CORALVILLE – The Iowa Board of Corrections voted unanimously today (Friday) in support of the appointment of Mike Heinricy as the next warden of the Iowa Medical and Classification Center, in Coralville. His appointment was recommended to the board by a department hiring committee. Heinricy has served as the deputy warden of the Iowa Medical and Classification Center since May of 2020, and he served as the Deputy Warden at the Anamosa State Penitentiary from May of 2016 to April of 2020.  He started his more-than-17-year career in corrections with the Anamosa State Penitentiary as a Correctional Officer in 2002. Throughout his career in corrections, he has held such positions as: Officer, Counselor, Unit Manager, and Deputy Warden.

Commenting on the approval by the board, Iowa Corrections Director Beth Skinner said, “IMCC is probably our most complex prison in the entire system. The team that works there is extremely dedicated to their job, and they deserve a leader that will be dedicated to helping them succeed. I am positive that Warden Heinricy is going to serve this team, and the taxpayers of Iowa well as the leader of this extremely important correctional facility.”

(Radio Iowa) – The 138th annual Old Soldiers Reunion takes place this weekend, in Griswold. The annual Military March into the town begins just outside the city limits at 4:15-p.m., Saturday. Landon Peterson is a member American Legion Post 508 in Griswold. “Veterans, families of veterans (and) our theme is ‘Hometown Heroes’ so law enforcement, fire and EMS — anybody who is involved in that is welcome to join in our road march.”

Tractors will be parked on Cass Street in Griswold for a tractor show that starts at 8 a.m. Saturday. Peterson says that’s been a popular part of the annual event for the tractor owners AND members of the community. “That’s something that they’ve always been done and they were really excited to know that we were going to continue with the reunion so they didn’t have to miss one, because they really enjoy that,” Peterson says.

Other events at this year’s Old Soldiers Reunion include a parade and a street dance on Saturday night.

(Radio Iowa) – The search for a former Wartburg College music instructor who left a Waterloo care facility Monday night is entering its fourth day. Authorities have been looking for 46-year-old Michael Jensen of Waverly since he escaped from Ravenwood Specialty Care through a window. Jensen’s wife, Jen, says her husband was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2012. “He’s had diminished capacity since 2016,” Jen Jansen says. “Mostly from the brain cancer and complications from the treatments.”

Michael Jensen

Jensen says the past few months have been extremely difficult on the family. Jensen and the couple’s three daughters, one of whom just graduated from Waverly-Shell Rock High School, haven’t been able to visit Michael because pandemic restrictions. “He’s been in a nursing home for two years with cooperative care,” Jensen says. “… To be quite honest, with COVID, we’ve been at the end of our rope. It had been 121 days on Monday since I’ve seen him and been able to hug him.”

Authorities believe Michael Mitchell may be trying to return to the family’s home in Waverly. Nearly 50 volunteers showed up in Janesville Thursday to help look for him and they spent the morning searching property between Cedar Falls and Waverly before severe weather ended the effort around noon. Mitchell says she’s extremely grateful for the support her family has received from friends and strangers. “When I drove in the parking lot, I had to a minute to have a good cry,” Jensen says. “It’s overwhelming to see … a parking lot full of volunteers, who are taking their summer day.”

Firefighters and first-responders went door-to-door in Janesville Thursday night. Even though there have been no signs of Mitchell since he disappeared, Jen Jensen is confident he will be found.”We’re going to find him,” Jensen says. “I have so much confidence in this law enforcement team. Waterloo P.D. has been fantastic and homeland security has been wonderful.”

The search for Jensen will resume at 9 AM today. Volunteers should report to the Incident Command Center at the Island Park Boat House in Cedar Falls.

(Radio Iowa) – This week the state’s Test Iowa program has passed the 100-thousand mark in number of tests conducted. Governor Kim Reynolds announced in April that a group of Utah companies were being paid 26-million dollars to supply the test kits. The first Test Iowa site opened April 25th in Des Moines.  “Last week, Test Iowa sites across the state surpassed the capacity of 3000 tests per day,” Reynolds says.

