Nearly a third of Iowans get some sort of benefit from the state’s welfare agency. Chuck Palmer is director of the Iowa Department of Human Services. “I think what is in some ways impressive and in other ways kind of overwhelming, on any given month we touch about 30 percent of the citizens of Iowa,” Palmer says. “Certainly child support becomes a big one, but we’re over 900,000 in any given month.” Parents who owe child support submit those payments to the agency, which in turn sends the money to the parent who has custody of the child.

The Department of Human Services also manages Medicaid, the government-paid health insurance for poor and disabled citizens. Palmer estimates the state will have to spend 11 percent more in the coming fiscal year to cover Medicaid costs. And that’s before the program takes on more adults who don’t have health care coverage. “We’ll pick up approximately 150,000 additional Iowans if health care goes through,” Palmer says. 

The state of Iowa has joined in the appeal of the national health care reform law President Obama signed in 2010. The director of Iowa’s Department of Management estimates the state would have to spend 315-million more dollars to cover those 150-thousand uninsured Iowans in the first year they’d be eligible for government coverage, in 2013.

(Radio Iowa)

Gas prices have dipped below three dollars ($3) a gallon in some parts of the state as many Iowans prepare to hit the road for the Christmas holiday weekend. Triple-A reports the average price in Iowa for regular unleaded fuel stands at $3.12 a gallon. Spokesperson Gail Weinholzer says the price has been dropping, for the most part, since hitting $3.92 a gallon early this summer. “We peaked out this year right around May first and we’ve been having a pretty steady decline since then,” Weinholzer said. “We are experiencing the lowest gas prices we’ve had in the last year. In fact, a year ago today the prices (averaged) $2.92.” 

Iowa’s current gas prices are roughly a dime a gallon cheaper than the national average. Motorists may want to consider fueling up now, rather than wait for the weekend, but Weinholzer said it probably won’t matter. “I don’t know that we’ll see a significant increase between now and the weekend. I think prices will hover where they are into the new year,” Weinholzer said. Many gas stations in the Des Moines area are currently pricing regular unleaded fuel at $2.95 a gallon. Triple-A estimates 100 million Americans will be traveling somewhere between December 23 and January 2, with most people doing so via highways and interstates. 

(Radio Iowa)

A study finds rural areas across the Midwest are losing residents, especially in vital age groups. Jon Bailey, research director at the Center for Rural Affairs, says the center’s latest report shows many areas of the region are being caught between “bookend generations” of the youngest and oldest segments of the population.  “A major implication is that both of those, the youngest and oldest generations, tend to need more services than the middle-age, working generation,” Bailey says. “You have needs for schools and health care and other social and human services that go for the youngest and oldest in our population.” 

Bailey says without the working generation, those between the ages of 25 and 55, it would be difficult to fund vital services in rural areas.”That’s a huge issue for rural communities,” he says. “How are they going to keep up the services that our youngest and our oldest need when the people who work and pay the taxes are increasingly going to larger communities and decreasing in numbers in rural places?”  Bailey says significant federal policy changes are needed to help rural areas bridge the growing gap. He says, “There’s policy investments we can take, both at the state, local and federal levels, on how to make more investments in rural places to create more businesses and create more jobs and a lot of it is to just take advantage of the advantages that rural communities have.” 

The report recommends a Rural Renewal Initiative be created in the next farm bill, and that Congress commit 500-million dollars over five years to a Community Prosperity Fund to help rural areas stabilize. The Center for Rural Affairs is based in Lyons, Nebraska. 

(Radio Iowa)

A woman from Redfield was injured during a rollover accident Monday morning, in Dallas County. According to the Iowa State Patrol, 46-year old Dawn Marie Merrell, of Redfield, who was wearing her seatbelt, was transported to Methodist Hospital in Des Moines, after the pickup she was driving went out of control on an icy eastbound Highway 6/I-80, at the intersection with Dallas County Road P-58, or about two-miles east of the Earlham exit. The accident happened at around 6:50-a.m.

The woman’s 2001 Chevy Silverado pickup entered the south ditch and rolled onto its side before coming to rest on its wheels. Damage to the vehicle was estimated at $1,500.