(Red Oak, Iowa) – The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports two recent arrests: Early this (Tuesday) afternoon, 23-year-old Tyler James Addison, of Emerson, was arrested on a valid warrant for Harassment in the 1st Degree. His cash-only bond was set at $2,000.

And, early Monday afternoon, 31-year-old Amber Elaine Lievsay, of Ames, was arrested on a warrant charging her with four-counts of Child Endangerment. Lievsay was also being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a$2,000 cash-only bond.

(Radio Iowa) – Another Iowa school is canceling classes Wednesday due to a rising illness rate. St. Thomas Aquinas Elementary in Webster City announced that classes for tomorrow will be called off. The percentage of students out sick has climbed from 22 percent Monday to 24 percent affecting all grade levels including preschool. A thorough disinfection of the school building will be underway Wednesday to allow students to return to classes on Thursday.

This week a similar situation occurred in the Laurens Marathon Elementary School in Pocahontas County. Blessed Sacrament School in Sioux City is also to close Wednesday due to illness.

Last week, a Johnston elementary school closed for several days when 20% of its students were out with illnesses.

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa – A federal grand jury in Council Bluffs returned a two-count indictment on January 29, 2025 charging two individuals with offenses related to distribution and receipt of child pornography.

The following individuals are charged in the Indictment:

• Jason J. Traina, 52, Rockland County, New York is charged with distribution of child pornography. On January 31, 2025, Traina made his initial appearance in the Southern District of New York. The government argued Traina should remain detained pending trial. The United States Magistrate Judge released Traina on conditions of home detention and location monitoring.
• Carrie Marie Campbell, 40, of Council Bluffs, is charged with receipt of child pornography. On February 3, 2025, Campbell made her initial appearance in the Southern District of Iowa. Campbell was temporarily ordered detained until a detention hearing.

Traina and Campbell each face a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison and a maximum sentence of twenty years in prison.

United States Attorney Richard D. Westphal of the Southern District of Iowa made the announcement. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Council Bluffs Police Department are investigating this case, with assistance from the Rockland County District Attorney’s Office, FBI Safe Streets NY, and the Stony Point Police Department.

An indictment is merely an allegation, and all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Senate Education Committee has approved a bill that would change Iowa’s limitation on when public and private schools can start in the fall. Current law says August 23rd is the earliest schools may start. It was set a decade ago at the urging of then-Governor Terry Branstad. to ensure the Iowa State Fair was over before schools started up. The bill would let schools start no earlier than the second to last Monday in August. Senator Tom Shipley, a Republican from Nodaway, says that means schools could start as early as August 18th in some years.

“I get a lot of comments that having a set start date for everybody, ‘Why did you do that?’ Well, it sounded good idea at the time,” Shipley says, “but we wanted to avoid around the State Fair.” Shipley says the bill would give schools a little more flexibility. “As a former school board member, this is what I like: it’s our call when we’re going to start — within reason,” Shipley said. “I think we’ve accomplished that within this bill.” Under Iowa’s current school start limitation, nearly all Iowa schools started this past year on Friday, August 23rd.

Senator Tom Shipley

Senator Sarah Trone-Garriott, a Democrat, is from Waukee, where the first day of this school year was on that Friday. “Any time we can fix an issue that the legislature created by giving flexibility to these local decision makers to make their own decisions that suit their communities, I’m in favor,” she said. The bill to let schools start as early as August 18th in some years is opposed by the Adventureland Amusement Park and Iowa Travel Industry Partners, an organization that represents restaurants, hotels and tourism spots around the state.

The Iowa State Fair’s lobbyist is monitoring the bill’s progress, but hasn’t registered in opposition to moving up the school start date. Before the mandatory school start date was set in 2015, 96 percent of Iowa school districts started BEFORE August 23rd.

(Radio Iowa) – After a record 125 tornadoes touched down in Iowa last year, the National Weather Service is making an urgent pitch to recruit more of the state’s residents to become trained severe weather spotters. N-W-S meteorologist Brad Small says the first regional spotter training course of the year is being held tonight (Tuesday) and they’re planning 18 more around the state over the coming weeks.

“We’re not covering every county in the state, but we will discuss spotter training, including how to spot cloud features, how to report severe weather, wall clouds, shelf clouds, things of that nature,” Small says, “and also some look-alikes, things that look like tornadoes, but may not be tornadoes.” Small says the free training courses used to start in March but they’ve decided to move them forward several weeks.

“We started a little earlier this season to try to get it out of the actual severe weather season,” Small says. “We’ve run into talks being canceled due to actual severe weather days, so, we’re trying to get a little bit of a head start this year.” Tonight’s training session will be held at the Greene City Hall in Butler County.

Others are planned through early April in: Algona, Leon, Corydon, Garwin, Des Moines, Winterset, Newton, Mason City, Denison, Carroll, Ottumwa, Atlantic, Lenox, Marshalltown, Sac City, Bremer County, and Estherville.

See the full schedule at weather.gov/dmx

(Des Moines, Iowa) —A lawmaker from west-central Iowa has introduced a bill into the Iowa legislature that calls for a  permanent monument of Hawkeye legends Caitlin Clark and former coach Lisa Bluder. House File 203 was introduced Monday by State Rep. Carter Nordman of Panora. In a post on “X,” Rep. Nordman said “In honor of @CaitlinClark22’s jersey retirement and the historic success of @IowaWBB, I have filed a bill to commission a statue of Caitlin and @LisaBluder here on the Iowa Capitol complex.”

Nordman said also, “These two women have brought great pride and attention to our state and women’s sports. They deserve a place at their Capitol for Iowans to honor their incredible accomplishments!”

The monument would be located on the grounds of the Capitol, but a location would be determined later. It would be paid for by tax credits.

(Atlantic, Iowa) – The Cass and Audubon County Boards of Supervisors held a joint meeting this (Tuesday) morning in Atlantic, with regard to vacating a section of road that crosses the County line, and was established over 125-years ago. That portion of 350^th Street/Akron Road is about 40-feet wide and is just under 5,000-feet long. Cass County Board Chair Steve Baier read the legal description.

The Board held a Public Hearing on the matter, during which they heard from some affected, nearby property owners with regard to access to their properties, with regard to easement compensation and maintenance of the road bed, especially in the area of the popular “Tree in the Middle of the Road” tourist site. Cass County Engineer Trent Wolken said the reason for vacating the road is due to the condition of a bridge in the area over Troublesome Creek. The Audubon County Supervisors said they were ready to move forward with the process on their end.

Joint Cass-Audubon County Supervisors meeting, 2-4-25 via Zoom

After more than 65-minutesof discussion, the Public Hearing was closed. Another 30-minutes was spent discussing motions, and were modified before a resolution was proposed. Steve Baier on the proposed modifications…

A modified resolution (2025-10) to vacate the road will take place at the Board’s next meeting on Feb. 18th. In other business, the Cass County Supervisors passed a resolution authorizing Sheriff’s Office employees to conduct banking transactions, and approved hiring Mandy Parks as a Sheriff’s Office Assistant at $22/hour, effective Feb. 10^th, 2025.

The Board approved 28-E (cost sharing) Agreements between Cass County and the Cities of Anita and Griswold, with regard to law enforcement services for FY2025 which begins July 1st. The agreements have been in-place for several years, with the only changes being made to the pay rate.

The Supervisors passed resolutions for various Cass County bridge and farm-to-market road projects, and received a regular report from Cass County Engineer Trent Wolken. Other reports were received from County Veteran’s Affairs Executive Director Mitch Holmes, and County Community Services Director/Mental Health Advocate Debbie Schuler.

One of the final business items on their agenda, was discussion with regard to a petition for the County to gravel on a portion of 670^th Street north of Lansing Road and east of Atlantic, between Keystone and Lansing Roads. The property owner agrees to pay half of the cost associated with the road rock, which amounts to a little more than Seven-thousand dollars. The Board approved the request as proposed.

