Ozarks At Large

Benton County native, Joe Woolbright, operator of Ozark Ecological Restoration, contracts with local and state nonprofit agencies, to help bring native grassland prairies on both public and private land back to life.

Opponents to Arkansas' 12-week abortion ban are asking a federal judge to issue a permanent injunction to prevent the law from ever being enforced. Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport gets a $3.4 million grant that will be used for pavement upgrades, a master plan and more. Mount Sequoyah Gardens in Fayetteville is getting upgrades to make it a more appealing overlook. And, the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality is holding several public meetings around the state regarding a revised statewide ten-year solid waste plan.

Ahead on this edition of Ozarks, we begin a series on what the Affordable Care Act will mean for Arkansans. In the first of five reports Jacqueline Froelich outlines how many parts of the new act will work. Plus a national convention devoted to recipients of the Purple Heart is coming to Rogers and will include a keynote address from Eric Shinseki, the Secretary of Veteran’s Affairs. And we spend some time with an Ozark ritual: decoration day at a local cemetery.

Though it may seem like a foreign concept to transplants to the region, natives of Washington County's rural areas still carry out the tradition of Decoration Day, on which families gather at cemeteries for fellowship and in honor of previous generations.