(Radio Iowa) – The City of Grinnell issued a boil water order this (Tuesday) morning for all of the community’s nine-thousand-plus residents, according to Water Department director Jordan Altenhofen. “Last night, we had a catastrophic failure, a big main break on a 12-inch pipe,” Altenhofen says. “The water tower is offline for routine maintenance which is why this had a very large impact. In short, we are still working on the repair. We are not done.”

Altenhofen says a city crew is working feverishly to get the break fixed and complete repairs. “I’m hoping to have them wrapped up today but to get this done, there’s one key piece I’m trying to get my hands on,” he says. “Basically, we have one in stock that we use but it’s with a odd manufacturer, so it really didn’t work that well. I’m working on getting my hands on a better repair sleeve to go there.” Once those repairs are complete, Altenhofen says the boil order will still be in effect for a minimum of 48 hours. “Once we’re back up and running safely, I take one round of bacteria samples, I have to do six bacteria tests across our system. I have to send those to a state-certified lab,” he says. “They take 24 hours to essentially process and then, knock on wood, they all clear, I have to do a second round just to be safe, to prove it.”

Water for consumption needs to be boiled for at least one minute, or he suggests using an alternative like bottled water.

(Council Bluffs, Iowa) – The Pottawattamie Sheriff’s Office today (Tuesday) issued numerous reports on arrests and prisoner transfers-in to the Pott. County Jail on various warrants.

Yesterday (Monday), 31-year-old Terrance Nathaniel Allen, of Council Bluffs, was arrested in the Pott. County Jail lobby, after he was found smoking inside of a business and/or public building. Allen refused to leave and/or stop smoking. He was arrested for Interference with Official Acts. During an investigation at the time of his arrest, a counterfeit $100 bill was found on Allen. He was subsequently charged with Fraudulent practices in the 5th Degree. Bond was set at $600 altogether.

Authorities say 36-year-old Jayme Antoinette Lauridsen was arrested Sunday in Shelby, for Driving While Barred. She was later released from the jail. 42-year-old Ryan Franklin Holm was arrested Sunday evening in Avoca, on a warrant for extradition to another agency. At around 12:50-a.m., Sunday, Pott. County Deputies arrested 24-year-old Kasey Lee Danielsen, of Council Bluffs, for Driving While Barred/Habitual Offender, with a $2,000 bond. He remains in the Pott. County Jail on on a total of $7,000 bond, $5,000 of which is associated with an OWI/3rd offense charge.

Saturday evening, 27-year-old Dalton Luis-Marciano Rocha was arrested in Council Bluffs, for being a fugitive from justice. Friday afternoon, 36-year-old David Allen Coenen was arrested in Lewis, following a traffic stop. He was charged with Driving While Barred. Friday morning, 33-year-old Paul R. Shaffer was arrested at the Pottawattamie County Sheriff’s Office, on a warrant for Assault.

The following individuals were arrested at other, area jails in Iowa or Nebraska, and brought to the Pottawattamie County Jail based on their warrants:

• 44-year-old Christopher Lee Grinnell was wanted for Credit Card Fraud under $1,500.
• 35-year-old Jessie James Baker was wanted for (Felony) Escape from Custody, Interference with Corrections Officials, and on a “Hold” for another facility.
• 20-year-old Jacorey Nathaniel Battles was wanted for Robbery in the 1st/Armed w/a dangerous weapon, and on a hold for another facility. He was transported to the Pott. Council Jail from the Clarinda Correctional Facility.
• 64-year-old Ricky Ellis Lamb was also transported from Clarinda to Council Bluffs, where he was wanted for Forgery/altering of writing, and on a hold for another facility.

(Atlantic, Iowa) – The Cass County Board of Supervisors will hold their regular weekly meeting on Wednesday this week (June 8th), beginning at 9-a.m. in the Boardroom at the Cass County Courthouse. On their agenda are ARPA requests and possible action on funding for the Marne Fire & Rescue Association and Cumberland Fire Department. Other requests are expected for the Cass County EMA/911, Sheriff’s Office, Atlantic Police Dept., Fire Association and a separate request from Cass County EMA Coordinator Mike Kennon.

The Board is also expected to discuss, and possible take action on a new employee and/or employees for the Cass County Treasurer’s Office, as well as a Resolution on Courthouse Hours. Regular reports are expected from County Engineer Trent Wolken and GA/MH Coordinator Deb Schuler.

Additional action may be taken (if applicants are available), for the Massena and Washington Township Trustees, and Washington Township Clerk.

(View the meeting HERE beginning 9-a.m., Wednesday)

(Atlantic, Iowa) – Members of the Atlantic School Board will meet in a regular monthly session beginning at 5:30-p.m., Wednesday, in the Schuler Elementary School Media Center. Among the items on their agenda, is approval of a resignation from Taylor Williams, Middle School Cross County Coach. The Board will discuss Achievement Center roof improvements. On a related note, during their Action items part of the agenda, the Board will act on adopting/passing a Resolution Authorizing Bid Letting & Setting the date for a Public Hearing, on the roof improvements.

Other action items include:

• Approving a June 2023 out-of-state to Washington, D-C, trip for the Middle School students. They’ll see memorials (Lincoln, WWII, Vietnam Vets & more), museums and other historical attractions.
• The Board will act on 2022-23 School District organizational membership renewals (IA Assoc. of School Boards; IA School Finance Info. Svs., & Rural School Advocates of IA)
• A 2022-23 Memorandum of Understanding with regard to iJAG program fundraising. The agreement calls for funding from the District in the amount of $22,500.
• And, the Board will act on approving a 2022-23 contract with Superintendent Steve Barber.

**You can view the meeting here, beginning at 5:30-p.m., Wednesday: https://youtu.be/zPYOt761njw **

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa’s top election official says there’s a team of state and federal officials working to ensure the safety of Iowa voters, poll workers and ballots in today’s (Tuesday’s) Primary. “We are dedicated to protecting the integrity of our elections and the sanctity of your vote,” Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate said.

Secretary of State Paul Pate. (RI photo)

Pate held a news conference Monday evening at the Iowa National Guard headquarters to discuss election security, emphasizing that Iowans use paper ballots and tabulating machines are not connected to the Internet. But Pate said he often gets reports of misinformation — some of it malicious — about Iowa’s elections.

The elections security team. (RI photo)

“With social media the way it is, it’s very easy for people to put information out there that can be misleading or tampering in some ways with an election, so we have be cognizant of it,” Pate said. “We have to keep people informed of the facts and do our very best.” Kim Wyman of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency said misinformation online is often from some of the countries that are engaged in cyber attacks on U.S. targets. “Places like Russia and Iran and China is we’ve seen them use mis-, dis- and mal-information campaigns to spread information that is not true to undermine not only confidence in our election system,” she said, “but to sow discord between Americans and to pit Americans against each other.”

Kim Wyman. (RI photo)

Iowa Public Safety Commissioner Stephan Bayens said staff in his agency are operating an intelligence hub to monitor digital and physical threats from both foreign and domestic adversaries that are related to Iowa elections.

“Our duty and focus is to educate Iowans on efforts to spread disinformation through emails and social media as well as any physical threats to our polling places on election day,” Bayens said.

Iowa Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management director John Benson announced that his agency recently used federal Homeland Security funding to buy secure storage equipment for 21 county auditors. “This investment will enable county auditors to more securely store and use their election equipment,” Benson said.

This is the first election after redistricting of congressional and legislative districts. That means precinct voting sites will be different for many voters. Pate said voters may find that a person who has represented them before in the U.S. congress or the state legislature may no longer be on their ballot because of district boundary changes

(Radio Iowa) – Tens of thousands of Iowans have cast absentee ballots for today’s Primary Election. Secretary of State Paul Pate has the latest numbers. “We’re about 65,000 early voting. That is above 2018 numbers, so that, to me, is a good indicator that people are paying attention,” Pate told Radio Iowa. “I don’t know if it’ll be as high as the past presidential cycle, but for a non-presidential election year, I think it’s pretty good.”