(Radio Iowa) – A motion is being filed in Cerro Gordo County District Court to open a sealed search warrant in the Jodi Huisentruit case dealing with cars owned by a potential suspect in her disappearance who recently died. According to the website Findjodi.com, Mason City attorneys Nellie O’Mara and Jesse Marzen filed a motion late last month arguing that the warrant regarding GPS data from two vehicles connected to John Vansice should be opened since Vansice died in December and any ongoing investigation into his involvement in the matter has now ceased.

Jodi Huisentruit (file photo)

County Attorney Carlyle Dalen told the website that he’s not seen a death certificate for Vansice, and whether or not Vansice has died, the investigation is ongoing and the motion to unseal the search warrant makes no sense and it could seriously hinder the investigation. The search warrant was originally filed in 2017 and has been re-sealed every year since that time. Mason City police chief Jeff Brinkley has previously said the search warrant did not result in any information that was useful.

Huisentruit, a former Mason City TV anchor, vanished in 1996.

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa Republican Congressman Zach Nunn says he’s supportive of President Donald Trump’s new tariffs on imports from Canada, Mexico and China. Nunn says he thinks the tariffs will help stop the flow of illegal fentanyl into the country.  “I think that tariffs are the best way to go after them, in a non-violent manner, but a very specific way to hold these bad actors accountable,” Nunn says. But Nunn says he agrees with Republican Senator Chuck Grassley’s concern that farmers should be exempt from some of the tariffs. Iowa farmers import much of their fertilizer from Canada.

“The U-S has done a phenomenal job of helping to both feed and fuel the world, and when it comes to countries tariffing food, that’s something that we should be looking at where America has been a source for good,” he says. Critics of Trump’s tariffs say they will hurt American jobs and the economy. The tariffs on Mexico have already been put on hold after the country agreed to send additional troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.

(Radio Iowa) – State education officials are proposing a new definition of grooming in the rules for the board that oversees teacher licensing, but the state senator in charge of the legislation says the definition needs work. Eric Sinclair of the Iowa Department of Education testified this (Tuesday) morning during a senate subcommittee hearing on the bill.  “We are looking to start addressing the gray area between inappropriate behavior and a sexual relationship,” he said. Nathaniel Arnold of the Professional Educators of Iowa says the agency agreed to a compromise definition last year and the new definition would define everyday actions as abuse. “I just want to read the definition that’s being proposed here and just want you to let it sink in: ‘The process of building trust and emotional connections with a student,” Arnold said. “Now perhaps naively I used to this think that was a good thing.”

Arnold, an attorney, says those who groom students for sex need to be expelled from the teaching ranks, but the bill goes too far. “I’m noticing a discouraging trend where the definition of abuse is getting broader and broader and broader to the point where, if you get accused of it, it’s pretty much impossible to defend yourself because everything meets that definition,” Arnold said. Dave Daughton is a lobbyist for Rural School Advocates of Iowa and the School Administrators of Iowa.  “Teachers and coaches always develop relationships with kids to help them learn. Any team that you’re ever on, you develop relationships with each other to help your team be more successful,” Dawson said, “so while we’re not opposed to the intent of it, we just have some questions and concerns about the language.”

Lisa Davis Cook is a lobbyist the Iowa Association for Justice, which represents lawyers. She says the proposed definition for the agency that oversees teacher licensing is very different from the criminal definition of grooming. “This definition is very broad, broad to the point where we’re worried about the vagueness and have concerns that if a teacher is tagged as violating this definition of grooming behavior, is it going to be referred to the criminal justice system,” Davis Cook said, “and, if so, with those definitions being so different, what happens?”

The bill cleared a subcommittee this (Tuesday) morning. However, the legislator guiding the bill through the senate said it won’t be considered in the Senate Education Committee until changes in the definition are developed.