(Radio Iowa) – A majority of the Republicans on the Iowa House Education Committee have voted to get rid of the tenure system at Iowa’s three public universities. Representative Skyler Wheeler, a Republican from Orange City, says tenure protects bad professors.

“Tenure was originally designed to protect diversity of thought on college campuses, however as we have seen clearly in our Regents universities, there is no longer diversity of thought,” Wheeler says. “According to a study of the top 40 colleges, this is about four years ago, on average for every one Republican college professor, there are 12 Democrats.”

Representative Mary Mascher, a Democrat from Iowa City, says Iowa would become the only state in the country to ban tenure if the bill becomes law. “I’ve always believed Iowa is a quality place and we stand alone, but I don’t believe this would create a good impression of our state and our educational system because it would suffer greatly if we were to abandon or eliminate tenure.”

The move to ban tenure is now eligible for debate in the full House.

(Radio Iowa) – A bill that has cleared an Iowa Senate subcommittee would require transgender students in Iowa schools to use bathrooms that match the sex listed on their birth certificate. Republican Senator Jim Carlin of Sioux City is the bill’s sponsor. “The concern is not so much with transgender individuals,” Carlin said, “…but that sexual predators would exploit such laws for posing as transgender in order to gain access to women and girls.”

A lobbyist representing Iowa school boards says the policy would put schools in the impossible position of violating Iowa’s Civil Rights Act and federal guidelines — and set the state up for lengthy litigation. Keenan Crow is a lobbyist for One Iowa, which represents L-G-B-T-Q Iowans.  “Transgender students in Iowa have been abel to use restrooms that match their gender identity since 2017 and over that 14 year period we haven’t seen any uptick in school restroom safety incidents,” Crow says.

North Carolina lawmakers passed what is often referred to as a “bathroom bill” in 2016, but repealed it a year later after some corporations cancelled business deals in North Carolina and the N-C-A-A and N-B-A moved games to other states.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa House has approved a series of bills that provide state grants and tax grants in hopes of boosting access to child care. One bill would set up a tax credit for businesses that provide child care benefits for employees. Representative Jane Bloomingdale of Northwood says it address two of the state’s major problems — a shortage of workers and a lack of child care options for parents who want to work.

“By providing child care, it helps the employer retain and recruit workers,” she says, “and it helps the employees go back to work when they know they have affordable and reliable child care.”

Officials say 81 Iowa child care centers have closed during the pandemic and another bill would let in-home child care providers that are registered with the state care for one more school-aged child. Another bill that passed the House would significantly raise the income threshold for the state’s child care assistance program. About 25-thousand Iowa children who live in low-income households with parents who work or go to school are covered by the program. Representative Lindsay James of Dubuque says some working parents turn down extra hours or raises because they’ll no longer quality and cannot afford to pay for child care on their own.

“I heard especially from single moms that they were falling off the cliff when it came to their child care benefits that our state offers because they’re getting a higher income in their jobs,” James says.

Each of the child care related bills passed the House with bipartisan support.

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 3:35 a.m. CST

JOHNSTON, Iowa (AP) — Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds is defending her relaxation of mask wearing and other coronavirus reduction measures, even as public health officials warn against ending the measures when a new more contagious variant of the virus is spreading in the U.S. Reynolds says lower hospitalizations and other measures prompted her to lift the partial mask mandate and limits on crowd sizes. She says she trusts Iowans to do the right thing. Iowa reported 1,035 new confirmed cases on Wednesday and 29 additional deaths, increasing the state’s death toll to 5,174. Michael Osterholm, a University of Minnesota epidemiologist, says opening up now gives the U.K. variant a chance to spread quickly in the U.S.

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa (AP) — A 37-year-old man has been charged in a shooting in Marshalltown that left a man dead and another injured. Robert Thomas was charged Wednesday with first-degree murder in the March 2020 death of 22-year-old Johnqwez Deanthony Lewis. Another man, 27-year-old Devonte Allen Brooks, was injured. Thomas was charged with attempted murder in Brooks’ shooting. Police said Thomas was already being held in the Marshall County Jail on unrelated charges. He remains in custody pending an initial court appearance. Police said the investigation into the shooting is continuing.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Authorities say three people – including a woman from Iowa – died in a vehicle crash northwest of Portland, Oregon. Oregon State Police say authorities responded to a crash involving two vehicles just after 10 a.m. Wednesday on U.S. Highway 26. Police say 21-year-old Walter Smith of Pendleton, Oregon was driving a Mercedes station wagon west when he lost control, slid sideways into the eastbound lanes and collided with a Toyota Tacoma. Police say Smith and his passengers, 20-year-old Erick Fadness of Decorah, Iowa and a 16-year-old Portland girl, died. Toyota driver, Natalie Swauger of Seaside, Oregon, was flown to a Portland hospital. Police say speed is believed to have been a contributing factor.

