(Radio Iowa) The new Iowa House Minority Leader says she’s unwilling to concede any part of the state to Republicans. The 41 Democrats in the Iowa House met last (Monday) night and elected State Representative Jennifer Konfrst of Windsor Heights as their new leader. “I talked a lot about the importance of learning from 2020, but not living in 2020 and focusing on the 2022 election cycle,” Konfrst says. Due to a delay in delivery of U-S Census data, the new maps for legislative districts won’t be developed until August, but Konfrst says she’s already recruiting candidates to challenge the Republicans’ current 59-seat House majority in 2022.

“I’m not the type of person who likes to go for second place,” Konfrst says. “I’m fully aware of the demographic challenges…the redistricting challenges, retirements — everything that’s out there, but I am fully committed to doing all we can to get to 51 in 2022. Everyone thinks it’s hard. Everyone thinks it’s impossible. I don’t.” Konfrst has been a full-time professor at Drake University since 2013, teaching journalism and strategic communications classes. Konfrst is now both spokesperson and lead organizer for Democrats in the Iowa House and Konfrst says she intends to make the Democratic Party’s message as clear as possible. “I refuse to concede any part of this state and so I’m ready to talk in any corner of Iowa,” Konfrst says. “…Democrats have ideas that Iowans like and appreciate and it’s time for us to tell that story.”

House Speaker Pat Grassley says House Republicans represent 97 of Iowa’s 99 counties and are advancing an agenda that matches Iowans’ values.

(Radio Iowa) – An Estherville man died as the result of injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident in rural Emmet County over the weekend. According to Emmet County Sheriff Mike Martens, a 2003 Harley Davidson motorcycle driven by 64-year-old Michael Schubert was eastbound on a county road, when the motorcycle failed to negotiate a curve and left the roadway and entered the road ditch. Schubert was pronounced dead at the scene by the Emmet County Medical Examiner.

Schubert had been reported missing to authorities around 3:30 PM Sunday after not returning from a motorcycle ride the day before. An investigation into his disappearance was then initiated and shortly after 10:38 PM, the accident scene was discovered in some tall grass by the Emmet County Sheriff’s Office. An autopsy will be performed by the Iowa State Medical Examiner’s Office and the matter remains under investigation.

(Atlantic) – Cass County Engineer Trent Wolken, Tuesday, told the Board of Supervisors work on the Olive Street bridge, north of Atlantic and south of I-80, continues to progress, along with work on the Boston Road bridge project.

Supervisors Mark O’Brien said he’s received complaints about dust control, especially with regard to grain trucks that use Boston Road to Buck Creek Road in order to get to the ethanol plant. Wolken said the DOT is encouraging those haulers to use the Elk Horn Road (Highway 173 to Highway 83) to deliver to the plant. Part of the problem, Wolken said, is there aren’t too many highly visible detour signs in place to direct the drivers to the alternate route.

Supervisor Steve Green said the ethanol plant is also working to instruct delivery drivers on the proper route to take that won’t create all the dust. Wolken said with regard to county road maintenance activities, they’ve backed-off blading the gravel roads because of the dry conditions and the dust it stirs-up. Instead, they’re concentrating on the lesser used dirt roads.

In other business, the Board approved a contract for the repair of the garage building located on the southwest corner of the courthouse parking lot. Supervisor John Hartkopf recommended (because of his past knowledge of their quality of work), Reds Masonry out of Villisca.

Their bid is $11,500. As it stands, Hartkopf said the equipment storage structure is “Becoming borderline dangerous.” The work can begin, he said, within about 30-days. And, the Board tabled until June 22^nd, action on appointing/re-appointing a Cass County Veterans Affairs Commissioner.

The Atlantic Parks and Recreation Department and the YMCA announced on Tuesday (Today), the Sunnyside Pool in Atlantic will open this Thursday, June 17th. Dan Haynes, Director of the Nishna Valley YMCA, says “We continue to work through mechanical issues as well as staffing shortages but we are excited to get things moving. Below you will find the pertinent information that will be helpful for you and your family.” The pool opening had been delayed from the original date of June 1st, while crews worked to investigate a leak that was causing the water level to drop daily, and the search for pool staff was undeway.

Haynes says the daily fee rate of $3.00 per visit per person will still be in affect however, there is a season pass option. “Since we are opening late in the season,” Haynes says, “we have decided to sell a season pass for individuals for $70 and a Family (immediate members) pass for $90. Closing day will be approximately August 15th or as lifeguards are available. When there is rain or inclement weather and the outdoor pool becomes closed, those with an individual or family pass may use the indoor YMCA pool. Pool passes may be purchased at the outdoor pool during regular business hours.”

The hours of operation will be: Monday – Saturday 1-7pm and Sunday 1-6pm. Family hour is 5-6pm.

Haynes adds, “As we have all learned over the past few years and especially this year, our community and surrounding service area are certainly in need of an upgrade for our pool facility to include a splash pad. During our last community recreation meeting, one of the top desires of those in attendance was a Splash Pad and pool upgrades. We would like to take this time to invite those interested in this specific topic to join us for an input session. This brainstorming and input session will be on Tuesday July 13th at 6:00pm at the Lincoln/Wickman Center gym.”

For further information you may contact the Park and Recreation Office at 712-243-3542 or Kyle at the YMCA at 712-243-3934.

The Mills County Sheriff’s Office, Tuesday (today), reported nine arrests over the past week. On Sunday, June 13th, 28-year-old Tabitha Lynn Madsen, of Glenwood, was arrested on two counts of Assault with Bodily Injury, with bond set at $2,000. 26-year-old Dylan Ray McKeown, of Council Bluffs, was arrested for being a Fugitive From Justice. He was being held without bond in the Mills County Jail. And, 23-year-old Erick Rodriguez, of Omaha, was arrested Sunday, for OWI/1st offense. Bond was set at $1,000.

Last Thursday, 42-year-old Jason Alexander Houston, of Omaha, was arrested on a warrant for Violation of Probation, with bond set at $2,500, and, 26-year-old Matthew Elza Anthony Campbell, of Omaha, was arrested for Possession of a Controlled Substance (Bond $1,000).

On June 9th: 23-year-old Adrianna Celeste Collins, and 45-year-old Christopher Kyle Swope, both of Omaha, were arrested for Conspiracy with the intent to deliver a controlled substance. Swope was additionally charged with Felon in control of a firearm. His bond was set at $30,000. Bond for Collins was set at $25,000; 42-year-old Heath Douglas Tilson, of Omaha, was arrested for being a Fugitive from Justice (No bond); and, 59-year-old Curtis James Hansen, of Beatrice, NE., was arrested for Driving Under Suspension and Open Container (Bond $600).

(Radio Iowa) – Protesters disrupted and prompted the suspension of last night’s Des Moines City Council meeting shortly after it started. Black Liberation Movement protesters unfurled a banner that read “Defund DMPD” — the Des Moines Police Department. Chelsea Chism-Vargas was among those asking the council to reject spending $10,000 to send a Des Moines Police officer to a training exercise in Florida.

“Y’all know it’s not right,” Chism-Vargas said. “…We do not support free vacations for Des Moines police officers when they’re in our communities violating us, brutalizing us on the streets and y’all don’t say nothing about it.”

After the council approved the trip, the protesters stood and began chanting. The Des Moines City Council tried to conduct business over the shouting, but then decided to suspend the meeting and reconvene online Wednesday morning at 7:30. Mayor Frank Cownie called last night’s incident “alarming.” The council had limited the audience to 25 people for its first in-person meeting at the Des Moines City Council chambers in 14 months.

(Radio Iowa) – A writing assignment for a University of Iowa honors class turned into a novel that caught the attention of movie producers and resulted in all 19 students signing a film option with two Hollywood studios. U-I Professor Harry Stecopoulos says he’s delighted by the development and while he couldn’t disclose the terms of the contract, says his students were thrilled with the deal they brokered. “There was a little bit of wrangling, as you might expect, and I should say, to the students’ great credit, they did their own negotiations with a little bit of advice from an Iowa alum who works for an agent in Los Angeles,” Stecopoulos says. “The undergrads all did their own negotiations and did them very well indeed.”

The students’ collaboration, “Gilded in Ash,” is a new version of what many regard as the greatest novel of the 20th century. The copyright on “The Great Gatsby” expired last year, so Stecopoulos had his students create a completely new telling of the classic 1925 story by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Never did he dream it would result in a film option. “I had no expectations of this kind whatsoever,” Stecopoulos says. “I hoped they would do a good job and I had no expectations. I’m doing it again with a Hemingway novel in the fall and I fear that the students will expect a similar result, which I can’t guarantee, obviously, but it’s been a wonderful surprise.”

The original plan called for an electronic version of the students’ novel to be released in January through the University of Iowa’s Digital Scholarship and Publishing Studio, with a paperback version this spring. That didn’t happen. “The producers, for understandable reasons, didn’t want a free copy of the book circulating in case, I guess, someone else might want to make a similar film,” he says. “Some of the students are interested in revising, tightening the existing manuscript and then submitting it to conventional publishers, seeing if they can get it in book form.”

The film option was signed with Independent Pictures and Fugitive Films, but there’s no guarantee “Gilded in Ash” will ever become a movie. “The film business is fickle,” Stecopoulos says, but he’s confident the movie will be made — eventually. The characters in the new story are “largely the same but it’s a different plot,” Stecopoulos says. “For example, Gatsby is an African-American woman who is an art forger, so a major change there.” The U-I students’ story is still set in the 1920s and in New York City but he says it’s very much an original account. So what’s the next writing project involve with Hemingway?

“It’s ‘The Sun Also Rises,’ published in 1926, and that copyright expires on January 1st of 2022.” Expiration of the copyright means anyone can publish the book, write a prequel, or adapt it however they’d like. Stecopoulos notes, there is no payday for him with the upcycled Gatsby tale, as the only reward he craves is in his students’ success.

(Radio Iowa) – An immigration amnesty bill is subject of a hearing before the U-S Senate Judiciary Committee today (Tuesday) but Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley says the panel is “focused on the wrong thing.” Grassley, the committee’s ranking Republican, says they instead should be concentrating on finding solutions to the “border crisis.” “It’s this administration’s new policies, promises and rhetoric that have created the crisis,” Grassley says. “You see it every day, hundreds wading the Rio Grande to come to this country in violation of our laws.”

Grassley quoted reports that said on one recent day, people from 35 different nations crossed into the U-S illegally along our southern border with Mexico. Iowan Michelle Root is scheduled to testify during today’s hearing. She’s the mother of a young woman from Council Bluffs who died in an accident five years ago in Omaha. “You may remember that her daughter, Sarah Root, was killed in a car crash by a drunk driving, undocumented immigrant,” Grassley says. “He’d been released by federal law enforcement because of some legal loophole.”

The crash took place on January 31st of 2016, a matter of hours after Root graduated with honors from Bellevue University. Omaha police said 19-year-old Eswin Mejia, a native of Honduras, was drag racing and caused the crash, but he was released on bail and disappeared. Grassley says he probably fled the country and likely will never be brought to justice. New legalization measures with no discussion of border security, Grassley says, are “a recipe for an even-longer crisis.”

“We should be sympathetic to the circumstances of young people who are illegally brought to this country as children,” Grassley says. “That decision wasn’t up to those children. Their parents violated the law.” Such measures, he says, need to be considered alongside legislation that promotes the rule of law and that would prevent future tragedies like what the Root family has endured.

Officials with Guthrie County/ISU Extension and Outreach report the US Sunbeams 4-H Club was the winner of a “Random Acts of Kindness” drawing. The club won $257.50 from one of the members aunt’s workplace.  The club in-turn used the money to “Pay It Forward” with the 15 Summer Activity Bags.

Meredith Arganbright presenting 15 Summer Activity Bags to Rhonda Huggins of New Opportunities Family Development Center in Guthrie Center. (Photo & information submitted)