(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Supreme Court has released a statement on how it may handle redrawing Iowa legislative districts this year if — as expected — U.S. Census data arrives past a constitutional deadline.

(Photo from the Judicial System website)

The statement from the Iowa Supreme Court seems to suggest the court would try to use parts of the state redistricting law the legislature has used for five decades. However, the court did not say which parts of the law it would use, only that it would aim to have the process completed by December 31, 2021.

The maps for Iowa House and Senate districts, as well as congressional districts, are redrawn once a decade to reflect population changes identified by the latest Census. 2020 Census data is due to arrive months late. Under the Iowa Constitution, lawmakers have a September deadline to complete the reapportionment process or that duty falls to the Iowa Supreme Court.

The document released by the court concluded by saying its written statement is “not legally binding” and noted how unusual it is for a court to comment on a matter it later may be forced to rule upon.

(Radio Iowa) – Black Lives Matter activists protested at the Iowa Capitol Thursday, urging lawmakers to reject a bill that would give Iowa law enforcement “qualified immunity” from most lawsuits over their on-duty actions. Harold Walehwa  was one of the protest organizers. “We’re literally in the middle of the Derek Chauvin trial, but we’re trying to pass bills to increase qualified immunity? What kind of sense does that make?” he asked rhetorically. “Why would y’all be trying to increase the protection police officers have instead of trying to go for accountability?”

House Speaker Pat Grassley says the legislature is on a tight schedule and the Minnesota trial of the officer charged with killing George Floyd isn’t a factor in the timing of bills to be debated in the Iowa House. Angelina Ramirez, another protest organizer, spoke out against bills that boost penalties for rioters who cause property damage and forbid diversity training in schools and other government institutions from discussing gender or racial stereotypes.”They won’t care about their Black and brown constituents unless…they’re pressured to,” she said. “We must be that catalyst.”

An Iowa State Trooper arrested an 18-year-old at the protest inside the capitol. Witnesses say she asked asked for the names and badge numbers of two officers. The Des Moines Register reports the trooper who made the arrest wrote in the criminal complaint that the high school student pushed his arm to get his attention.

(Radio Iowa) Shelby County Sheriff Neil Gross, Carroll County Sheriff Ken Pingrey, and Cerro Gordo County Sheriff Kevin Pals, are three of ten sheriffs in Iowa to sign a letter sent to President Joe Biden this week urging him to secure the southern border and stop the mass influx of illegal immigration. Sheriffs in Clayton, Greene, Grundy, Iowa, Lucas, Scott, and Wayne Counties also signed on.

The letter said ““In the interests of ending the undermining of our laws and the increased risks to the safety and security of the people of the United States of America, we respectfully request that you immediately reverse course on your pro-illegal immigration policies, resume the border wall construction, and embrace the common-sense, public-safety-supporting border policies of the previous administration.”

Sheriff Kevin Pals there are enough illegals with bad intentions coming in that they are placing a strain on local law enforcement agencies. “The problem is identifying some of these people. They are hard to identify, and if they’ve never been arrested before even taking their fingerprints for identification purposes — sometimes we don’t know who they are,” Pals says. “The problem is there are some who have gotten deported and they are back in North Iowa within two week,” Pals says.

Pals says most of those causing problems are from one part of the world. He says the majority are from Mexico, Guatemala, and Brazil that are coming here. He says those from other countries have such small numbers that they are not detected. Pals says it is not just law enforcement that is trying to deal with the influx. “And the human services that are necessary to care for these people. We’ve got homeless people in North Iowa and then we are bringing in other people. How is our system going to continue to support these people,” Pals says.

Almost 275 sheriff’s from 39 states including Iowa signed the letter sent to the President.

(Radio Iowa) – A small tornado has been confirmed with the storm that hit Cedar Rapids Wednesday. According to the National Weather Service, one person suffered minor injuries when the tornado briefly hit Summit View Village, a mobile home park on the city’s southwest side around 9:15 p-m. Firefighters reported damage to at least two trailer homes, one of which had the roof torn off.

Officials from the National Weather Service determined that the E-F-zero tornado briefly touched down in Cedar Rapids. It was on the ground for about one-half mile before dissipating above a corn field. The survey team estimated maximum winds were around 85 miles-an-hour.

(Radio Iowa) – Democrats in the Iowa legislature say it’s not necessary to enact a state ban on so-called vaccine passports, as Republican Governor Kim Reynolds is proposing. House Democratic Leader Todd Prichard of Charles City says there are pandemic-related issues that need attention, but not vaccine passports. “Congressional leaders, the Biden Administration said they’re not doing it,” Prichard says, “so I think this is just kind of a red herring discussion to take attention away from some of the problems that she’s having in her response.”

