

Oh, what does Josh Huarvin9661 say?

This was the most epic guitar playthrough I've ever watched.

What?

You've been, what a warm embrace by the cold digital ether of the internet.

Zombified Zealot says, there is no blanking reason for the breakdown to be this brutal.

I am thankful.

Sick.

All right.

They go on about the breakdown a lot.

What is happening with this breakdown?

Honestly, like when I, a lot of the times when I write songs, I just get into a flow and whatever comes out, comes out.

I'm not like trying to calculate this or think about that.

I do have general songwriting practices and structures in mind just from all the years of doing it.

But like when we got to that part, you know, I was like, OK, something some big, gnarly vocal, intense, like aggressive vocal buildup into some heavy fricking riff.

Well, some people pay for therapy, but you're getting paid for apparently breathing fire out your eyes.

Yeah.

No, honestly, like like performing and writing that that is a version of therapy for me.

Yeah, it's it's another flow state writing a song puts one in a flow state performing puts one in a flow state. going all out on stage, running around, spinning around, thrashing, whatever.

And then the crowd's doing that too.

And it's this like circular symbiotic energy that happens between us and the crowd.

And it's, it's, it's concerts are therapy, especially metal shows, you know, cause there's so much energy and that's, that's what drew me to metal.

Initially, my, my first show ever, my dad took me to see was kiss when I was like five years old.

Incredible.

And I'm like, what the hell's going on?

Why he's spitting blood and there's fire.

And then he's shooting out in the crowd and there's rockets out of his guitar and everyone's having a good time.

I was like, this is cool.

The energy of a metal show is unmatched.

You will not find that in any other genre of music.

And something people may not realize it's a positive energy.

Exactly.

And that's the thing.

Like a lot of people, like I've had friends that, or friends of friends that have come to like one of our shows or just gone to a metal show.

Cause their friend was going, they're like, yeah, I'll check it out.

Like I'm not into this, but I'll check it out.

Sure, why not?

They go to a show and that's usually when they're converted.

They're like, oh, I see what this is about now.

There is a community and a positive energy and vibe to all of the aggression and screaming that is associated with metal.

Well, positive screaming coming out of the San Luis Valley, Del Norte, Colorado, to be specific with Gabe Mangold here.

Thank you so much for telling us about what it takes to make that happen.

Totally.

Thank you for having me here.

You can find more of Gabe's epic and brutal guitar playing with his various projects.

Enterprise Earth, Devil Driver, Dead Icarus, and of course, The Beauty and the Horror, wherever you listen to music.

Well, it's almost time for a break.

But first, we have to have your first trivia clue for the week.

We'll give you three trivia clues throughout the hour and then reveal the answer at the end of the episode.

And this week, you get an extra hint.

If you've been listening to the show recently, you just might know the answer.

Here's the first clue.

The answer to this week's trivia is a historic movement that began in Odessa in what is now Ukraine in 1881.

So we'll have more hints and the answer.

And then we're doing a deep dive in the Big Bend region on the border wall.

That's coming up on Yonder Radio. music guitar solo Yonder Radio, rural conversations with National Reach.

We're about to go to West Texas, but on the way.

Of course, trivia, more clues, bogs, which are important for Pete's sake.

That's some quality wordplay you may not have picked up there, but you'll know more about bogs soon.

But first, West Texas.

This is where the Trump administration is moving forward with plans to build a border wall across 500 miles of the Big Bend region.

Now, this area is known for its rugged landscape, its isolation and its beauty.

Here to tell us about it are Daily Yonder reporters, Madeline DeFigueredo and Anya Patron-Slepian.

Madeline, we'll start with you.

Let's just get oriented with the big picture.

What is going on with the border wall in the Big Bend region of West Texas?

The big picture is fuzzy at best.

This whole process has been characterized by a complete lack of transparency at the federal government level.

The Big Bend region is in far west Texas.

Think about going somewhere where for literally miles and miles you cannot see anything around you except for mountains and desert.

We're in the middle of the Chihuahua Desert.

And in this area, the Trump administration has poured billions of dollars into the construction of a border wall that is looking to be about 30 feet tall and completely made of steel that will be extending throughout the region.

And it was originally proposed to go through the national park.

And due to some community resistance, it appears that the plans for the national park itself are in flux.

Madeline, the story has gotten a lot of attention.

And part of that is because people's efforts to stop the construction in Big Bend National Park.

What can you tell us about that?

The construction is going to affect not only the national park and the state park, but a large span of land throughout the region.

And this is going to affect everybody, the local business owners, landowners, folks who built their life around the nature and the economy and the ecosystem of this area.

And so it's really been a community effort to bring visibility to what is happening and to work together to stop it. not only because this wall could interrupt that ecosystem, but also in order to build it, they're moving at a rapid pace that is requiring the federal government to waive dozens of environmental and cultural protections that are in place and are essential to the archaeological and environmental landscape.

And Anya, what else would you want to add?

Another thing is that where they're proposing building the wall would cut off river access for all of these people along the entire route of the wall.

And so that includes farmers and ranchers whose livestock drink from the river.

That includes people who own small businesses that involve rafting or boating on the river.

And that also includes just property owners who, you know, have the land that they have because of the access to the river.

And now instead of river access, they're all going to have a 30-foot steel wall across their backyard and through their property.

And this is why it's so important that you were there because you spoke to people Who did you talk to and what was their reaction?

We were lucky that we could connect with a really broad spectrum of folks in the area, from landowners and business owners to county commissioners and local government representatives to people who were just passing through.

One of the people we spoke to is a guy named Charlie Angel.

He is a river guide.

He has his own business.

He has land that is adjoining the river.

So he's really interested in protecting the history and the natural value of where he lives.

Madeline and I had the opportunity to attend a county commissioner meeting in Presidio County, and there were a lot of people speaking really passionately, and Charlie was one of them.

My name is Charlie Angel.

I'm from Redford, Texas.

I can't believe I just pledged allegiance to a nation and a flag that's going to take away my business and my house.

That's ridiculous.

There is no border crisis, and we know that. everybody here knows that there is an existential crisis everybody that has land along the river who cares about the big bend we're going through the existential crisis my life is getting ruined my business is going to get ruined everything is going to get ruined the wildlife will get ruined there's going to be a crisis on the border at my house I can guarantee you it's going to be some kind of wake-up stuff somebody needs to change that this courtroom has the power and I do too and everybody else here does So this is a huge story, but you've broken it down into some bite-sized pieces for us.

What is first?

Well, one of the things that we got from talking to everybody was just how important local newsrooms have been in keeping track of what's going on.

And like Madeline mentioned, it's all been very opaque.

It's been really hard to get a handle on what's actually going on because things are changing so rapidly and there's so little publicly available information.

But local newsrooms in the area have done a great job tracking down all sorts of information and making it publicly available.

And according to Charlie, he actually helped get the ball rolling on that.

It was in February.

And I have a friend who has a family member of the Border Patrol.

And that friend said, hey, guess what I just heard?

And I was like, whoa.

And so I called the Sentinel.

I said, hey, have you heard of this?

Anya, and now your piece on local journalism in the Big Bend region.

The Sentinel Charlie mentioned is the Big Bend Sentinel, a nonprofit newspaper that has been covering West Texas for 100 years.

When Charlie called Rob D'Amico, the editor of the Sentinel, little confirmed information about the proposed border wall construction was publicly available.

Early details emerged in fragments through contract filings and letters addressed to property owners, and spread quickly through the rumor mill.

By mid-January, community members and local journalists were struggling to piece together the scope and location of the proposed construction.

One of those journalists is Sam Karras, the only full-time news reporter for the Sentinel.

She's been following the border wall story for months and has made the Sentinel a go-to source of verified information in a rapidly changing situation where official details are hard to come by.

I believe it was January 27th we put out the first story about this, and that accelerated everything, where then the whole community was more or less on the same page.

The Big Bend Sentinel covers Presidio, Brewster, and Jeff Davis counties in far west Texas.

Those three counties span over 12,300 square miles, an area around the same size as Maryland.

Though the paper only has a handful of employees, it still manages to serve West Texas in a way that has become increasingly rare for rural communities across the state and country.

In addition to the Big Ben Sentinel, residents have also turned to Marfa Public Radio.

Travis Bubenik is the news director.

Just as soon as landowners and residents who would be impacted by this project started hearing whispers of it, We knew in the press almost right away because they were reaching out to the press.

They were sharing government documents, CBP letters that they received with us pretty freely, you know, in a way that doesn't always happen in bigger places, urban places.

Because again, we know these people.

At Marfa Public Radio, a two-person reporting team covers far west Texas and the Permian Basin.

The station reaches communities from Midland to Presidio, covering what Bubenik describes as fundamental civic information.

In the absence of transparent plans, early reporting on the border wall relied heavily on record searches and information offered by landowners who had been contacted by the Department of Homeland Security.

The investigation became a community effort, according to Bubenik.

In a lot of ways, people who live here began practicing journalism in the sense of just like trying to get answers, right?

I mean, just as we were reporting on this story, so were everyday people.

They were trying to figure out what the details were.

They were talking to their local elected officials in the same way that we do.

They were showing up to meetings, trying to learn more.

Early reporting by small newsrooms established a timeline of events, identified key contractors in federal agencies, and documented where proposed construction could occur, efforts that began to draw attention well beyond West Texas.

Karis says that short videos for social media have been especially effective tools for reaching a broad audience and providing updates on new information.

It's really prompted us to join the 21st century.

The newspaper comes out once a week and things are happening so incredibly quickly that it's kind of shifted the way that we think about news.

But even as the story has drawn national attention, the difficulties of reporting in a remote region remain.

With limited staff and resources, newsrooms face difficult decisions about what they can and cannot cover and how to incorporate external reporting, according to Bubenik.

We're one of the only media outlets in the region.

We can't cover it all.

Every week there's some little aspect to this story that we just have to say, oh, we can't cover it.

We just don't have enough time, resources for that.

We have to stay focused on the bigger picture.

For Karis, the moment highlights the importance and potential of local rural journalism.

Local rural news is in a really difficult spot, politically, economically, all of those things.

But there are still people out here doing this work.

And we're doing it in really enthusiastic and creative ways.

So what was it like being reporters on the ground and seeing what all the local outlets were doing?

As reporters, you know, we're news nerds.

And it was exciting to talk to so many people who were reading their local newspaper and were really jazzed about the work that other reporters were doing.

We heard from so many people who said that they knew about this issue and they were involved in this issue because of the reporting that they had seen.

One of those people was Yozdi Valdivia, who is a resident of a small border town called Presidio.

I knew about the border wall thanks to Sam Karras.

I saw her videos like it was thanks to her TikTok videos with the sentinels.

Yeah, so it was it was thanks to her.

Things in Presidio look a bit different than in, say, a place like Marfa.

Can you tell us a bit about that community and how it fits into this larger story?

Yeah.

Presidio is a rural border town that has about 3,000 residents, and it's one of the few places where the wall will actually cut directly through the town itself.

A lot of the other neighboring communities surrounding the Big Bend National Park and the Big Bend Ranch State Park are, to some degree, inland.

Presidio is a smaller town that has less of a tourism presence, but the entire community functions as a cross-border community.

We talk to folks who do their grocery shopping in Ohinaga, the Mexican town directly across the border.

We talk to folks who have their children in daycare there and whose families span a cross-border lifestyle.

And so that town not only is going to have a border wall in their backyard, but will also kind of have an entire interruption to their way of life.

Here's the story.

Presidio is a majority Hispanic community facing a poverty rate approaching 40 percent, far above the statewide rate of about 14 percent, and depends heavily on economic ties with Ohinaga, a larger Mexican city directly across the river.

For many in Presidio, the proposed wall would transform their daily lives.

People are surviving here in Presidio.

We Ace Carrera is a Presidio resident.

Maps from U.S. Customs and Border Protection have offered few details about how construction could affect Presidio's international checkpoint, which residents like Carrera cross multiple times a day.

Without Mexico, honestly, we'd be in a bad place because it's where we get our groceries from.

A lot of things that we can't get here in Presidio because we only have one grocery store.

But even if Presidio's border checkpoint remains open, the wall construction alone could threaten access to Ohinaga.

In recent decades, floods have damaged local levees and forced closures of the international bridge connecting Presidio and Ohinaga.

Residents and local officials warned that a 30-foot steel wall along the Rio Grande could worsen future floods by trapping debris and interfering with the city's already fragile flood control system in a region prone to flash flooding and river surges.

City officials said federal agencies have yet to provide adequate engineering or hydrology studies despite the area's history of devastating floods.

In response, the city has commissioned an independent flood risk assessment and has continued pressing federal officials for answers.

Across the broader Big Bend region, concerns about safety and environmental damage have only intensified as new anti-border crossing infrastructure has already begun appearing along the river.

In October 2025, the U.S. Army and Border Protection installed miles of concertina razor wire along the Rio Grande and underneath Presidio's International Bridge.

This prompted outrage from locals who worry the razor wire could come loose during the river's annual summer floods.

Erin Little owns the Big Bend Boating and Hiking Company.

We're worried about the razor wire.

They have some upstream in Presidio area that is not secured very well, and the Rio Grande is with monsoonal rains, flash floods, and I think that that wire could go downstream easily, and I think it threatens anybody who's in the water swimming.

In addition to safety and environmental concerns, residents also fear the wall could undermine Presidio's delicate but growing tourist economy.

In October 2024, Presidio resident Yosdi Valdivia opened an art gallery, Galeria Reises.

Now she worries the wall could put her out of business.

I'm barely getting started with this dream of mine, and this would kill tourism, this will kill the town.

Like many residents in Presidio, Valdivia's personal life is deeply intertwined with Ohinaga.

I go to Hilavera every day for groceries, visiting family, for school.

I have my son at the daycare.

Compared to other far west Texas towns, Presidio's community opposition to the border wall plants has been relatively subdued.

Valdivia thinks this is partially because there's not as much information available about the wall in Spanish, which is the language most Presidio residents speak at home.

As part of her work with the No Big Bend Border Wall Coalition, Valdivia is working on spreading the word.

We're planning to do like some radio commercials for Ueno Hinaga.

There's a radio station there.

We don't listen to the Marfa radio here because we only speak Spanish here.

Well, mostly.

Another reason some Presidio residents may be keeping quiet is intimidation and fear that there may be consequences for speaking out, according to Valdivia.

A lot of people are afraid of the government, truly.

They think they're going to remove their green card.

For Presidio Mayor John Ferguson, that fear has heightened his responsibility to the community.

He spoke at a Presidio County Commissioner's meeting in April.

The Presidio community needs to get more engaged.

I think they're intimidated.

Those of us who have that authority and that representation, we need to come together immediately, fly into action, and represent everybody here in the big thing.

In April, Presidio City Council unanimously passed a resolution opposing the border wall and urging the federal government to reconsider its plans.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said construction in Presidio County will begin this summer.

There's the deep dive on the Big Bend border wall reported by Daily Yonder reporters Anya Patron-Slepian and Madeline DeFigureto.

You can see the stories at dailyyonder.com and the ongoing local reporting on the border wall at bigbensentinel.com and marfapublicradio.com.

Well, it's almost time for a break, which means it's time for your second trivia clue.

We're talking about a historic movement that began in Eastern Europe in 1881.

This movement led to the establishment of far-flung Jewish farming colonies in remote locations like Sicily Island, Louisiana, and New Odessa, Oregon.

So that's your second clue.

We have more coming up.

Also, we got to get ready for a multimedia potluck of sorts with Rural Assembly.

It's called Rural Assembly Everywhere, and it's for everyone.

We'll learn more coming up on Yonder Radio. piano plays softly Yonder Radio, rural conversations with national reach.

Our next guests are near and dear to our heart at Yonder Radio.

It's part of the family.

Madeline Mattson and Tainam Fotheringill.

They lead the Rural Assembly, a project of the Center for Rural Strategies like us here at Yonder Radio.

The Rural Assembly connects rural communities, innovators, and leaders from around the country.

And on July 23rd, they'll host a nationwide virtual event called Rural Assembly Everywhere.

How long has this happened that you've been everywhere at once?

Yeah, so everywhere came out of the pandemic in 2020, actually.

We used to do these large in-person gatherings, and obviously the pandemic kind of took that ability away.

So everywhere was created as a way to continue to gather rural people together, even though not in person, but digitally, remotely.

And we have continued that since 2020.

It's morphed every year based on what we think is important and what we think rural people's needs are.

But everywhere the concept came out of 2020 and the pandemic.

It reminds me of those halcyon days of the internet where it was just beautiful.

There was inspiring music and this connectivity that was going to bring us all together.

Tatum, is that the case?

Do you feel that?

Honestly, with everywhere, yes.

Most people are coming to Rural Assembly's programming to learn about what other people are doing.

And they show up and they're just like genuinely curious about what's going on and have a lot of heart for the rural places that they grew up in or live in now and care for.

And the other top thing that we see from Rural Assembly everywhere in particular is that it is a source of enthusiasm and inspiration for people who are on the ground in their communities doing hard work throughout the year.

And so people show up in everywhere and there's a chat that goes and there's genuine connections being made and people just are really excited to meet each other and get to see what's going on across the country.

Well, it looks like they're excited because you already have all the partners you requested.

Who's an example of a partner and what as a partner are they doing?

