Can someone who is local or knows the area well give us a feel for the culture and demographics of the town?
Are there any peculiarities that make the place different to any other town in America or even the state?
Are there tensions between communities at all?
Is it an affluent area?
How rare are crimes of violence?
What about drug and alcohol misuse? Any particular problems above the average?
I lived here for close to a decade and worked at UI.
The town is a mix of college students, religious cults/groups (google "Christ Church"), and faculty/staff tied to either the University of Idaho or Washington State University 6 miles next door.
There are tensions between Christ Church and the community, which have unfortunately been publicized in national and international media.
There is no real animosity against the college students and locals. People understand college students contribute greatly to the local economy. The students are usually not super disruptive. Parties tend not to seep into the local community.
Area is not affluent, though housing prices have skyrocketed in recent years, making Moscow and Pullman nearly unaffordable for many folks. EMSI and Schweitzer Engineering are the other two big employers in town, or were when I lived there.
Crimes of this magnitude are pretty unusual, though there were several mass shootings and a murder suicide involving a UI professor/student in recent times.
In terms of demographics and unusual history, the county (Latah) is the only democratic voting county in Idaho (thanks to the university community). The state is very gun happy; you can open carry around town, and conceal carry all around campus (in classrooms, for instance). Lots of people have guns/weapons. There are hate and white supremacy groups not far out of town. Coeur d'Alene (CDA), which isn't very far from Moscow, has historically been home to the Aryan Nations. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, there were a series of murders committed by an assumed serial killer. There have been a few documentaries and podcasts about these killings. They are usually referred to as the Lewis Clark Valley murders. They remain unsolved.
I never got the sense that drugs were rampant on campus. Washington State U. tends to have more affluent students from Seattle, and there have been drug busts over there. If there were drug busts at UI, I haven't heard of them. I think the drinking is heavy, but probably not anything worse than other college campuses.