(Corning, Iowa) – The Adams County Sheriff’s Office Thursday (today), reports a man was arrested on warrants Wednesday night, in Carbon. Authorities say 61-year old Ricardo Alphonso Avila was taken into custody in the 600 block of B Street in Carbon, on 10 Adams County warrants for Failure to Appear. Avila was additionally charged with possession of a controlled substance/Methamphetamine, and possession of a controlled substance/Marijuana. He was being held in the Adams County Jail on a $5,000 cash bond.

Ricardo Avila

And, Deputies in Adams County arrested a woman from Union County, Tuesday. Officials say 40-year old Heather Fay Scarberry, of Creston, was arrested following a traffic stop on Highway 34 at Poplar Avenue. Scarberry was charged with OWI/1^st offense. She was also cited for speeding and open container. Deputies transported Scarberry to the Adams County Jail where she was being held without bond.

(Radio Iowa) – The Ankeny-based Casey’s convenience store chain reported net income was up 66 percent in the third quarter compared to last year as gasoline and in-store sales were both up. Gas prices in Iowa have increased by 46 cents a gallon in the last week — but Casey’s C-E-O Darren Rebelez, says sales haven’t dropped off. “This will seem counterintuitive, but when you see prices rapidly increasing like we have over the last week — the consume behavior tends to be more of aggressive buying as opposed to not aggressive buying — because people are afraid it is going to be 20 cents more a gallon tomorrow as it was today,” Rebelez explains.

Rebelez spoke about the gas situation during a conference call for investors on the third-quarter results. “Our gallons have increased far beyond where our current trend line had been going prior to all this happening. Now, at some point when it hits a peak –people are going to have full gas tanks and we’ll see a week or so lag of full volume, and it will start to normalize again,” he says. Rebelez says you need to keep things in perspective as the gas price approaches four dollars a gallon. “The last time was in July of 2008. Certainly, that was during the financial crisis and it peaked out at four dollars and six cents a gallon. By today’s dollars — that would be five dollars and 30 cents a gallon,” Rebelez says.

Casey’s CEO Darren Rebelez

He says the economic situation is much different now than it was when gas hit the four-dollar mark. “All four dollars aren’t created equal,” Rebelez says, “we would need to get to well over five dollars a gallon before we start to see the same dynamic that we saw in 2008. In 2008, you did start to see some demand destruction — but there was also a pretty significant recession taking place at the time. Unemployment at that time was six percent and rising — ultimately getting to ten percent.” He says unemployment now is below four percent — and there is a labor shortage with employers trying to lure in workers. Rebelez doesn’t think we are at the point where people will cut back on buying gas. “There is a price at which people will start to change behavior — but we think that price is closer to five dollars a gallon than it is to four dollars a gallon right now,” he says.

Rebelez says the midwest market Casey’s serves is different from the national gas market. “The national numbers for retail prices of fuel are heavily influenced by the northeast and the west coast — which are well over four dollars a gallon,” Rebelez says. .”As we sit here today in our market, we are sitting just under four dollars a gallon across our 16-state geography. And the midwest tends to be pretty low relative to others. And part of that is because we blend a lot of ethanol, and ethanol is trading about 70 to 80 cents below gasoline.”

Casey’s saw its fuel gallons sold increase nearly six percent in the third quarter — with a margin of 38-point-three cents per gallon compared to nearly 33 cents a gallon one year ago. Total fuel gross profit increased nearly 40 percent to 237-point-nine million dollars compared to the prior year.

(Radio Iowa) – The Story County Sheriff’s Department has charged a 17-year-old with setting fires at the Casey’s in Maxwell and in a bus at Collins-Maxwell High School.

The Casey’s fires were set on February 3rd and 6th, and the bus fire on March 9th. The teen is charged with first-degree arson, two counts of second-degree arson, and two counts of first-degree criminal mischief.

The school bus was a total loss, as was the Casey’s building, and the company has said the convenience store won’t reopen.

(Radio Iowa) – After raising nearly four million dollars last year and delivering the G-O-P response to President Biden’s speech last week, Kim Reynolds has formally kicked off her bid for another term as Iowa’s governor. “I want to use the next four years to show how much further we can go when we trust Iowans,” Reynolds said. Reynolds addressed a crowd of supporters on the Iowa State Fairgrounds.

“I am so excited to finally announce tonight my candidacy for governor of the great state of Iowa,” Reynolds said near the end of her remarks. Rather than outline proposals for the future, Reynolds reviewed her recent record, including last week’s tax bill and last year’s ban on mask mandates in schools. “We got our kids back in the classroom and, again, we did it before anyone else. Unlike Democrats, we didn’t wait for bad poll numbers to finally discover science,” Reynolds said, to laughter and applause.

Gov. Reynolds and Lt. Governor Gregg

Her supporters cheered loudly for another action, the law Reynolds approved a week ago that bans trans athletes from participating in girls’ and women’s sports in Iowa’s schools, colleges and universities. “We’re preserving girls sports for girls,” Reynolds said, to a standing ovation. Reynolds criticized Democrats in general and President Biden in particular, and suggested Democrats were misjudging the problems Americans face.  “The threats facing this nation aren’t from Canadian truckers, Joe Rogan’s podcast or parents who care about their child’s education,” Reynolds said, to loud cheers.

Reynolds offered this assessment of the 2022 campaign: “It is not about liberal versus conservative. It is not about Republican versus Democrat. It is about who is going to fight to keep Iowa and America free.” Reynolds concluded the event by saying Republicans have a good chance to make this the best November ever for the G-O-P.

A Des Moines Register Iowa Poll released this weekend found Democratic gubernatorial candidate Deidre DeJear trailing Reynolds by eight points. DeJear, a Des Moines businesswoman who has never held public office, says the poll is confirmation Iowans are willing to give her a shot. “I knew that we were capable, but the question was whether or not we were willing and whether we could see deep down within if we had more gas in the tank,” DeJear says, “and I’m seeing in that poll that we’ve got it.”

DeJear reported having just 85-hundred dollars in her campaign account at the end of 2021. She told reporters her recent fundraising is on an upward trajectory.  “Fundraising bumps, I mean, we are seeing them and again it’s encouraging,” DeJear said. “We’re able to build this campaign in such a way that it’s being tooled for the General Election.” DeJear is the only Democrat actively campaigning for governor.

(Radio Iowa) – Criminal justice students at Iowa State University will soon have a chance to test their policing skills on a high-tech simulator that features an interactive ten-foot-wide screen. I-S-U Police Chief Michael Newton says his officers are also using the simulator to practice a variety of techniques used to diffuse volatile situations and to better respond to behavioral health issues.

“Training like this puts our officers in real-life-type situations without actually being in real life,” Chief Newton says. “They get a chance to practice. They get a chance to make mistakes in a teaching and learning environment.” I-S-U officers are put through roleplaying training sessions on the simulator which Newton says are designed to mimic different scenarios they could encounter on campus.

“Immediately, you feel like you’re in it. You feel like you’re really there in the situation and you immediately have the physiological response that we do sometimes on our cases,” Newton says. “Our heart rate goes up, what can happen to officers is tunnel vision can set in.” That sort of response can interfere with decision-making, so Newton says simulator training helps officers recognize how their bodies react and practice techniques that may prevent a stressful situation from worsening.

Police officers are often the first responders to a mental health crisis, especially in rural Iowa, but they typically don’t have the resources to get additional training to recognize different disorders or practice de-escalation techniques.  “With the video options, we can run through many more revolutions of training in a really fast time frame,” