Water in the U.S. West faces considerable challenges and uncertainties. Climate change has intensified weather extremes, threatening the water sources that support the region’s many stakeholders. Urban water providers are among the stakeholders contending with the challenge of providing reliable water supplies to their growing populations. Recognizing the critical role...
After the 1996 national welfare reform known as the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) was enacted with more stringent eligibility and work requirements for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) program, a plethora of analyses have followed assessing the...
The Rohingya community have faced continuous violence, discrimination and statelessness in the Rakhine State of Myanmar. In 2017, a violent crackdown by Myanmar’s army on Rohingya Muslims sent almost a million fleeing across the border of Bangladesh. They found their temporary home in the refugee camps of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh...
Children enter kindergarten on unequal footing. Early childhood experiences shape initial disparities and predict academic achievement and life trajectories. One influence, child care, is not available to all children in Oregon as most counties qualify as child care deserts. This paper analyzes if child care access has an effect on...
Children enter kindergarten on unequal footing. Early childhood experiences shape initial disparities and predict academic achievement and life trajectories. One influence, child care, is not available to all children in Oregon as most counties qualify as child care deserts. This paper analyzes if child care access has an effect on...
Sand dams – low-head dams built in ephemeral streambeds that store water within saturated sediments – are a proven means to increase water supplies for rural communities in arid and semiarid regions. Water percolates into the reservoir-impounded sediments during wet season rains and can subsequently be extracted during the dry...
The management of the Northern Rocky Mountains (NRM) gray wolf population is a longstanding controversy that has fueled generations of political and cultural turmoil in the American West. At the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, wolves were eradicated from the West for the threat...
Transportation contributes approximately 41 percent of California’s greenhouse gas emissions and 27 percent of national greenhouse gas emissions (CARB, 2019, EPA, 2017). In response to climate change concerns, stakeholders have encouraged the use of electric and hybrid vehicles through tax credits, rebates, and education campaigns. Environmental and transportation justice groups...
Background: Calls by presidents and legislators to raise the U.S. college graduation rate to 60% by 2025 have required educational institutions to find ways to increase accessibility and quality while simultaneously reducing costs (Bautsch, 2018; Smith, 2017). Private foundations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation are getting involved...
Because the environmental threats are becoming global in scope, international cooperation and global governance issues are in the spotlight. The most controversial environmental law and policy problems arise in the areas where no individual state has sole responsibility for governing, "global commons." Scholars believe that the best way to deal...
Diversity and inclusion represent central challenges and opportunities in the transnational field of higher education, as the number of students enrolled in higher education has expanded exponentially over the past century and universal access to tertiary education has emerged as a development imperative. Within this context, diversity has emerged as...
This research explores the prospects of legislation in Michigan to authorize statewide use of Overdose Fatality Review Teams (OFRTs) to address the escalating opioid crisis. OFRTs consist of multidisciplinary teams that collaborate for overdose prevention. These teams operate on a local to statewide level and are comprised of individuals from...
This MPP essay examines how states expand access to nutritious food for low-income families, focusing specifically on policies related to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and farmers’ markets. Coalitions made up of nonprofits focused on hunger, farmers, and health collaborate to impact relevant policies in their respective states. The...
The shortage of physicians serving rural communities is well documented. To address the rural shortage, medical schools have developed extracurricular programs, called rural health tracks, with an intent to foster medical students’ interest in serving rural communities. While there has been some research about the effects of these tracks, almost...
Improving access to and uptake of antenatal care remains a persistent challenge for India. It is a far greater challenge for an underdeveloped, poorer and mostly rural state like Bihar. The 2015-16 National Family Health Survey (NFHS-IV) of India reported that only 3% pregnant women in rural Bihar utilized full...
Background:
The number of people diagnosed with chronic physical conditions is increasing in the United States. Chronic mental illnesses are also common in the country. Low-income women and those on Medicaid bear a disproportionate burden of chronic conditions and these conditions significantly contribute to obstetric morbidity. Prioritizing preventive measures and...
The Columbia River Treaty (CRT), signed in 1964, is known widely as a successful transboundary river treaty between the United States and Canada. It was designed with a basic dual functional purpose, to increase flood prevention in the lower basin and to maximize hydroelectric power output between the two nations....
Increasing calls from stakeholders for a greater role in public decision making has led to the rapid world-wide adoption of multi stakeholder collaboration for policymaking. In line with this emerging trend the Government of Nepal with support from its long-time development partners and bi-lateral donors initiated a policy level experiment...
Recreational fisheries regulations at the state level along the US Atlantic coast are constantly changing to ensure the sustainability of marine fish populations. It is hypothesized that effective management of recreational fishing effort should have a positive impact on fish stocks. Using recreational catch per unit effort (CPUE) as a...
The use of FDA-approved medications for the treatment of opioid use disorder (OUD) is a critical tool in reducing the impacts of the opioid crisis. Despite the known benefits of these medications, access to these treatments is lacking more than two decades into the opioid crisis. While most policy changes...
California and Steller sea lions (Zalophus californianus, Eumetopias jubatus, respectively) are considered sentinel species because they have long life spans, are long-term coastal residents, feed at high trophic levels, and have large blubber stores that serve as depots for anthropogenic toxicants. There are few studies on sea lion health and...
Nuclear fuel management is an optimization problem on many levels. Finding “viable” solutions for the core reload design problem is difficult without expert knowledge and software automation. Small modular reactors with a shared used fuel pool demonstrate a novel opportunity for fuel cycle optimization.
A Python package was developed and...
The year, 2020, marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment’s ratification, granting American (primarily white) women the right to vote, however, women remain underrepresented in elected offices across the United States. In comparison to men, women face several additional challenges related to gender when attempting to reach the upper...
Little is known about non-industrial private forestland (NIPF) owners in relation to Oregon’s two primary preferential forest property tax programs: Forestland Program – the default tax program for many forestland owners, and Small Tract Forestland Option (STF) – a voluntary program wherein landowners pay reduced annual property taxes and an...
Wastewater treatment plants around the world are becoming increasingly at risk of sea level rise impacts as these facilities are typically located in low-lying areas to utilize gravity flow for influent (incoming sewage) and effluent (discharged treated sewage). As these risks become realized, treatment plant managers and decision-makers must know...