Nick Lowrey

Entrepreneurs across South Dakota are already taking steps to claim a share of the state’s soon-to-be-legal marijuana market, but legislators and regulators are off to a slow start in crafting laws and rules to govern the controversial new industry.  The sale, possession and use of recreational and medicinal marijuana

The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed more Native Americans living on reservations in South Dakota to seek homeownership, a potential step toward greater family financial security and community stability in some of the state’s most impoverished regions. But long-standing institutional, economic and geographic barriers continue to block some reservation residents

South Dakota’s billion-dollar outdoor recreation economy boomed in 2020, providing a much-needed economic boost in several business sectors while giving hope to wildlife management agencies that they can reverse a long-term decline in the number of licensed hunters and anglers. As movie theaters closed, concerts were canceled, stores shut

Ensuring widespread distribution, usage and effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccine in South Dakota will be challenging, health experts say, due to the rural nature of the state, the difficulty in storing and distributing doses of the vaccine and concerns that some people will be reluctant to be vaccinated. South Dakota

South Dakota’s largest hospitals are at or above their capacity to care for critically ill COVID-19 patients, forcing some of the sickest patients to be flown out of state to receive care. The strain of a months-long surge in coronavirus cases has reduced hospital capacity to care for those

One major concern of South Dakotans who opposed legalization of medical and recreational marijuana was that it could lead to an epidemic of youth use of the drug. Drug-abuse prevention advocates and law enforcement officials said greater availability of marijuana would almost certainly lead to an increase of use among