(Radio Iowa) – A Teacher in Webster County has resigned after being accused of sexual misconduct. Brandon Louis has resigned from his post as music teacher at Southeast Valley High School in Gowrie after being accused of sexual misconduct. A former student spoke at the school board meeting Tuesday alleging that while she was a student there, Louis sent her text messages of a sexual nature. Reportedly over 20 current and former female students are claiming that Louis sent them similar messages.
The District said in a statement Tuesday Night they are cooperating with law enforcement as they investigate the allegations.
The Atlantic cross country teams will attempt to punch their ticket to State tonight in Winterset. The Trojans will be competing in one of five State Qualifying Meets in Class 3A with the Top 3 Teams and Top 15 Individuals qualifying for the State Meet on Friday, October 30th in Fort Dodge.
The teams included in the Winterset site are: ADM, Atlantic, Boone, Clarke, Creston, Dallas Center-Grimes, Gilbert, Glenwood, Greene County, Kuemper Catholic, Perry, Saydel, and Winterset.
Atlantic Head Coach Dan Vargason is proud of the way his teams have run so far this year and knows they have put themselves in position to try to earn team trips to State. He said they have emphasized the fact that it just takes one good night for everyone on the team to advance.
Both the boys and girls races will feature a number of tough ranked teams. Coach Vargason says they can’t think about numbers and need just go out and fight to reach their goals.
Action in Winterset gets underway at 4:00 p.m. tonight. Again the Top 3 Teams and Top 15 Individuals advance to State.
Denison-Schleswig and Harlan will be competing at the Spencer SQM tonight as well. In Class 4A CB Abraham Lincoln, CB Thomas Jefferson, and Lewis Central will all be at the Council Bluffs site.
Class 1A and 2A SQM’s will be contested on Thursday.
Anita Rescue and Wiota Fire were dispatched this morning to a two-vehicle collision with rollover accident west of Wiota, at 655th and Whitepole Road. The call went out at 7:48-a.m. According to the report, one vehicle was on the road while the other rolled into the ditch. Additional details are currently not available.
Another crash was reported in the Omaha area on eastbound I-80 near the I-480 split. That crash was reported around 7:30 a.m. The Nebraska Department of Transportation reports that the center two lanes are closed. Avoid the area and use an alternate route if possible.
Jim Field visits with Atlantic Area Chamber of Commerce Programs Director Kelsey Beschorner about a Pink Cruise event planned for Thursday to mark Breast Cancer Awareness Week and Benefit the Cass County Relay for Life.
The Creston Police Department reports the arrest at around 8:50-p.m., Tuesday, of 40-year-old Aaron Riepe. The Creston man was arrested at his residence on a Union County Warrant for the charge of Violation of Probation. Riepe was being held in the Union County Jail awaiting bond hearing.
(Radio Iowa) – An ethanol plant in northwest Iowa designed to make the fuel from corn cobs and stalks rather than kernels has closed. The Des Moines Register was first to report the “Project Liberty” plant in Emmetsburg had closed. Iowa State University agronomist Emily Heaton says corn stover can easily be converted into cellulosic ethanol, the hard part is competing with the price of petroleum. “It’s the same story of the plant in Nevada that DuPont closed and now unfortunately POET’s Project Liberty is closing and that is a real loss for Iowa,” she says. “Those were two, ground-breaking, first-in-the-nation cellulosic ethanol plants that simply couldn’t compete with the low price of oil that we’ve had for the last few years.”
DuPont closed its cellulosic ethanol plant in Nevada in 2017. POET shut down production at the Emmetsburg plant about a year ago and took steps to lay off its remaining employees this summer. The ethanol plants still operating in Iowa use corn kernels to make the fuel. Heaton’s research at Iowa State focuses on using perennial crops. “The idea was that we would get started to using corn stover to make cellulosic ethanol,” she says, “but then switch to using these high-yielding perennial crops, like switchgrass, to make ethanol.”
Heaton says switchgrass and other perennials that can used to produce ethanol have the side benefit of holding valuable Iowa soil in place and improving water quality. “Really the opportunities that cellulosic ethanol presents for Iowa are huge,” Heaton says, “which is why the loss of these first generation corn stover plants is so real for the state.”
More than two-thousand people — including the King of the Netherlands — attended the grand opening of the ethanol plant in Emmetsburg in 2014. The plant was a joint venture of a Dutch company and POET, an ethanol company based in South Dakota. The State of Iowa provided 20 million dollars for job training and construction costs. The U.S. Department of Energy provided 100 million dollars worth of grants to build the plant.
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