The Red Oak Police Department reports three arrests overnight Friday into early Saturday.

On Friday at approximately 9:51 p.m. Officers arrested two men in the 300 block of East Valley Street in Red Oak. 40-year-old Sean Alan Kinsley and 29-year-old Joshua Michael Lowe, both of Red Oak were arrested on a charge each of Simple Assault. Both men were taken to the Montgomery County Jail and held on $300 bond each.

Early Saturday at 2:23 a.m. Red Oak Police arrested 54-year-old Richard James Linfor of Red Oak in the 500 block of East Market Street on a charge of Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. Linfor was taken to the Montgomery County Jail and held on $300 bond.

The Red Oak Police Department reports an arrest on Friday evening at 6:35 p.m. Officers arrested 32-year-old Chloe Margeurite Coburn of Red Oak on a charge of Domestic Abuse Assault. Coburn was booked into the Montgomery County Jail and held on no bond.

(Radio Iowa) – The hospital in Keokuk closed permanently at 7 a.m. today (Friday). Blessing Health System bought the hospital in Keokuk last year from UnityPoint. The facility needs millions of dollars in repairs and patient traffic has dwindled, so Blessing Health executives announced earlier this month that it would close. The hospital’s 147 employees will stay on the payroll through November 4th. Some are going to work in other Blessing Health facilities and others are on paid leave.

Keokuk has had a hospital for well over a century. The city’s first hospital opened in 1892. During the Civil War, a military hospital in Keokuk treated soldiers from both sides of the conflict. 

The original announcement from Blessing Health indicated the current hospital in Keokuk would close at 12:01 a.m. Saturday, but the hospital’s website says it already has been closed and anyone with a medical emergency should call 911.

(Radio Iowa) – Books about Vietnam were the focus of an event Thursday at the Siouxland Freedom Park Interpretive Center.

A long-time Sioux City college professor turned over his extensive collection of books on Vietnam during the event. Ralph Swain’s collection includes more than 100 books. “I actually started accumulating the books just before I went to Vietnam because I wanted to learn about the place I was going to, especially since I’m half Asian, and I’m going to an Asian country on the pretext of engaging violently against other Asians that I encounter that are trying to get me,” he says. 

Swain served in the Army in Vietnam and later taught at Briar Cliff and Western Iowa Tech In Sioux City. University of South Dakota professor emeritus Steve Feimer was also on hand. He wrote a book, profiling the stories of 31 Vietnam veterans.
“One story led to the other and I thought well I’m gonna do six guys and have it take me six months — but as you can see it took me nine years and we ended up with 31,” he says. “I just couldn’t say no, and every time I’d interview one vet they’d say you got to talk to this guy get this guy’s stories.”

You can find the book online at TheVietnamVets.com.

(Radio Iowa) – A new group is proposing that businesses that use the most energy in Iowa be able to buy electricity from other sources. Under current rules, customers must use the utility assigned to both maintain the power grid in their area AND provide the electricity for it. R.G. Schwarm is executive director of the new Iowa Economic Alliance.

The concept called electric choice is up and running in some other states, like Illinois and Ohio, and customers can compare electricity prices from different providers — but still are required to pay fees to the company that maintains the electric lines in their area. Schwarm says electric rates are a factor businesses evaluate when deciding where to locate or expand.

Schwarm is not revealing the names of the businesses that are part of the Iowa Economic Alliance, but he says the coalition’s members have seen electric rates sharply increase over the past couple of years.

The group recently commissioned a statewide survey to gauge public sentiment about the concept of electric choice. The poll found about 70 percent of Iowans prefer the idea of choosing from among electric providers rather than being restricted to the one company state regulators have designated to serve their area.