(Radio Iowa) – Vaping among Iowa teens is at epidemic levels and officials with the American Lung Association are launching an effort to provide kids better access to cessation programs, support and education. Beth Turner of Urbandale, director of health promotions for the association’s Iowa chapter, says schools can apply now to become a part of the proven intervention programs.

“Our Vape-Free Schools initiative provides school administrators and educators training to be able to offer an alternative suspension approach for students that are caught vaping, smoking or chewing on school property,” Turner says. “This also includes a voluntary vaping and tobacco cessation program for youth who are wanting to quit.” Now more than ever, Turner says schools need support in helping students to quit tobacco products.

“We’re seeking to raise funds to give schools across the country access to these programs,” Turner says. “There’s a cost of $400 per training seat, so our goal is to raise $400,000 to serve 1,000 schools in need by the end of 2021.” While the number of adult smokers in Iowa has remained steady or fallen slightly in recent years, the number of young people vaping and using other tobacco products is quickly rising.

“In Iowa, we see our high school tobacco use rates at an alarming 22.7%,” Turner says. “This is higher than our adult rates for smoking and we see on a national basis nearly one in five teens are vaping and close to one in four teens are using at least one tobacco product.” One of the Lung Association’s teen smoking/vaping cessation programs is called NOT, for Not On Tobacco. The 10-session program offers teens the tools, information and support to end their addiction. Learn more at lung.org.

(Radio Iowa) – A delegation of 60 Iowans will be traveling to our sister nation of Kosovo in southeastern Europe later this month. Among those chosen for the trip is Joe Nelson, the superintendent of the Clarion Goldfield Dows Community School District or C-G-D in Wright County.  Nelson says, “Our goal with the country of Kosovo is to start that international partnership and international learning so that we get some students from Kosovo to come over and embrace everything that we love about CGD.”

Agriculture is an important industry both in Iowa and Kosovo and Nelson says the students in his district will be great ambassadors for Iowa. “One in six kids in our high school are involved in FFA and the roots of ag run deep in Clarion, 4H started here,” Nelson says. “We’ve had some highly successful kids who have graduated from here and gone on to great careers in ag, so why not open that up to the world.” The city administrator of Fort Dodge and the mayors of several Iowa cities will also be a part of the delegation.

“General Orr from the National Guard is leading the delegation,” Nelson says. “We’ll be going over to the country of Kosovo for about a week. The clay is still wet on this project but what an exciting project to be a part of and what a cool partnership opportunity for our students.” The trip is scheduled for September 23rd through October 2nd. Iowa has had a sister state relationship with Kosovo since 2013 when then-Iowa Governor Terry Branstad signed an agreement with that country’s president.

(Radio Iowa) – World War Two veterans from Iowa and across the nation are being honored by participating on a flight aboard a biplane. It is all part of what is known as “Dream Flight”. Darryl Fisher says it started when he helped his dad fly his refurbished biplane from Mississippi to Oregon in 2011. “So I thought we’ve got to make 15 gas stops, so why see if there is a World War Two veteran at a local facility on our gas stop and we’ll just give them a quick flight and see what happens. And it was amazing. So we gave our first Dream Flight on March 29, 2011. We gave 25 dream flights on the way back,” he says. He says they have now given 46-hundred flights in 10 years.

“Our mission is to give back to those who gave. This generation gave us our freedom, this generation gave us our freedom. We can’t thank them enough for that,” Fisher says. Fisher says the biplane used for the “Dream Flights” helped prepare those we were going to war. “This biplane had one mission. They were built between 1940 and 1945 and they were designed to teach pilots to fly in World War Two, that was it,” he says. He says they decided to change things up this fall in honor of the end of World War Two, which came in August.

“In 1945 they signed the surrender agreement with Japan. So we said hey, let’s start flying August 1, we’ll finish flying on September 30, and we’ll call it Operation September Freedom. We’ll take our six airplanes and barnstorm across the country and fly as many World War Two veterans as we can in 60 days,” according to Fisher. Each flight is about 20 minutes. Upon completion of the flight, the World War II veterans are presented with a cap, thanked for their service to their country, and are asked to sign their name on the tail of the airplane.

Dream Flight flew veterans in Le Mars and Sioux City last week, and they are scheduled to honor other World War II veterans at Vinton and Ottumwa today (Monday) and Moline, Illinois on Tuesday.

(Hampton, Iowa) – Officials with the Hampton Police Department report an arrest was made Sunday, following an investigation into the death in August, 2020, of a 23-month old boy. Authorities say Jhonny Junior Salvatore Suarez Rivera was arrested Sunday, Sept. 5th, 2021, and charged with 1st Degree Murder, as well as Child Endangerment Resulting in Death. He was being held in the Franklin County Jail.

Jhonny Junior Salvatore Suarez Rivera

On Saturday, Aug. 1st, 2020, at around 3:45-p.m., the child was taken by private vehicle to the Franklin General Hospital, in Hampton. Life-saving measures were taken, bu the child died a little over an hour later. An autopsy conducted August 3rd, 2020, determined the child’s cause of death was multiple blunt force injuries and the manner of death was ruled a homicide.

Rivera was identified as a caretaker of the child and suspect in the death through an investigation conducted by the Hampton Police Department with assistance from the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation.

