Featured Work
The second part of a 6,000 word investigation into the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services’ backlog of Medicaid applications for long term care. In the case of a 75 year old woman with Alzheimer’s, she suffered multiple falls and broke her hip and back while waiting for her Medicaid application to be determined.
A look into one woman’s Medicaid fight for her friend
— The Keene Sentinel
As the 2025 federal government shutdown dragged on, a local mental health care provider whose employees relied on the Affordable Care Act’s enhanced premium tax credits was bracing for costs to spike. The cost that she would pay for health insurance, she said, was “like a mortgage payment.”
Local provider braces for ACA insurance premium spike
— The Keene Sentinel
As Medicare Advantage markets across the United States contracted at the end of 2025, the senior citizens in Cheshire County, New Hampshire were left out of the network of their local hospital when negotiations stalled between the Dartmouth Health System and Humana.
As insurers drop Medicare Advantage plans, seniors scramble for coverage
— The Keene Sentinel
Massive swaths of blue-green in lakes, rivers, and oceans are now a common sign of an unhealthy aquatic ecosystem. For an affordable, more immediate fix, some city, state, and federal agencies are now rolling out ultrasonic algae remediation devices that kill cyanobacteria using sound.
Can an Ultrasonic Device Burst the Algal Bloom Bubble?
— Sierra Magazine
Maggie Hassan and Richard Blumenthal are the last two Democratic Senators from New England unconditionally supporting the Gaza genocide. Activists have tried to get meetings with both of them, but they have instead favored their districts’ manufacturers of weapons.
The Last Two New England Democratic Senators Unconditionally Supporting the Gaza Genocide
— Drop Site News
After years of financial strain, the only freestanding birth center in the Monadnock Region closed in December 2024. The Monadnock Birth Center had seen years of low Medicaid reimbursement rates and low birth volumes. The closure left several birthing women throughout the region without access to a professional non-medicalized birth setting.
How financial strain forced local birth center to close
— The Keene Sentinel
Firefighters throughout the Monadnock Region of New Hampshire have been replacing gear contaminated with the toxic substance group known as PFAS. Despite firefighters having cancer rates higher than the average person, under resourced fire departments are still using the gear.
Monadnock Region firefighters replacing gear contaminated with PFAS
— The Keene Sentinel
An experimental program focused on addressing the mental health of people in a community homeless shelter aims to reduce the amount of hospitalizations and arrests. However, it’s implementation and funding faces several barriers.
Could a new mental health program help break local cycles of homelessness?
— The Keene Sentinel
After years of leading the country in overdose deaths, New Hampshire’s overdose rate began to decline in 2024. In the Monadnock Region, local social service workers, first responders, and survivors attribute the decrease to the widespread distribution of Narcan and declining stigma towards drug use.
Local overdose deaths are finally declining. What’s working?
— The Keene Sentinel
For years, the city of Keene has struggled with high levels of fine particle pollution as a result of its local topography. However, high efficiency wood stoves made cheaper through federal funding are being rolled out as a solution.
Are high efficiency stoves the solution to Keene’s wood smoke pollution?
— The Keene Sentinel
When a 14 year old girl in rural Allendale County, South Carolina was killed by a stray bullet, the community began to rally around addressing gun violence, which had been affecting the community for years. However, they met barriers to addressing the issue wherever they turned.
A Teen’s Killing Sparked a Gun Reform Movement in Rural South Carolina. Here’s How it Fared.
— The Trace
Precision agriculture includes the use of artificial intelligence, satellite imagery, cloud computing, remote irrigation, drones and self-driving tractors to maximize crop yield. But technological barriers to implementation and a divide between traditional and innovative farming styles hold rural communities back.
Precision agriculture promises rural farmers efficiency, but barriers hold local implementation back
— The People Sentinel/Solutions Journalism Network
Ahead of the 2024 Democratic Party Presidential Primaries, Black voters in Allendale County, South Carolina said the party hadn’t done enough to earn their vote, following years of economic decline and empty promises.
In South Carolina, Democrats Aren’t Listening to Black Voters
— The Progressive
Throughout the country, low-income people are being evicted into extreme weather as the housing crisis and climate crisis begin to overlap.
Evicted into the Climate Crisis
— The Progressive
A popular net metering program allowed utility customers to sell excess energy from rooftop solar to the utility monopoly Georgia Power, effectively lowering bills. However, utility monopolies are pushing customers to keep using expensive, unsustainable fossil fuels.
Renewable Energy Threatens Utility Profiteers
— The Progressive
Over 100 years after the 1915 Armenian Genocide, Armenians across the world are watching as the world turns its back on Artsakh, the historically Armenian region being blockaded and ethnically cleansed by Azerbaijan.
Dispatch from Artsakh: ‘A Continuous Effort to Ethnically Cleanse Armenians’
— The Progressive
Ithaca College’s administration is building an artificial turf, despite the turf containing PFAs chemicals and environmental scientists saying the turf’s construction is in conflict with its goals to cut carbon emissions.
Planned turf at IC to contain toxic chemicals
— The Ithacan
In 2020 — the same year that former Ithaca College President Shirley M. Collado and her administration began the process of eliminating 116 full-time equivalent faculty positions — Collado’s received a $172,796 payment.
Former president Collado received $172,796 payment before layoffs
— The Ithacan
The U.S. News and World Report’s college ranking system has been found to be easily manipulated by colleges like Columbia University that seek to maintain high rankings and prestige.
IC community expresses doubt in national college ranking system
— The Ithacan
The first part of a 6,000 word investigation into the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services’ backlog of Medicaid applications for long term care. In some cases, seniors in the state have died before their Medicaid applications have been approved.
Medicaid backlog puts NH seniors in crisis
— The Keene Sentinel
In 2026, the cost of health insurance rose at the fastest rate in 15 years. For people in the Monadnock Region on ACA marketplace plans or employer-sponsored insurance, this has meant downgrading their insurance or rationing necessary medical care.
As health insurance costs rise, locals confront impacts
— The Keene Sentinel
In the most rural part of South Carolina, two counties are finding ways to navigate a rural health care system that has closed two of its local hospitals. Losses from private insurers and the decline of federal aid during the pandemic has left their rural health care system in dire straits.
‘I’m gonna fight for my patients’: How Barnwell and Allendale counties are navigating the rural health care crisis
— The People Sentinel
Precision agriculture includes the use of artificial intelligence, satellite imagery, cloud computing, remote irrigation, drones and self-driving tractors to maximize crop yield. But technological barriers to implementation and a divide between traditional and innovative farming styles hold rural communities back.