Mercy Health used an innovative walking program to become one of the healthiest workplaces in the country.
Ozarks At Large
A roundup of events and news for the next few weeks include an alternative way to deliver a Valentine.


An administrative law judge with the Arkansas Public Service Commission on Friday ordered SWEPCO to proceed on its proposed plan to build a massive new power transmission line through portions of northwest Arkansas. Also, Governor Mike Beebe says that recent cost analyses of operating the state's Private Option expansion of Medicaid justifies the program's passage during last year's session of the state legislature. And the state Attorney General's office warns residents about rapid-refund tax providers.

Ahead on Ozarks, a conversation with young adult author An Na. Also, we learn what it takes to become a police officer.

We speak with An Na, author of A Step From Heaven, a book that was awarded the Michael L. Prince Award when it was published a decade ago. Critics and reviewers commended the book's characters for speaking like a child without being too precocious or condescending. The author will speak in Fayetteville later this month.
Latest Edition of Ozarks at Large
Sunday, March 9, 2014
Ahead on this edition of Weekend Ozarks, we visit the kitchen of Jen Lewis, take a spin in a state-run clinic that aids veterans in rural communities, and we meet a recovering opiate addict who has found hope with methadone.
Two public meetings were held late yesterday in Jasper to address concerns about the large CAFO in Newton County. Picasolar took home several thousand dollars from an MIT competition earlier this week. Fort Smith has finished automating trash collection, but now the city's sanitation department is turning its eye to automating recyclable collection. And speaking of Fort Smith, Senator Mark Pryor demands answers from the U.S. Air Force regarding the future of the 188th Fighter Wing.
"Seventh Voyage of Sinbad: The Duel With the Skeleton" by Bernard Hermann
Researchers at the University of Arkansas recently completed a study, concluding that the use of sequential pricing based on real-time knowledge of shopper preferences could increase retailer profits. Ozarks at Larges Christina Thomas spoke with Cary Deck and John Aloysius of the Walton College of Business.
This week a business plan from Picasolar took top honrs, and big money, at a competition at MIT.
A new program gets young people on the river, some paddling in a canoe for the first time.
Becca Martin Brown of NWA Newspapers gives a litany of entertainment options for Mothers' Day gifts.
"Valley of the Gwangi" by Phantom Tollbooth