RYAN, Iowa (AP) — Prosecutors in eastern Iowa have charged a woman with first-degree murder in the shooting death earlier this week of her boyfriend. Television station KWWL reports that 33-year-old Danielle Weiner, of Ryan, is accused in the fatal shooting of 27-year-old Devon Hierrezuelo, of Oak Law, Illinois. Delaware County Sheriff’s officials say the shooting happened around 1 a.m. Monday at the Shady Acres Apartments in Ryan, where arriving deputies found Hierrezuelo dead inside an apartment. Investigators say Weiner told them a man entered the apartment and argued with Hierrezuelo before shooting him in the living room. But investigators say evidence shows Hierrezuelo was shot in the bedroom, then moved to the living area.

The Atlantic School Board, Wednesday night, approved during an electronic session, Snyder and Associates Engineers advertising for bids for the west high school parking lot project. They also approved setting their meeting March 10th as the date for a public hearing on the project, which the engineer’s estimate says will run $840,000, including contingencies.

Snyder’s Dave Sturm told the Board the parking lot will be replaced with 7-inch concrete, and will include an additional 17- 20-additional parking stalls without adding extra concrete. They plan to recycle the existing concrete and add more draining tile, according to Sturm.

The project also includes the widening of the entryway into the high school parking lot, along with the replacement of the front entryway sidewalk. Bids requests along with the plans and specifications are set to be posted on Thursday, Feb. 11th. Sturm said bids are due back prior to the March 10 School Board meeting. He expects they will find four or five interested contractors for the project. The School Board also awarded the Middle School roofing project to McDermott & Son Roofing for $122,529.87. The engineer’s cost estimate was $135,000, but McDermott & Son’s bid  came in nearly 10-percent below that.

In other business, the Board held a public hearing on the 2021-22 School Calendar, during which there were no comments received. Later on in the meeting, the Board voted to approve the Calendar as presented. They also approved 2020-21 academy programs through Iowa Western Community College, an overnight Music Department trip to Florida during the 2021 Spring Break, and the resignation of 4th Grade Teacher Janet Hascall, who Superintendent Steve Barber said has been in education for more than 38 years, with at least 25 years in Atlantic. Hascall, he said, has decided it’s time to retire. He wished her the best for putting in all the time and energy to makes a difference for the kids. Board Vice President Nick Hunt said “Janet has been loyal, and her husband (Phil Hascall) has served on the School Board. She’s been a faithful teacher, and we’ll miss her.”

The Board approved Contract Recommendations for: Steve Anderson, Route Bus Driver; Mark Vavricek, Special Ed car driver; Shannon Hayden, MS/HS Schuler Food Service, and Kassidy Edwards, MS Special Ed. Paraeducator.

A new agreement has been reached by the City of Hamburg and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to raise the Hamburg Ditch 6 levee system by eight feet. According to the Army Corps of Engineers, the agreement reached Tuesday marks the first project in the U.S. to utilize the Section 1176 authority to raise the height of a federal levee system.

Aerial photo of Hamburg – Ditch 6 shows scope of damage from the flooding. Photo taken Mar. 17, 2019. – US Army Corps of Engineers photo

Corps officials say the achievement comes after the Omaha district, the city and other shareholders worked to implement a section from the 2020 Water Resources Development Act, or WRDA. Representative Cindy Axne said Wednesday, the agreement is a critical step to protecting the flood-damaged city from future risk.

When devastating floods hit Hamburg in 2019, Ditch 6 was overrun by water and sustained severe damage that resulted in the City of Hamburg being inundated with flood waters. The result was bipartisan legislation being introduced to provide the Army Corps with new authority to cut through red tape and provide federal funds for levees in repeated flooding communities.