We have, yeah, over 30 partners who are joining us this year.

Last year was the first time where we layered on in-person programming to our virtual broadcast.

With the 30 folks who are on board this year, it's something like 22 states represented.

And what we wanted was to offer something that people who are already really connected in community organizing, wherever they are, could add on with.

So how could you, wherever you are in your local community, dial into national rural conversations like Yonder Radio?

How could they layer on things that they need to talk about in their own communities?

And so how could those partners then talk to each other, get to know each other a little bit more, get access to all the folks in the Rural Assembly team?

So somebody who is really taking that and running with it is April Martin of the Wild Rose Center on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation.

They had a great potluck group conversation, had some music in person, and they're doing it again this year.

What can people expect either in person or virtually at this year's Everywhere?

It's going to be a variety of conversations ranging from rural music.

So actually some friends of mine, holiday friends, will be performing.

They are a band from Astoria, Oregon, an indie band, which was covered here on Yonder Radio a few weeks back.

There will be a conversation with author and journalist Marianette Pember about her recent book, Medicine River.

It is about the generational trauma and legacy around Native boarding schools in the United States.

We will also have a conversation with our friend Ash Hanson at Department of Public Transformation and Aaron Borla, who is the executive director of the Roundhouse Foundation in Oregon, about philanthropy and how philanthropy needs to show up for rural America.

The topics range widely, and there will be a lot of fun little snippets from some of our site partners around the country showing the wide range of geography that we are going to be covering this year with everywhere.

So there's a lot of fun things that people can expect both in person and sitting at home in the comfort of their easy chair watching on Crowdcast.

Tatum, how exactly can folks join this event?

Yeah, so Everywhere will stream live on July 23rd at 10 a.m.

Pacific, though we have a real fun time talking about every single time zone that exists for Everywhere.

So wherever you are in the country, for me here in Washington State, it's 10 a.m.

Pacific For 90 minutes, that's just the virtual broadcast.

Our partners are going to be gathering live that day.

And some of them are going to be meeting throughout that whole week.

So from July 23rd to July 30th, wherever you are, you can just stop and think about all the people getting together to talk about how great their rural communities are and how we can make them even better.

So if you go to ruralassembly.org slash everywhere, that's where you can sign up to join us on Crowdcast.

After Everywhere, the live broadcast, the broadcast will be available on YouTube.

So if people can't catch the live broadcast, they can go see all of the content after the fact.

The theme here, Connecting Communities, I feel like that's what we're doing here.

We are about to pole vault real or virtual walls and bring people together and have a conversation.

Absolutely.

It's so easy for rural people to feel isolated.

And this allows people to come together and learn from each other what's going on, what issues are people facing, how can they pool ideas and resources and capacity together to get things done?

What we see is when people are working really hard at building relationships where they are getting their main streets connected, getting social programs off the ground, they're doing that day in, day out.

They're tired.

And I think to me, you know, a 90 minute thing one time is never going to transform somebody's life.

But if you can walk away feeling just a little bit more energized, you're going to keep doing what you're doing every day with a little bit more inspiration, enthusiasm and be ready to keep it going.

Madeline Mattson and Tainem Fatheringill, part of the Rural Assembly team, putting on this year's Rural Assembly Everywhere.

You can sign up to attend Rural Assembly Everywhere at ruralassembly.org slash everywhere.

And thank you both so much.

Absolutely.

Thanks for having us, Jared.

Next up for you, we have a special treat.

Cranberries.

I don't care if you like cranberries or not.

You're going to like this story.

Reporters Claire Carlson and Julia Tilton traveled to a rural cranberry bog along Washington's rugged coastline, just about a quarter mile from a beach that used to be one of the fastest eroding stretches of the entire West Coast.

That is until the local residents and cranberry farmers got involved.

Here's their dispatch.

This story starts, of all places, in a cranberry bog.

Julia, why were we in a cranberry bog?

So yesterday, we headed to North Cove, a small coastal community in the southwest corner of Washington.

And there, about a quarter of a mile from the ocean, we met Connie Allen on her cranberry bog.

Like many folks in a rural community, Connie Allen wears a lot of hats.

She's the Drainage District Commissioner for Pacific County, leader of a grassroots erosion control group, and, of course, a cranberry farmer.

She told us she's one of around 72 cranberry farmers in the area.

We've often said we're the North Cove, which is where we are, is the forgotten corner of the forgotten county, and maybe sometimes forgotten corner of the United States.

