The area’s latest and/or top news stories at 7:06-a.m. From KJAN News Director Ric Hanson.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (5.1MB)

Subscribe: RSS

Atlantic Memorial Day organizer Steve Livengood reports the services are still planned for 10-a.m. today at the Atlantic Cemetery.

(Radio Iowa) — Four of the U.S. Senators who’re running for president spent the weekend in Iowa, holding 29 public events over the past three days.  Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York kicked her things off Friday afternoon in West Des Moines with a forum focused on what she calls her “Family Bill of Rights.” It includes a federal law requiring paid family leave and a series of steps to expand access to day care. “I was the sixth woman, ever, to give birth as a member of Congress…Shocking, but it shows that people who are in these decision-making roles tend to be male, they tend to be white and they tend to be affluent and so they don’t understand, necessarily, that access to day care is make-or-break for any family,” Gillibrand said.

New Jersey Senator Cory Booker is on a four-day tour of the state in an R-V. During a stop in Burlington Saturday, Booker focused on the closure of the local Planned Parenthood clinic and promised to create an Office of Reproductive Rights and Freedom if he’s elected president. “Codify Roe v Wade,” Booker said, “…fully funding organizations like Planned Parenthood which in some counties are the only provider of contraceptive care.”

On Sunday in Oskaloosa, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren said Republicans are trying to get “a tilted court.” “It’s partly around issues like Roe…but a big part of it, it’s about corporations,” Warren said. “It’s about a court that, over and over, when it’s a corporation versus an employee, is with the corporation.”

Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar (KLOH-buh-shar) told Iowans this weekend that as president she’d end the loopholes oil companies use to get around federal policies promoting ethanol. Klobuchar also emphasized changes she’d make to help farmers facing bankruptcy. At events in Decorah, Charles City, Iowa Falls and Des Moines, Klobuchar heard a familiar song. Klobuchar turned 59 Saturday and the crowds sang “Happy Birthday” to her.

(Radio Iowa) – Governor Kim Reynolds signed a bill Friday afternoon to extend Iowa’s one cent school infrastructure sales tax through the year 2051. Reynolds signed the measure in ceremonies at the Sioux City public school’s Career Academy. Reynolds says school districts can use it and expand some of the ways they use the funding.

The measure also allocates one million dollars to help fund Career Academies such as Sioux City’s, which help high school students learn and train in specific career paths. “Career academies was something I’m very passionate about… and I just think those are tremendous opportunities for students. So to be able to use the funding for that, I am just very appreciative of that and that was something that I had asked for,”Reynolds says.

Governor Reynolds visited with Career Academy students Jonah Snieder (Snyder) and Colby East — who are juniors at East High School: They said they are both in the business path and like how they are getting dual credit for high school and college and how they are able to go out of the building and meet with real businesses and see how they are run.

Sioux City School Superintendent Paul Gausman says the local district was the first in the state to initiate the one cent tax: Gausman says Sioux City passed it as a local option in 1998, and then in 2008 then Governor Chet Culver came to Irving Elementary School in Sioux City to sign the bill creating the first statewide sales tax for schools.

Gausman says nearly 400 million dollars has been raised locally for new school projects since the tax was first implemented.

The Mills County Emergency Management Agency reports Hazardous Household Waste debris removal from residential properties within the flood affected areas of unincorporated Mills County and the City of Pacific Junction is scheduled for Wednesday, May 29, 2019 and will be conducted by Tradebe Environmental Services LLC.

Hazardous Household Waste should be in sealed containers and placed in the right of way, within 10 feet of the edge of the closest road. Hazardous household waste should not be placed in an area to block or disrupt water flow through the ditches. If a property owner cannot reasonably place it within the right-of-way, please contact the Mills County Engineer’s Office at (712) 527-4873 to make other arrangements.

IDOT has completed the debris pick-up for residents of this area. There will be an additional opportunity scheduled later to serve those who have not completed property clean-up. Residents are encouraged to report displaced (“orphaned”) tanks, drums or other containers found in flood debris using the online forms located on the Iowa DNR Disaster Assistance Website.

(Radio Iowa) — Authorities say two women were seriously injured in an attempted robbery at the Le Mars Hy-Vee gas station early Sunday morning and the male suspect shot himself to death in Nebraska. Le Mars Police Chief Kevin Vande Vegte  says at about 6 a.m. Sunday, a man with a gun demanded cash from the store clerks in Le Mars.

