(Radio Iowa) – Two people were injured in a house explosion in eastern Iowa last (Wednesday) night. KCRG-TV reports Jones County dispatch got a 911 call about a disturbance. A woman in Monticello claimed her husband was threatening to blow up the house. Deputies arrived and tried to talk with the man, who allegedly set off a device in the basement, damaging the structure and starting a fire. The man and a deputy were hurt, but the report says neither had life-threatening injuries.

The man, identified as 62-year-old David Costello, is being held on a court-ordered committal.

(Council Bluffs, Iowa) – Officials with Connections Area Agency on Aging have announced that they will host their 3rd Annual Secret Santa for Seniors, holiday gift program. According to Aubury Krueger-Kutchara, Connections’ Director of Community Engagement, the agency is looking for nominations for older community members aged 60 or older that have little or no family near, that would benefit from some holiday cheer.  The organization is also looking for community members that would like to “adopt” an older community member and purchase gift cards from their wish list.

Krueger-Kutchara says they are focusing on gift cards again this year to ensure health and safety of older community members and donors. She says “Our seniors are thrilled to be able to shop for wanted items without affecting their tight budget.” Three years ago, Connections staff came together, and thought it would be great if there was a holiday giving program specifically for seniors.  There were many programs throughout our service area for children and families, but no programs just for older community members.  In the previous 2 years, Connections has been able to bring holiday joy to 139 seniors across its service area.

Tasha Jones, Elder Rights Specialist with the Connections Agency, says “It is such an honor to be able to offer this unique program again to our very special community members. A common theme in talking with our seniors is the gratitude they have to receive gift cards to purchase wanted items without choosing between a basic need and to be remembered during the Holiday Season. Our program is a great example of how community comes together to support each other and its members.”

To find out how you can nominate an older community member for the program, or how you can donate contact Tasha Jones at tjones@connectionsaaa.org

(Des Moines, Iowa) – Iowa’s Auditor of State Rob Sand announced today (Thursday)), “Pi Day,” the winners of the first Public Innovations and Efficiencies (PIE) Awards. Included among the area award winners was Cass and Ringgold Counties, and the City of Beaconsfield, in Ringgold County.

Auditor Sand established the PIE program in 2019. 79 counties and 267 cities took Auditor Sand’s opportunity to share how they are using practical tips and tricks to reduce waste, by filling out the Office’s “PIE” chart. Iowa’s local governments also developed “PIE” recipes to be shared by their creators with other public entities statewide. Cost-cutting measures range from shutting off the lights to reduce energy costs, to the creation of policies that reduce travel expenses.

Cities and counties were awarded points, based on the number of cost-cutting measures implemented in 2019 and 2020.

This year’s PIE Awards go to:
• Largest City: Cedar Rapids, population 132,301*
• Smallest City: Beaconsfield, population 18*
• Largest County: Polk County, population 490,161*
• Smallest County: Ringgold County, population 4,964*
• Most Submissions Within a County: Johnson County, 100% participation among agencies.
• Most Improved: A tie between the cities of Dysart and Wilton. Each more than doubled the number of efficiency measures from 2019 to 2020.
• Overall Best Performing City: Montezuma, 42 efficiency measures.
• Overall Best Performing County: Fayette, 50 efficiency measures.
• Best Performing County, Largest Fifth in Population: Johnson County
• Best Performing County, Second Fifth in Population: Fayette County
• Best Performing County, Middle Fifth in Population: Tie between Iowa and Cass Counties.
• Best Performing County, Fourth Fifth in Population: Mitchell County
• Best Performing County, Smallest Fifth in Population: Ida County
• Best Performing City, Largest Fifth in Population: Cedar Rapids
• Best Performing City, Second Fifth in Population: Montezuma
• Best Performing City, Middle Fifth in Population: Plainfield
• Best Performing City, Fourth Fifth in Population: Alleman
• Best Performing City, Smallest Fifth in Population: Ricketts

The winners of this year’s PIE Awards will receive a pie of their choice, hand delivered by Auditor Sand. Auditor Sand thanks all of the PIE participants and appreciates their efforts to save
taxpayer money.

*Based on 2019 Census

More area, and state news, from Ric Hanson.

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(Radio Iowa) – More than a dozen people are safe after a tense situation at the Waterloo Regional Airport last (Wednesday) night. Local police and fire rescue crews were called out to be on standby while a United Express airplane that was experiencing a mechanical problem made an emergency landing. Waterloo Fire Rescue officials say the small commercial plane lost one of its two engines while flying from Chicago to Mason City.

The pilot diverted the plane to Waterloo, where he landed safely around 8:30 p.m. Officials say there were 14 passengers on board the United Express flight. No injuries were reported.

A man from Creston reported to Police Tuesday morning, that his residence in the 500 block of N. Vine Street, had been broken into.  He said a BB gun pistol and a gun cleaning kit were taken. The loss was estimated at $70.

(Atlantic/Cass County) – The latest local News from KJAN News Director Ric Hanson.

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(Radio Iowa) – The pandemic and the tight labor market are cited as two of the main causes for a drop in community college enrollment in Iowa. The Iowa Department of Education’s Community College administrator Jeremy Varner. “Our enrollment at our 15 community this fall is down about one-point-six percent from the prior year — bringing us to about 82-thousand students,” Varner says. “While that enrollment is down — national fall enrollment at community colleges is down about five-point-six percent.”