Iowa set an all-time primary election participation record of nearly half a million voters in 2020 — during the pandemic when many voters opted to cast absentee ballots rather than vote in person. Pate isn’t making predictions about turnout for this year’s Democratic and Republican Primary Elections. “Democrats and Republicans both have primaries in the U.S. Senate race. We have quite a few legislative primaries here and there across the state, so I think there’d be motivation to see a higher turnout, but my crystal ball is not that clear enough
to give you a hard number,” Pate said.

Iowans voting in-person today should double-check their polling location, as some have changed. That’s because of the once-every-decade process that has redrawn the boundaries of legislative and congressional districts. “It’s why you hear us talking about having a voting plan, checking your voting site, checking the secretary of state’s website to know where you’re going or call your county auditor because we want to make sure you’re comfortable in knowing where you’re supposed to be doing that voting,” Pate said.

Republican lawmakers shortened the time period for requesting an absentee ballot and the Iowa Capital Dispatch is reporting 461 voters in four of Iowa’s largest counties missed the deadline. Pate said he doesn’t have any statewide data, but isn’t surprised by those numbers from Polk, Linn, Scott and Black Hawk Counties. “I did expect that we’d see some of that. It’s going to probably take another election cycle to get people used to this,” Pate said, adding that county auditors have systems in place to notify voters if they didn’t make the absentee ballot request deadline and those voters have been able to vote in person at the county auditor’s office — or they can vote in-person today at their local precinct, “so they won’t be shut out.”

Iowans who’ve filled out an absentee ballot, but didn’t get it delivered have two options today. They can surrender it at their local precinct and cast a new ballot at the polling place or they can take the absentee ballot to their local county auditor’s office. Absentee ballots must be delivered to the auditor’s office by 8 p.m. tonight, or the ballot will not be counted.

The Legislative Council voted last month to give Pate authority — in emergency situations like fires — to let county election officials move precinct locations. “It could be something as simple as a water pipe burst,” Pate says. “In another incident, they moved a site because there were some other activities going on that were putting a lot of traffic congestion at a polling site so that people couldn’t readily access it, so we just basically moved it to the other side of a building, but it’s a technical thing and we want to make sure we handle it properly because the last thing we want to do is confuse a voter about having them go to the wrong spot and then find we moved it, so we want to be very sensitive in how we handle that.”

The polls open at 7 a.m. and close at 8 p.m. A 2021 law change moved up poll closing time an hour.

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports 37-year-old Corey Smith,from Elliott,was arrested at around 5-p.m. Monday, in the 200 block of Cherry Street, in Elliott. Smith was transported to the Montgomery County Jail and charged with Failure to Appear, on an original Possession of a Controlled Substance/Methamphetamine – 3^rd offense, charge. His cash-only bond was set at $5,000.

(Radio Iowa) – There are two statewide races in Tuesday’s Primary Election for Iowa’s U-S Senate seat. Three candidates are competing in the Democratic Primary. In the Republican Primary, Jim Carlin is challenging incumbent Chuck Grassley. Grassley is seeking an eighth term. Carlin is an attorney and a state senator from Sioux City. “I feel that the base of people that are going to align themselves with us is very energized,” Carlin said.

According to the most recent campaign filing, Carlin raised over half a million dollars for his campaign and had about 56-hundred left in mid-May.  “I’m very fortunate to have some very good staff around the state and they’ve done a really good job getting us in front of a lot of people,” Carlin says. “….I think the message of the preservation of freedom has really resonated with a lot of people.”

Carlin says too many politicians care more about power than about representing their constituents.

The Friends of Lake Anita hosted their annual Kids Fishing Day program in conjunction with the Iowa free fishing weekend this past Saturday. The event drew a nice crowd of 75 kids registered on the day.

Kids in attendance heard a presentation on fish identification from Iowa DNR Fisheries Technician Mark Boucher. He used some posters to talk about the differences in fish species in Iowa and then brought out some live fish to have the kids put their identifying skills to the test.

Kids then had about an hour to fish and with some bait and tackle provided if needed. After fishing all kids received a prize package and everyone in attendance was treated to a free will hot dog meal from the Friends of Lake Anita.

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The City of Atlantic is informing residents that mosquito spraying will begin this week and will continue every week until further notice. Spraying will take place on Thursday and Friday mornings from 4:00 a.m. to 7:00 a.m.