The broadcast News at 8:05-a.m., with Ric Hanson.

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(Atlantic, Iowa) – Here’s a reminder from Healthy Cass County: There will be a Food Bank for the Heartland drive through mobile food pantry at the Cass County Community Center in Atlantic, on Wednesday, September 8th from 4-6 PM. People from surrounding communities are welcome. The event runs from 4-until 6-p.m., or as supplies last. Traffic at the Cass County Community Center will be directed by volunteers.

A mobile pantry is a traveling food pantry that delivers food directly to families in need for a one-day distribution. The mobile pantry is available free of charge. Visitors are asked stay in their vehicles with the trunk open. Each household will receive 1 shelf stable mobile community box, 1 loaf of bread, and one produce box. Each vehicle can take food for two households. If food is needed for multiple households, contact County Wellness Coordinator Brigham Hoegh at 712-249-5870.

Anyone in need is welcome. No documentation needed. People from surrounding towns and communities are welcome. Food distribution and delivery is made possible with volunteers. Volunteering requires repeatedly lifting up to 20 pounds, but some less-strenuous positions are available. To volunteer contact Cass County Wellness Coordinator Brigham Hoegh at 712-249-5870. Thank you!

The broadcast News at 7:07-a.m., with Ric Hanson.

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(Radio Iowa) – Labor Day union events and parades in most major cities in Iowa were canceled due to concerns about the spread of COVID-19. Iowa Federation of Labor spokesman, Lance Coles, says there was a lot of discussion before the final decision. “It wasn’t an easy decision,” Coles says. “Each of the cities have their own central bodies or affiliates and they met together. Up until about a few weeks ago they were still planning on having it — but with the increase in Delta COVID — they had a lot of discussion, and it wasn’t an easy decision, there were a lot of people who still wanted to have the events.”

He says they also decided to expand the recognition by designating September as Union Appreciation Month. “We decided why just take one day out of September and celebrate labor — let’s celebrate it the whole month,” Coles explains. Coles is a postal worker who has been a union member for more than 40 years. He was asked about where things stand in 2021. “I see it getting better. Our memberships are improving. People are wanting to join unions — especially the younger generation that wasn’t too savvy on what a union was or what it could do for them,” Coles says.

He says the pandemic has also made many people think about what jobs pay and consider if joining a union is a better option for their employment future. Some are critical of unions for getting too political, and leaning more toward Democrats. “In reality, about a third of our membership are registered Republicans. And another third are independents — kind of like the state of Iowa — it’s divided pretty well a third of the way across,” he says. “We don’t just say this is the candidate we want because they are the Democratic party.”

He says they review all the qualifications of candidates. Coles says the parade will be missed because they are a way to get out and meet people and show they pride that union workers have. Union events in Iowa City; Mason City, Des Moines; Cedar Rapids; Council Bluffs; FortDodge; Sioux City; Waterloo; Quad Cities; Clinton; Marshalltown have all been canceled. Dubuque Is still planning to have a Labor Day Parade, but has canceled its picnic.

(Radio Iowa) – Dubuque native Kenneth Quinn, a former U.S. Ambassador to Cambodia, led the Des Moines based World Food Prize for 20 years — and Quinn recently got a call from China’s new ambassador to the United States. “It was the first call to any Americans made by the new Chinese ambassador outside of Washington, D.C.,” Quinn says. Sarah Lande of Muscatine was also on the call. She hosted China’s president when Xi Jinping visited Iowa in 1985, back when XI was a regional ag official in China. “I think they’re looking to say: ‘Where can we look to, how can we find some place that could maybe help restore things back to where they were,'” Quinn says, “‘back in 2012.”

Just before Xi became the leader of China’s Communist Party and China’s president, he visited Iowa and then-Governor Terry Branstad hosted a state dinner for Xi at the Capitol in Des Moines. “He went to Muscatine, came to the State Capitol, gave a toast in which he invoked Mark Twain — the sun over the Mississippi — and all of these memories,” Quinn says. “I’d never heard a foreign leader talk about our country that way.” Quinn says he believes China is anxious to rebuild trade relationships with Iowa and he sees Iowa businesses and ag commodity groups with the same desire.

“It is going to be one of the two most significant countries on the face of our planet, for sure, and our question to us and to them is: ‘Are we going to have a super adversarial relationship? Or can we find ways to do things together?'” Quinn says. “…To be sure we have enough food to feed 9 to 10 billion people, to deal with climate change, to prevent pandemics China and the U.S. have to work together.”

Quinn spent 32 years as an officer in the U.S. Start Department. He made his comments during a recent appearance on Iowa P-B-S.

SABULA, Iowa – Iowa DNR Conservation Officers responded to a boat crash on the Mississippi River on Sunday morning that left two people with serious injuries.

The crash happened around 10:30am, north of Sabula near river mile marker 542, when one vessel failed to maintain proper following distance, hitting and ramping the vessel in front. The crash caused serious injuries to an occupant and an operator of one of the vessels. One adult male was taken to MercyOne Clinton Medical Center and one adult female was airlifted to OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center in Rockford, IL.

All safety equipment was properly in place on both vessels and passengers required to wear personal flotation devices were wearing them at the time the crash occurred.  Alcohol and drugs were not a factor in the crash.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources assisted the Iowa DNR with the investigation.