Among dozens of Observer features this year, 10 rose to the top among staff and readers as the most memorable.
BEST OF 2017: This year, our writers delved deep into important topics virtually untouched by other Texas publications. From spotlighting social and environmental injustices to capturing the characters — artists, politicians and everyday Texans — that make this state unique, these are stories you won’t find anywhere else.
Though media attention to the Zika virus has waned, the threat of an outbreak is still real in South Texas.
The Rio Grande Valley has near-perfect conditions for Zika: a year-round mosquito season, some of the worst poverty in the nation, a tattered health care system and an international border crossed daily by tens of thousands of people.
Brownsville, on the frontlines of the fight against Zika in the U.S., hasn't received direct state or federal funding help. It's spent almost $500,000 on mosquito control so far.
“In this political landscape, there’s no telling what funding will look like on the border,” said Cameron County health administrator Esmeralda “Esmer” Guajardo. “But we can’t let our guard down. Today it might be Zika, tomorrow it’ll be something else.”
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From the archives
Fungi Town
Leah Caldwell takes a mushroom census in southeast Texas in this feature published last year.
From the story: "Lewis, a 69-year-old retired paper mill chemist, is the longtime president of the Gulf States Mycological Society. Texas Mushrooms: A Field Guide calls him 'probably the most knowledgeable person on Texas mushrooms.' Such a reputation has attracted a lot of attention from strangers. People often call his home phone to ask where they can find hallucinogenic mushrooms (Psilocybin cubensis). Lewis says he can’t help with that — he’s never ingested them himself ('I’m too neurotic,' he says) — but he will identify any mushroom that comes his way, illegal or otherwise."
What’s Happening at the Observer
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