(Left to right) Emily Plagman, 2021 Cass County Pork Ambassador; Paige Jensen, 2021 Cass County Pork Queen.

Cass County Pork Producers, Sunday, crowned Paige Jensen as Cass County Pork Queen and Emily Plagman as County Pork Ambassador. Paige is a Junior at CAM High School who is involved in 4H and FFA. Her parents are Ryan and Eva Jensen. Emily is a Senior at CAM. She’s the daughter of Mike and Kristi Plagman, and is also actively involved in 4H and FFA. Paige Jensen will act as a role model for the youth of Cass County, attend parades if it’s safe to do so (with regard to COVID), and help the pork producer board with promoting pork in Cass County. She will receive a scholarship as an additional reward for her involvement in the pork industry.

She explained why she wanted to be involved in the pork industry this year.

She started showing pigs in her 5^th Grade year, and have developed a bond with the swine she’s had, and with the various leadership opportunities that have been presented to her. Agriculture, she said, runs in her blood.

Emily Plagman will promote pork, attend parades if they are safe, assist in promoting pork within the county, and she’ll also receive a scholarship for future schooling or advancing in the pork industry. She said she’s had a love for pigs since she was young, and this was a natural progression in that passion.

She too has always been involved in 4H and FFA ever since she was young, and growing up on a farm, and she wants to spread a message about pork.

Paige Jensen says her message is simple.

The Junior says after high school she plans to study Ag Communications, Marketing or Business in college, and afterward start raising beef and swine on a family farm. Emily says she wants to get an Associates of Agriculture Degree at a community college, then transfer and get a double major in Ag Media and Ag Education, with a Minor in Communications. She says she wants to stay in a rural area and promote ag the best she can.

With Ric Hanson.

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A woman from Creston reported Saturday afternoon, that someone had stolen her motorcycle. The theft of a black, 2007 Harley Davidson occurred sometime between 11-p.m. Friday and 1-p.m., Saturday, from the vicinity of 412 N. Maple Street, in Creston. The motorcycle was parked in front of the residence on the sidewalk, and keys were not in it. The loss was estimated at $16,000.

The 7:07-a.m. News with News Director Ric Hanson.

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Audubon county hard surface roads and gravel have several inches of slushy snow on them this morning (March 15), and the hard surface roads are slick under the snow. Plows will be out at  to clear hard surface roads. Give yourself extra travel time and stopping distance this morning. Gravel roads will be soft under the snow in areas after the amount of rain we received over the weekend. Drive safe.

A Public Hearing will be held electronically Tuesday morning, in Atlantic, on the FY 2022 Cass County Budget. The hearing begins at 9:05-a.m. during a meeting of the Cass County Board of Supervisors, and is accessible via ZOOM (see related data for the meeting below). Following the hearing, the Board will reconvene their regular session, and review County Compensation Board recommendations for elected officers’ FY2022 compensation, and act on those recommendations.

The Board will also take action on adopting the FY2022 Cass County Secondary Roads, and Cass County, Budgets. They are then expected to receive an update from Secondary Roads Dept. Engineer Trent Wolken, followed by the appointment of a Sheriff’s Deputy, and Lincoln Township Clerk (the latter of which is for the remainder of a term ending 12/31/2024).

[ZOOM Meeting info.: Meeting ID: 138 870 131              Password: 012064 ]

(Radio Iowa) – March is “Problem Gambling Awareness” month and the head of Iowa’s treatment program says they are trying to let everyone know that things don’t have to get out of control. Eric Pruess says that’s why they have started their “Be Number One at Getting Help” campaign. “To help those who might not understand much about gambling have a bit more empathy understanding and support for those individuals — to encourage them to reach out for support rather than anger and I can’t believe you did this, how could you do this? Why do you have this problem and no one else has this problem,” Pruess says.

He says the gambler and those around them need to know what’s involved. “It’s a disease, it’s something that people need help for and there’s help available. That’s really what we are trying to get at,” Pruess says. “And certainly within the theme of Problem Gambling Awareness Month is awareness plus action makes good things happen.” Sports betting has taken off in Iowa since becoming legal — and Preuss says there’s no doubt it increases the temptation for those who might gamble illegally. “All you have to do is watch T-V and know there is a very high level of competition that is going on with the new sportsbooks when the sports law changed,” Preuss says.

He says there are a lot of offers out there trying to get people into sports gambling. “They’re competing for a limited number of Iowans and trying to build that relationship with Iowans to do sports wagering. And they are doing it in some very enticing ways — bet a dollar win a hundred. We guarantee you won’t lose your first 25 dollars,” Preuss says. ” For a person who hasn’t gambled before, it sounds like ‘why wouldn’t I try that?” He says gambling doesn’t have to take over your life. “We really just want to get the message out to them to play responsibly — to stay within their means. Make sure you are only wagering your discretionary income and not looking at it to make money,” according to Pruess. ” I mean, it’s fun, it’s entertainment. If you win great, if you don’t, you walk away and you had fun doing it, that type of thing.”