“In the process of the robbery, the suspect shot both victims in the stomach area and then fled driving a beige Buick four-door with an Iowa plate,” Vande Vegte says. The names and the ages of the two Hy-Vee clerks are not being released. Both were taken to a Sioux City hospital and the police chief says the women are in serious but stable condition.

Vande Vegte says the male suspect was located at around 8 a.m. Sunday by police in South Sioux City, Nebraska, which is about 35 miles away from Le Mars.  “They did locate the suspect with an apparent, lethal, self-inflicted gunshot wound,” Vande Vegte says.

The police chief says the suspect has ties with Le Mars and it does not appear the public is in any danger. “Le Mars Police Department continues to investigate this crime and will release details after the investigation is complete. We do ask for the public’s patience, the media’s patience. We have some families that are going through a traumatic event, emergency response individuals that went through a traumatic event and we’re not going to rush into anything,” He said. “We’ll release the information, but it may be a day or so.”

Counselors were sent to meet with Hy-Vee employees. The Hy-Vee convenience store remains closed. A Hy-Vee vice president said like the rest of the Le Mars community, company officials are “shocked and saddened” by the shooting and she said the two employees who were injured were in “our thoughts and prayers.”

Police in Red Oak, Sunday night, arrested a woman on a drug charge. 35-year old Nicole Leann Barker, of Red Oak, was taken into custody at around 9-p.m. in the 2400 block of N. 8th Street, for Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. Barker was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $300 bond.

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 3:40 a.m. CDT

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — In Iowa, one of the whitest states in the nation, black Democrats are more energized than they’ve been since Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign and poised to make a mark on 2020. Driven by dissatisfaction with President Donald Trump, they could make a difference in a state that chooses its primary candidate via a caucus, which, unlike an open primary, attracts only the most motivated voters.

GLENWOOD, Iowa (AP) — A former western Iowa art teacher and track coach accused of groping and having other sexual contact with a female student has been convicted of two counts. Prosecutors in Mills County say a jury convicted 40-year-old Christopher Lee Irvin, of Pacific Junction, on Friday of third-degree sexual abuse and sexual exploitation by a school employee. Irvin is being held without bond until his sentencing at a later date, when he faces up to 12 years in prison.

NEBRASKA CITY, Neb. (AP) — Only weeks after reopening in the wake of historic flooding along the Missouri River in March, Interstate 29 on and off ramps for Highway 2 in southwest Iowa have again closed due to flooding. Highway 2 connects southwest Iowa to Nebraska City, Nebraska, over the Missouri River. The Omaha World-Herald reports that as of Saturday morning, floodwater was covering the ramps to the highway from I-29.

SALIX, Iowa – DNR Conservation Officers responded to a boating incident that left two people with serious injuries on Saturday, May 25 at Brown’s Lake just before 4:00pm.

Two tubers, 17-year old Adreanna Hamman, of Sioux City, and 39-year old Bernard Jon Baker (B.J. Baker), of Lawton, were being pulled behind a boat driven by 29-year old Nicole Baker, when the tube struck a stationary boat causing serious injury to both tubers.

Both Hamman and Baker were taken to a Sioux City hospital. Hamman has since been transferred to an Omaha hospital and has undergone surgery and is in stable condition.  Baker is still at a Sioux City Hospital and is currently stabilized.

Alcohol and drugs were not a factor in the crash. All safety equipment was in place on the boat during the crash and the tubers were wearing personal flotation devices when the crash occurred. Charges are pending.

Woodbury County Conservation, Woodbury County Sheriff’s Department, and the Iowa State Patrol assisted the Iowa DNR with the investigation.

CORALVILLE, Iowa – Iowa DNR Conservation Officers responded to a diving rock on the Coralville Reservoir Saturday, around 4:30-p.m., where a group of approximately 15 teenagers were gathered and one had been rescued after jumping into the water and nearly drowning.

A passerby boat noticed a male that could not swim and was struggling to stay above the water and stopped to rescue the male. The male was transported to a local hospital once the DNR and Johnson County Sheriff’s Office arrived.

A DNR Conservation Officer charged a 14 year old female after the officer found drug paraphernalia. It is against Army Corps of Engineers rules to jump off the rock into the water.