(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa District office of the U-S Small Business Administration is wrapping up its busiest-ever fiscal year of providing traditional and emergency loans to thousands of Iowa businesses. The S-B-A’s state director Jayne Armstrong says in a typical year, they process around 400 loans. This past year, with the pandemic that caused widespread economic turmoil, the figure exceeded 79-thousand loans. The agency offers two “traditional” loan programs. “We increased over last year, not only the number of loans but also dramatically on the dollar volume,” Armstrong says, “to start-ups and to existing businesses.”

The value of those traditional loans jumped from around 168-million dollars last fiscal year to a total of 233-million this fiscal year. The district, with offices in Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, also approved more than 17,000 loans through the Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program and another 61,000 through the Paycheck Protection Program. “On the PPP side, of course, that helps to keep the employees employed and on the payroll during the closures,” Armstrong says. “A lot of small businesses aren’t out of the woods yet. It’s critical that we get this next round of the stimulus package, whenever that comes.”

Calling 2020 an “unprecedented” year for the agency, Armstrong says the loan volume demonstrates the S-B-A’s commitment to Iowa’s small business community. “The unsung hero of the CARES Act was the SBA Debt Relief Initiative which SBA was making six months of payments on existing SBA loans and for all new SBA loans,” Armstrong says. “That really made a difference for a lot of small businesses to keep them afloat with helping them with the cashflow.”

More than 95-percent of Iowa’s businesses are considered small businesses, so the shut-downs due to COVID-19 were especially hard on multiple industries. Armstrong says a few key federal programs helped to keep many thousands of Iowa merchants in business during the exceptionally challenging times.

The City Council in Atlantic will meet during a regular session 5:30-p.m. Wednesday, in their Chambers at City Hall. One of the top items on their agenda is cutting the sleeves off of Atlantic Police Chief Dave Erickson, as part of Breast Cancer Awareness.

IA Gov, Kim Reynolds cuts the sleeve of Atlantic Police Chief Dave Erickson to get his pink Breast Cancer Awareness Month patch to benefit the Cass County Relay for Life. (A-PD photo)

Last week, the Chief presented Governor Kim Reynolds and Senator Joni Ernst with the opportunity to cut off one of the department’s pink police patches from his uniform, while they were in town. Both took him up on the offer and made a donation to purchase a patch. Money raised from the sale of the patches will be donated to the Cass County Relay for Life.

The Council will then receive an Annual report from Atlantic Public Library Director Michelle Andersen before taking action on a Resolution “Obligating funds from the Hotel Whitney Urban Renewal Area Revenue Fund for appropriation to the payment of annual appropriation TIF (tax increment financed) obligations,” which will be due in the next fiscal year. This will be the third year the City has been eligible to capture the taxes paid by the Whitney Group for their renovation project, using TIF. The appropriation will be an annual feature on the Council’s agenda until the maximum payment of $750,000 is paid-off, or 20-years expires…whichever comes first. The City will pull tax dollars from both the Hotel Whitney Urban Renewal Area and North Urban Renewal Area.

In other business, the Atlantic City Council will hold the third and final reading of an Ordinance amending the City Code, and entitled “Stop Required,” with regard to the proposed 4-way stop at 22nd and Olive, and the conversion to a three way-stop at 32nd and Chestnut. Afterward, the Council will hold a Public Hearing on an Ordinance calling for the City of vacate the Right-Of-Way for partial, non-connecting stub of E. 9th Street, east of Plum Street, which would agreeably increase the size of two taxable properties to the north and south, and provide a minor benefit to the City in the form of additional taxes.

The Council will hold the first reading of an Ordinance vacating a certain City alley, as previously discussed. And, they’ll act on an Order to approve the Fiscal Year 2020 Urban Renewal Report, as required by the Code of Iowa, for those cities with an active Urban Renewal Area. The report details everything related to TIF districts and projects.

