Idaho Matters

Here in Boise there is no shortage of art—from traffic boxes to sculptures to murals, there is a splash of color on almost every corner of the community, and that’s not by mistake.

The Boise City Department of Arts & History has made it their mission to add value to our public spaces, and part of that includes planning for the future. Which is why they’re asking for your feedback in a new survey that will help to update the city's 2017 Cultural Master Plan.

Cultural planner Tilley Bubb, with the Boise City Department of Arts and History, joined Idaho Matters to talk more.

With Robert F. Kennedy Junior on the short list for the next head of the Department of Health and Human Services, big changes could be coming to our our country’s health care system.

Dr. David Pate, former CEO of St. Luke's Health System joined Idaho Matters to talk more about these possible changes along with other public health issues.

It was six years ago when Idaho voters approved Medicaid expansion, which opened up health insurance to many who could not afford it.

Since then, advocates of expansion say the 100,000 or so people who are currently part of the program have benefited greatly from Medicaid, and the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare says Idaho hospitals have saved $42 million in charity care.

Some Idaho lawmakers have tried to curb or overturn Medicaid expansion as recently as the 2024 legislative session, and supporters of the program have been lobbying diligently to keep going.

The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network and Idaho Voices For Children have created a new short film called "Idaho Supports Medicaid: In Our Words," where Idahoans tell their stories, and the film premieres tonight in Boise.

Randy Johnson, the Idaho Government Relations Director for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network and Ayla Birch with Idaho Supports Medicaid joined Idaho Matters for a preview.

Idaho rivers were once home to one of the country’s largest salmon runs. Today, however, those same salmon are headed towards extinction.

For more than fifty years this decline has had far-reaching effects on the state's ecosystem and cultural identity, which is why many groups are fighting to bring these fish back to our waterways.

Mitch Cutter, a salmon and energy strategist with the Idaho Conservation League, and Dennis Daw, the fish and wildlife program director for the Upper Snake River Tribes Foundation, will be talking more about this effort next week at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute in Boise, and they joined Idaho Matters for a preview.

Hundreds of volunteers from Utah and Idaho gathered recently to help the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation heal the site of the Bear River Massacre.

The Mountain West News Bureau, Clarissa Casper of the Salt Lake Tribune and Utah Public Radio has the story.

How many people voted in Idaho on Election Day? How many people registered Nov. 5? Were there any issues at the voting booth?

Because it’s a presidential election year, there’s been a lot of focus on not just who gets elected but also on how our election system works at both a national and local level.

To answer the questions that have come up this election season, we asked Idaho’s Secretary of State, Phil McGrane, to join Idaho Matters for a breakdown.

Along the Boise River, between the Barber Dam and the Highway 21 bridge, sits 700 acres of land that supports more than 300 native species.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is hoping to restore some of the land at Barber Pool for fish, wildlife, water quality and people, and Boise State University is sponsoring a project to restore several side channels of the river.

Greg Kaltenecker, director of the Intermountain Bird Observatory at Boise State, joined Idaho Matters to talk more about this effort.

If you start at Hawaii and travel 1,000 miles south, you’ll run into a cluster of tiny islands known as islets that make up the Palmyra Atoll.

There’s just around 600 acres of land above the sea, but below it there are 15,000 acres of some of the most diverse coral reef systems on the planet.

Palmyra was decimated during World War II by deforestation and rats , which ate pretty much everything — crabs, insects, seabird eggs, chicks ... even the trees.

For more than ten years, there’s been an effort to reclaim Palmyra, and it’s succeeding — restoring the landscape and the reef and providing a blueprint for other conservation efforts.

Matt Miller lives in Boise and is the editor of the Nature Conservancy’s online blog "Cool Green Science" and author of the book, "Fishing Through the Apocalypse." Three years ago, he got to go fishing on Palmyra Atoll as part of the Fishing for Science Research Program and he’s going to share his story at the Boise Public Library on Tuesday, Nov. 19. He joined Idaho Matters for a preview. 

The Colorado River is shrinking, and leaders from the states that use it are on the hook to come up with a new plan for managing its water. They have to submit that plan to the federal government by 2026, when the current rules for sharing water expire.

KUNC’s Alex Hager reports those state leaders do not think President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House will change their strategy.

Idaho voters broke records this election, hundreds of students in eastern Idaho were turned away at the polls, legislators can now expect to see raises and state officials are preparing to head back to the capitol.

It’s Friday, which means it's time for our Reporter Roundtable when Idaho Matters gets you up to date on all the news that made headlines this past week.

Our journalist panel today: