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Iowa early News Headlines: Sunday, 8/2/2020

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August 2nd, 2020 by Ric Hanson

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 5:15 a.m. CDT

SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) — Sioux City police officers could be wearing body cameras by the end of the year. Police Chief Rex Mueller says the city council will be asked Monday to approve spending $260,000 for 120 body cameras. Mayor Bob Scott said he would be shocked if the proposal doesn’t pass unanimously. Mueller said after training, officers could be wearing the cameras late this year. Purchasing cameras is voluntary for Iowa law enforcement agencies, Sioux City has been considering them for several years but Mueller said the financing was never available because of other city priorities.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — One influential pork company has received the vast majority of payments from an Iowa program designed to support farmers who euthanized their hogs after the coronavirus devastated their industry. Newly released data shows that Christensen Farms has received $1.86 million from the Iowa Disposal Assistance Program. That’s 72% of the $2.6 million the program has paid to date. Christensen Farms is one of the nation’s largest family-owned pork producers, The Sleepy Eye, Minnesota-based company has received reimbursement payments for disposing of 46,599 euthanized hogs. The 15 other companies and farmers who have received payments reported euthanizing about 18,000 hogs combined.

WATERLOO, Iowa (AP) — A 37-year-old Waterloo man was sentenced to 15 years in prison on gun charges after he shot a man in 2019. Alberto Quinto-Pascual shot Alejandro Franco at a Waterloo apartment and Franco later died from his injuries. Quinto-Pascual was not charged with murder but was sentenced Friday in federal court on gun charges, in a move the increased his sentence. Quinto-Pascual is a citizen of Mexico, and will likely be deported following his prison time. Prosecutors said the two men met at a bar and then went to a house, where Quinto-Pascual shot Franco. Quinto-Pascual told police Franco shot himself.

UNDATED (AP) — Officials from states across the country who are hoping to expand broadband internet to underserved areas with federal money appropriated to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic are scrambling to finish the projects by the end of the year. To comply with the current CARES Act rules, states must have the broadband projects, which can typically take months if not years of planning and construction, up and running by Dec. 30. In Vermont, the Legislature cut back on what lawmakers would have liked to allocate from $100 million to less than $20 million because they didn’t believe they could have spent the larger amount on time, despite the need.