There are now 20 “Test Iowa” sites in the state. Some are drive-through sites. Others are set up in partnership with local hospitals and clinics. According to the governor, 21 percent of the COVID-19 tests that have been done in Iowa since March have been run through the Test Iowa program. Reynolds says Test Iowa is currently the state’s number one source for tests. “As demand for testing continues to grow, Test Iowa appointments are filling up quickly, so even though we’ve far exceeded our capacity for the past two weeks, we’re mindful that we can push our capacity limits only so far,” Reynolds says. “While our volume of tests are in good supply, we are considering different ways to adjust operations at some of our test sites and at the State Hygenic Lab so that we can further expand capacity to meet the demands of Iowans that want to be tested.”

Iowans must use the Test Iowa app or call to schedule an appointment time for a COVID-19 test. Sites in Des Moines and Waukee account for 40 percent of the tests conducted through the Test Iowa program this month.

In the Iowa Department of Public Health’s Coronavirus update today (Friday, 10-a.m.), officials report: Three more people have died from COVID-19 (for a total of 742); Officials say 358,394 have been tested for the virus to-date, with the number of positive cases up 744 to 33,756. There were 7,972 Iowans tested Thursday, another new single-day record. One of 9 Iowans have been tested for the virus and 1 of 94 have tested positive. Negative cases stand at 326,822; and, 25,750 Iowans have recovered from the virus.

Iowa’s hospitalization rates have been increasing since the beginning of July after a long period of decline. IDPH reported 169 current patients with COVID-19, up from 168 the previous day. There are 54 patients listed in intensive care, up from 49 the previous day. There are 26 patients on ventilators, equal to the previous day. There were 19 patients admitted in the last 24 hours, down from 32 the previous day. In southwest/western Iowa RMCC Region 4: Five people are hospitalized (2 less than yesterday); 4 are in an ICU; none were admitted to a hospital, and there was no one on a ventilator. Long-Term Care (LTC) facility data show: 15 current outbreaks; 282 residents/staff tested positive for COVID-19; 87 have recovered, and there have been 392 deaths to-date.

County-by-County COVID-19 cases, and the number of person who have recovered (   ).

• Cass: 27 (19)
• Adair: 16 (12)
• Adams: 8 (8)
• Audubon: 16 (15)
• Guthrie: 72 (57)
• Montgomery: 11 (8)
• Pottawattamie: 796 (655)
• Shelby: 119 [2 more than on Thursday] (105)

(Radio Iowa) – A meat locker in Story City is the first in Iowa to be allowed to sell its products to customers in other states. A new federal program lets state-inspected lockers get a U-S-D-A stamp on processed meat, so it can be sold across state lines. Iowa Agriculture Secretary Mike Naig says this opens up new markets for Iowa meat lockers as well as livestock and poultry producers.  “Iowa’s got a great brand for agriculture, as we know, and specially for meat production and so we think that’s something that
we think can perform very well really all across the country,” Naig says.

This could broaden the range of Iowa beef, pork and poultry sold to restaurants in cities like Chicago and beyond that promote the farm-to-table concept. It also means Iowa-branded meat could be sold in regional grocery stores.  “Over the last couple of months we’ve had a lot of focus on the food and agriculture supply chain and meat in particular and so I think there’s a lot of interest on the part of consumers and restaurants and really all across the board in more options when it comes to sourcing meat,” Naig says, “and we’ve seen that in the fact that our meat lockers are very, very busy and we like that we think that there’s an upside for them to stay busy.”

Naig and his staff worked for nearly a year to ensure all state regulations and inspections met the federal program requirements. It meant buying some new equipment and additional training for the state’s meat and poultry inspectors. “It does also require USDA to come into those lockers from time to time,” Naig says, “but the day-to-day, ongoing operational inspections will be conducted by our team.”

Meat processing businesses that have fewer than 25 full-time employees can sign up for the federal program. Al’s Country Meat Locker in Calmar and Ohrt’s Smokehouse in Ionia have also qualified for the program. Naig says dozen other meat lockers that are eligible have applied.  “This is where I think there’s an opportunity: one for those existing meat lockers to expand, maybe hire some additional staff, make some equipment investments and some facility investments,” Naig says. “And we are hearing, too, of some real interest in some new facilities and folks getting into the business, so that’s an exciting thing for us to look at — expanding this market opportunity and the economic development that goes along with it.”

There are a couple of hundred meat lockers in the state and 68 of them are eligible for this federal program.