(Update 10-a.m.) The Iowa Department of Public Health’s Coronavirus dashboard today (Monday), indicated the number of Positive cases in the State continue to rise, along with the number of deaths. There were 1,469 new cases statewide, and 17 deaths reported for a total of 1,733. Pre-existing conditions account for 1,132 of the total deaths. Cass County has one more death (total of 4), 16 more Positive cases, for a total of 495. Pottawattamie County has 29 new Positive cases.

Long-Term Care Facility deaths are up seven, 847. The number of outbreaks at LTC’s are down one, to 80. In Cass County, two facilities: Atlantic Specialty Care and the Griswold Rehabilitation and Health Care Center, have a combined total of 116 positive cases, with 17 recovered. Harrison County has 251 cases among three facilities, and 125 recovered.  (For more data not seen here, go to https://coronavirus.iowa.gov/)

Hospitalizations total 718 today (compared to 676 Sunday). There are 156 COVID patients in an ICU (Down from 164 on Sunday), 108 have been admitted since Sunday (down from 128 previously), and 57 are on a ventilator (up from 53 yesterday). In western/southwestern Iowa: there are 46 people hospitalized with COVID (compared to 43 yesterday); 10 are in an ICU, four were admitted and three are on a ventilator.

The IDPH reports a total of 984,539 Iowans have been tested for the virus, with 131,713 testing positive, and 851,139 testing Negative. The Individual Positivity rate is 13.4%, and the 14-day rolling average is 14.4%. There are 11 counties with a Positivity rate of 20% or greater, including: Cass County, at 21.9%;  Harrison County at 21.5%, and Taylor County at 20.1%.  Officials say 93,813 Iowans have recovered from the virus.

In the KJAN listening area, here are the current number positive cases in each county (as of 6-a.m., 11/2), along with the 24-hour change in case numbers {+#}; the number of persons recovered, and the total number of [deaths] (if any), since the pandemic began,

• Cass, 495 cases {+16}; 308 recovered; 4 deaths
• Adair, 230 {+9}; 77; 1
• Adams, 88 {+1}; 51; 1
• Audubon, 193 {+2}; 105; 1
• Guthrie, 440 {+13); 284; 15
• Harrison County, 745 {+5}; 351; 17
• Madison County, 401 {+5}; 275; 3
• Mills County, 489 {+16}; 233; 3
• Montgomery, 214 {+3}; 162; 7
• Pottawattamie County, 3,585 {+29]; 2,552; 45
• Shelby County, 430 {+4}; 360; 2
• Union County,  291; 232; 5

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa has four congressional districts and, once the votes are counted in this election, at least two but perhaps three of the four districts will be represented by women. University of Northern Iowa political science professor Donna Hoffman says getting more female representation, at all levels, is a national trend — and national studies show women are better than men at constituent case work. “The more experience that voters have with diverse models of representation, quite frankly the better off representation in the United States will be,” Hoffman says.

Iowa currently has two congresswomen, both seeking reelection to a second term. Democrat Cindy Axne of West Des Moines is in a rematch in the third district with former Republican Congressman David Young, a Republican. In Iowa’s first district, incumbent Abby Finkenauer, a Democrat from Cedar Rapids, faces Republican Ashley Hinson of Marion. She’s a former T-V reporter in the Cedar Rapids market. Hoffman says both have emphasized how they have responded to derecho victims in the district. “This is one of the races that people across the country are watching,” Hoffman says, “the parties are sinking money into, lots of people are sinking money into.”

Hinson, who spoke with Radio Iowa this weekend, raised one-point-six million dollars for her campaign in the third quarter. “It shows the strength of our campaign and I think it shows that we are going to win this race on Tuesday,” Hinson said. Hinson has highlighted her votes as a member of the state legislature to reduce state taxes. During the president’s rally in Dubuque Sunday, she declared Iowa “Trump Country” and this was her message to a crowd in Maquoketa.”Abby Finkenauer is marching in lockstep with Pelosi and Biden as well,” Hinson said this weekend in Maquoketa. Finkenauer spoke Saturday at a rally with other Democrats in Marion.”We are going to keep this congressional district blue. We are going to send Joe Biden to that White House,” she said.