Varner says it wasn’t an across the board drop. “Nine of the 15 community colleges actually saw gains this fall. A lot of what is going on there are institutions sort of adjusting to disruptions from the pandemic last fall. So, some of the colleges that saw the biggest dips last fall are seeing things sort of evening out a bit,” he says. Varner says the economy and job market have a big influence. “I always say when I am talking about our community colleges, community college enrollment is in a substantial part countercyclical, meaning when the economy is very tight, folks are looking to get into the workforce. And during recessionary periods we have more students coming back looking to get more training,” according to Varner.

He says a decline in high school graduates deciding to go to college also plays into the enrollment issue. They track that by the number of high school students who sign up for the free college aid availability assessment. “Those trends have been generally downward — which is a bit worrisome. So, we are watching that and generally how students and families think about college,” Varner says. One change saw a drop in female enrollment. “Because the national trend there is actually for the male students to be falling off. Instead, we saw female students slip about three percent,” Varner says. “since about 1980, roughly 40 years, we had this roughly a 60-40 split. We were surprised to see male students increasing this fall.”

Female students still make up 56-point-five percent of community college students, while males moved up to 43-point-five percent. The Des Moines Area Community College saw the largest decrease in students at around 11 percent, followed by North Iowa Area at a seven-point-four percent drop. Iowa Lakes held steady, while Iowa Central in Fort Dodge had the largest increase at nine-point-eight percent.

Other enrollment drops saw Northeast Iowa down point-one percent, Iowa Valley down two-point-eight percent, Iowa Western down one-point-seven percent. Other increases saw Northwest Iowa up two-point-two percent, Eastern Iowa up five-point-four percent, Kirkwood up two-point-seven percent, Western Iowa Tech up one-point-seven percent, Southwestern up two-point-six percent, Indian Hills up three-point-two percent, and Southeastern enrollment increased by two-point-seven percent.

(Radio Iowa) – Union workers at John Deere have accepted the company’s latest offer and their 35-day strike has ended.
Sixty-one percent of workers who cast ballots yesterday voted “yes” on Deere and Company’s third contract offer. It was very similar to the second. Both promised immediate 10 percent raises along with 5 percent raises in the third and fifth years of the six-year-long contract. The third agreement made modifications to production incentives.

In a written statement, U-A-W International president Ray Curry said the strike at John Deere seemed to unite the nation behind the struggle for fairness in the workplace. Deere and Company C-E-O John May also issued a statement, calling the wage and benefit package groundbreaking in many ways.

The U-A-W said its members assigned to the third shift could voluntarily work overnight. All others will be expected at their job sites today. This was the first strike at Deere and Company since 1986.

Here are vote margins:
UAW Locals in Iowa:
Ankeny — 64% yes
Davenport — 77% yes
Dubuque — 86% yes
Ottumwa — 75% yes
Waterloo — 44% yes

(Radio Iowa) – Former Iowa Governor Terry Branstad will be “ambassador-in-residence” at Drake University, meeting with students and planning to host a yearly conference about U.S. and China relations. Branstad, who was President Trump’s Ambassador to China, graduated from Drake’s law school 50 years ago.  “I have a lot of good memories involved with going to law school here, even though I was also serving in the legislature. It was a very active time,” Branstad says. “This is where I met my wife, for Drake’s homecoming.”

Branstad, the nation’s longest-serving governor, has just turned 75. His office on the Drake campus is in the law library. “I’m feeling good and I’m in good health and I hope this will be for an extended period of time,” Branstad says. “I do intend to meet with students, be available like on a weekly basis. I will only teach classes not real often, maybe a couple of times a semester or something like that.” Branstad hopes to organize an annual conference to focus on the U.S. relationship with China — a country Branstad says can be considered both an adversary and a potential trading partner.

“We have some big differences on policy and those have gotten wider over the years and especially since Covid,” Branstad says. “The Chinese still deny that it started in Wuhan.” Branstad says it was no easy task as the ambassador to evacuate 13-hundred people from China back to the United States. Branstad says the Chinese government has done everything it can to cover up the origins of Covid-19 and the world probably will never know for sure how it started.

“We had people from the CDC there at the embassy and we’re calling them every day, offering assistance and wanting to help, but no response,” Branstad says. “…They did everything they could to lie and cover it up and say everything is fine and whatever — until it got way out of hand.” Some of Branstad’s personal papers and memorabilia will also be donated to Drake. Some of it is already at the Winnebago County Historical Museum.

“You get a lot of stuff as governor and as ambassador I found out as well and so we wanted a place to display it where the public can see it and so some of it will be here,” Branstad says. “There is some up in Forest City at the Mansion Museum as well.” Branstad’s OFFICIAL papers from his time as governor are digitized and available at the State Historical Museum’s library. Digital copies will soon be available at the library on the Drake campus as well.

Drake’s library is also the repository for Senator Tom Harkin’s papers and the records of former Governor Robert Ray. Ray graduated from Drake’s Law School in 1954 and served as Drake’s interim president in 1998.