Something to know about North Cove is that the ocean just down the road from Connie's Cranberry Bog has been documented as the fastest eroding shore on the West Coast.

The state of Washington calls this area the fastest eroding spot on the West Coast, shaped by geology and strong tides.

On this stretch of shoreline alone, 76 feet per year, swallowed by the Pacific since 1945.

There's been whole neighborhoods in North Cove that have fallen into the ocean.

In some places, the roads just end, signaling where the ocean has reclaimed them.

Since 2017, though, the beach has started to grow.

And this is because of Connie and her late husband, David Cottrell, who organized to address this problem in their community.

They called themselves Wash Away No More.

In the beginning, yeah, it was the conservation district was the group that stepped up and said, what can you do with $50,000?

And we went, $50,000?

We could solve the whole problem with $50,000.

Well, it took $100,000 that first little chunk.

And we didn't quite get it solved.

But what we did was have a proof in concept that this could really have an effect of doing dynamic revetment, of putting out smaller cobblins instead.

We were told to ask you about dynamic revetment.

Okay.

Gosh, I should have brought out my toys.

I have all sorts of visual aids.

So as you heard, we asked Connie what dynamic revetment is.

And the way that we understand it is a fancy way to talk about building a berm on the beach using cobble and gravel, heavy materials that can't wash away as easily as sand or sand dune grass.

And that helps to stop the waves from eating away at the shore.

The reason why Connie and David's work is interesting is because they didn't ask for permission to deal with the erosion problem.

They saw it was an issue and they said, we are going to handle this ourselves.

It's a two-edged sword being that forgotten place because we can experiment.

People are willing to put some money into something that isn't going to be a major economic impact to the whole country.

So we've benefited from our isolation and our non-importance, so to speak.

On the other hand, obviously there are times when we're ignored and it's not very fun.

Connie told us one of the advantages of living in a rural, often ignored corner of Washington is that you can do a lot with a little bit of money, which is exactly what they did.

With the help of a grant, community donations, and volunteer help, they actually reversed the eroding beach.

Part of our campaign was, this matters.

This is our beach.

Let's take care of it.

That was Claire Carlson and Julia Tilton reporting from North Cove, Washington.

And we have an update on the story.

Recently, the Pacific Conservation District announced it will use part of a $12.7 million grant to construct a long-term project aimed at restoring and controlling erosion on Washaway Beach in North Cove.

The Conservation District said it expects to start construction in 2028.

And that's great news for Connie and the work she and her husband started.

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for.

I'm going to give you our third and final trivia clue, and then reveal the answer.

Just to remind you, we're talking about a 19th century movement that resulted in Jewish farming colonies spreading across remote reaches of the New World.

And here's the third clue.

Many of the colonies were short-lived, but some, like the one in Alliance, New Jersey, lasted for generations.

And the answer is...

The Om Olam Movement.

The Om Olam Movement was created in response to anti-Jewish violence in the Russian Empire.

While most Jewish immigrants landed in major cities, Om Olam settlers founded socialist Jewish agricultural colonies, often in remote locations.

In the 1880s, there were more than two dozen colonies spread across eight states, as well as several in Canada and South America.

But because of laws that prevented Jews from owning land in the Russian Empire, few of the settlers had any farming experience.

This lack of agricultural knowledge, combined with the difficult environmental and economic circumstances of the colonies, as well as internal ideological disagreements, led most of the colonies to fail in a matter of years.

But, as Anya Patron Slepin reported in a previous episode, the Alliance colony in southern New Jersey's Pine Barrens is an exception.

Today, the land is still stewarded by the Levin family, marking six generations since the community was founded.

Well, there we go.

We did it again.

Another hour of Yonder Radio, and we greatly appreciate you listening.

You can learn more and listen again if you'd like at yonderradio.com.

Thank you for listening to Yonder Radio, a production of the Center for Rural Strategies, publisher of The Daily Yonder.

I'm your host, Jared Iwi.

The Living Tradition segment was produced by Nicole Musgrave.

Thanks to Don Castle and the Tennessee Sheiks, Steph Gunno and the Lone Tones, Quincy Ponfair, Leo Pozel, and Tim Merima for the great music.

Our editor and producer is Susanna Brown.

This episode was also produced by Anya Patron-Slepian, with additional support from Alana Newman and Julia Tilton.

Our executive producer is Joel Cohen.

The executive in charge of production is Adam Georgi.

Beyond a Radio, Rural Conversations with National Reach. guitar solo