Finkenauer worked on Biden’s 2008 Iowa campaign and she endorsed him before this year’s Iowa Caucuses. In Iowa’s second congressional district, two women — Democrat Rita Hart of Wheatland and Mariannette Miller-Meeks of Ottuwma — are competing for that seat. Dave Loebsack, a Democrat from Iowa City, is not seeking reelection .

The countdown clock for the 2020 election has shifted from days to hours. President Trump spoke in Dubuque Sunday afternoon. “What a crowd,” Trump said, to cheers as he took the stage. “We had a great victory here four years ago.” Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar campaigned with Democrats in Marion on Saturday. “All eyes are on Iowa right now in the country. They are!” The outcome of Iowa’s U.S. Senate race may determine which party holds a majority in the Senate next year. Incumbent Republican Joni Ernst and her campaign bus rolled into Maquoketa early Saturday afternoon.

“We are seeing a level of enthusiasm and energy all across the state of Iowa. It’s not doom and gloom. It’s not the dark winter some might want you to believe…We know that there is a brighter future ahead,” Ernst said, to cheers. Democratic challenger Theresa Greenfield told the crowd in Marion it’s a “tough race…but I’ll tell you what — it’s a race we can win.” Greenfield’s closing pitch this weekend focused on issues like Social Security’s solvency and health care. “Another thing that people tell me about everywhere I go is they want the divisiveness to end. They want the bickering and the name-calling to end, yeah. I do, too. It’s part of why I’m in this race. I’ll work with anyone if they’ve got a good idea to help our country to move forward.”

Ernst spoke with Radio Iowa just before leaving Maquoketa, headed for Clinton. “This has been a long, long journey obviously,” Ernst said. “But no matter the outcome, I know this is in God’s hands and I’ve loved traveling the state of Iowa, so on to victory,” Ernst said.  Greenfield told Radio Iowa by the end of the weekend, her campaign will have made two million voter contacts by via text or direct phone conversations. “We are fired up, honestly. People are voting. They’re talking to their neighbors and friends, so I know it’s going to be a competitive race,” Greenfield said.

According to the Secretary of State’s website, nearly 925-thousand Iowans had already voted by Saturday.

Red Oak Police, Sunday night, arrested a man for Violation of a No Contact Order. 42-year-old Brian Keith Shaver, of Red Oak, was arrested at around 10:18-p.m. in the 400 block of E. Corning Street. He was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $300 bond.

Sheriff’s officials in Ringgold County report a man from Union County was arrested Friday night, following a complaint about a suspicious vehicle northeast of Diagonal. The vehicle was followed by a citizen who was able to give deputies the suspect vehicle’s location. The vehicle was stopped at around 7:30-p.m. and the driver, 33-year old Nicholas Bryan Crenshaw, of Afton, taken into custody on a Union County felony warrant for Amphetamine Possession.

Crenshaw was released to the Union County Sheriff’s Office.

A pursuit initiated by an Iowa State Patrol Trooper Sunday afternoon in Scott County, led to a fatal crash. The State Patrol reports a Trooper was attempting to make a traffic stop on a 2005 Buick passenger car on I-80 eastbound approaching I-280, when the driver of the Buick, 31-year old Kathryn Anne Burkhead, of Donahue, failed to yield.

The chase exited I-80 onto I280 and then onto Kimberly Road eastbound, where the Buick went out of control just west of the intersection with Wisconsin Avenue. The Buick went into the opposite lane, and was struck broadside by a 2013 Jeep, driven by 22-year old Emilie Anne Heggen, of Iowa City. The accident happened at around 4:35-p.m.

After the impact, the Buick rolled onto its roof, and the Jeep came to rest in the north ditch. Burkhead died at the scene. Heggen was transported to a local hospital by ambulance. Both women were wearing their seat belts. The Scott County Sheriff’s Office assisted at the scene.