The second-ranking Democrat in the Iowa House says the state would have been better off if Reynolds had put this kind of urgency behind the state’s Covid vaccine roll-out in December and January. On Wednesday, Reynolds said she would enact an executive order to ban vaccine passports if the Republican-led House and Senate don’t have time to pass a bill to do so before the 2021 legislative session ends.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa legislature has voted to set up a state funding source for an automated system that lets law enforcement AND victims track the evidence kits used to prosecute rapists. Senator Julian Garrett of Indianola says “These are horrendous crimes and we certainly do need to do what we can to address them.”  The Iowa Attorney General’s office is currently using a nearly 800-thousand dollar FEDERAL grant for the system that records information about rape kits when evidence is collected at a hospital to when the evidence is processed at the state crime lab and, finally, when the evidence is turned over to a police or sheriff’s department. The federal money for the system runs out in 2023.

Garrett says the bill would keep the system operating by using a combination of criminal fines paid in Iowa courts and a percentage of what Iowa prison inmates earn by working at private sector jobs.  “This will allow victims, county attorneys and any entity with custody of a test kit to track it,” Garrett says. “Victims must be notified before a kit is disposed of.” Senator Janet Petersen of Des Moines cites the recent processing of more than 11-thousand untested rape kits in the Detroit area that identified more than 800 potential serial rapists.  “I do think we need to do a better job of tracking our rape kits,” Petersen says.

A state audit in 2017 revealed Iowa law enforcement agencies had 42-hundred untested evidence kits for alleged sexual assaults. By 2020, about 62 percent of those kits had been processed and the state crime lab’s average testing period for a rape kit had been reduced to 46 days.

(Radio Iowa) A woman was rescued from a railroad bridge early this (Thursday) morning in Ames. The Union Pacific Railroad reported a distraught woman hanging off the bridge at Dayton Avenue just before 1:30 this morning. Ames Police Sergeant Joel Congdon says officers held the woman to keep her from falling. “The first thing was they wanted to kind of contain it to be able to make sure they could hang on to the woman that was in distress. Once they had that secured, they quickly formulated plans and figured out what they needed,” Congdon says.

He says a fire department ladder truck was used to reach the woman and put her in a harness, and then she was lowered down. Congdon noted the officers didn’t have a lot of room to work with at the scene. “The area that the officers had to work with, they basically had to stick their arms underneath the railing to grab onto her, so they were dealing with a couple of different variables,” Congdon says. “You had to have your arm be able to fit through a tight spot and I’m sure it was quite the exciting ordeal.”

The woman was taken to Mary Greeley Medical Center for evaluation. Her name was not released.

An investigation into what caused damage to homes in Cedar Rapids Wednesday night is underway, and officials think it may have been a tornado. KCRG TV reports the damage occurred at around 8:30-p.m., and resulted in injuries to a child. The weather phenomenon affected the Summit View Mobile Home Park. Residents say the roof of one mobile home was partially torn off, and windows in another home were blown out.

According to KGAN TV, one resident called 911 to report that their daughter had been cut by flying glass.

(Radio Iowa) – Drivers education courses are required by state law to include topics like railroad crossing safety as well as four hours of instruction about the dangers of driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol. The Iowa Legislature has sent the governor a bill that would divide that four hour period between the topics of substance abuse and distracted driving.

“I think it’s a good bill that could very well prevent accidental deaths from auto accidents,” Representative Thomas Gerhold of Atkins said when the bill unanimously passed the House in February. The Senate approved the bill yesterday without debate. An Iowa DOT report shows that in 2019, nearly 1,100 traffic accidents were caused by a driver who was distracted by a cell phone or other electronic device.

Three people were killed and 538 people were injured in those wrecks linked to distracted drivers.

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa State University Extension is beginning a three-year project to study the challenges and opportunities for women landowners. Madeline Schultz is leading the study she says will look at several things facing women. “What some of the barriers are to making good decisions for greater economic profitability as well as conservation decisions, as well as land succession or generational transition decisions,” Schultz says.

Schultz is the program manager for the farm management team’s women in ag program. An I-S-U survey found 47 percent of all acres and 55 percent of all leased acres in Iowa were owned by women. She says there has already been some good research on the issues — including a 2014 U-S-D-A study. “And in that particular study, it revealed that decisions on land owned by women landowners are more likely to be made by the tenants,” she says. Schultz says they want to dig deeper into some of the previous findings. “We’re hoping to build on that and find out how we can support women in making decisions for their land,” Schultz says.

She says another I-S-U survey found that 76 percent of the women landowners are 65 or older. “So what this means for us is that women’s succession decisions are of considerable importance really to the whole farming community — and to the future of our agricultural system,” according to Schultz. She says the survey is the start of their work. Schultz says the next step is to engage women in focus groups and advisory committees to talk with them in small groups — and then they can do some pilot programming to provide them some education.

A survey will be sent to known women landowners in June, and those interested in participating can contact Madeline Schultz at 515-294-0588 or schultz@iastate.edu. The U-S-D-A has provided 300-thousand dollars for the study.