He says if you feel you have a problem there is help at 1-800-BETTS-OFF or by going online to yourlifeiowa.org. “And they can initiate a chat session there. But they can also find more information about responsible gambling, what a gambling problem might look like, and other resources to assist them,” he says.  Pruess says about one percent of Iowans meet the criteria for a gambling disorder and about 14 percent who may be at risk for gambling disorder.

Red Oak Police, Sunday afternoon, arrested 37-year old Kyle Anthony Zeigler, of Red Oak, for Driving While Barred. Zeigler was being held in the Montgomery County Jail, on $2,000 bond.

(Radio Iowa) – There’s debate among economists about how the American economy will respond to the injection of one-point-nine trillion dollars from the new pandemic relief package. Creighton University’s Ernie Goss predicts it will spur inflation. “It’s the wrong package at the wrong time,” Goss says. Iowa State University’s David Swenson disagrees. “This bill was important and it’s needed,” Swenson says.

Swenson and Goss debated the so-called American Rescue Plan during a joint appearance on this weekend’s “Iowa Press” program on Iowa P-B-S. Goss says sending more federal money to state and local governments is a mistake. “I’ll use a good economic term: crazy,” Goss says. “It’s allocated according to the unemployment rate at the end of the year. Now, could that make sense to anyone other than a state that’s been in lockdown, making bad decisions?”

Swenson says there should have been a formula that took into account several factors, not just unemployment rates, for distributing that 350 BILLION dollars to states and local governments. Swenson says the package, overall, covers a wide range of categories that weren’t adequately addressed in the first two pandemic-relief packages. “Businesses that are stressed — restaurants, dining and drinking establishments especially – (get) another big chunk of money,” Swenson says, “…A lot assistance has also been…targeted especially for back rent.”

The plan did NOT include an increase in the minimum wage. Swenson says the minimum wage should be much above the current 7-dollars-and-25 cents per hour and future increases should be tied to the inflation rate, to get the politics out of it. “We create a lot of either misery or underperformance with regard to the labor force as a consequence of an artificially low minimum wage,” Swenson says. “Yes, we have businesses out there that the market wage is higher, but we still have a substantial fraction of people that have to work at that minimum wage.”

Goss agrees the minimum wage is too low, but he says raising the wage at this time would hammer the hospitality industry. “For businesses, manufacturers and the small businesses that we survey, the big issue is finding highly qualified workers,” Goss says, “so they’re bidding up the wage right now, well above the minimum wage for manufacturers.”

There is 10-point-four billion for agriculture in the pandemic relief package President Biden approved last week. Both economists say with expanding exports and rising commodity prices, there won’t be a need to match the extra 46 BILLION in payments the Trump Administration sent farmers in 2020.

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 3:30 a.m. CDT

WATERLOO, Iowa (AP) — Tyson says about a third of workers at its Waterloo, Iowa have received the COVID-19 vaccine. The Quad-City Times on Sunday reported the vaccination rate at the plant, where the virus has already sickened about a third of the site’s nearly 3,000 employees. Waterloo Tyson is linked to at least six worker deaths from the coronavirus. The company hosted vaccination clinics this month for Waterloo workers. The virus has ravaged the meatpacking industry across the U.S.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — More than 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccine have been administered in Iowa, even as residents who qualify struggle to make appointments for a shot. The Iowa Department of Public Health said Friday that Iowa has administered 1.03 million doses. The milestone reflects significant increases in vaccine supplies but it’s unclear how the state will handle surging demand as more adults become eligible in the coming months. Iowa has no centralized system for people to secure a vaccine appointment.

Iowa City (AP) — As virus cases plummeted, Iowa quietly extended a $3.9 million contact tracing contract with a company owned by a major Republican Party donor and supporter of Gov. Kim Reynolds. The Iowa Department of Public Health hired MCI, an Iowa City telemarketing firm, in November to trace the contacts of Iowa residents infected with COVID-19 after a one-day emergency bidding process. The two-month, $2.3 million contract came during an explosion of cases that filled up hospitals with patients and after counties had for months complained of a shortage of contact tracing workers. Four days before MCI’s contract was to expire on Jan. 31, Iowa’s state epidemiologist signed a three-month contract extension with MCI that is worth another $1.6 million.

MASON CITY, Iowa (AP) — Police in northern Iowa are investigating the discovery of what appear to be human bones. Mason City police said in a news release that a resident found the bones, along with clothing, on Thursday on the shore of the Winnebago River. Officers searched the area and found additional bones. Everything that was collected was transported to the Iowa Office of the State Medical Examiner for examination.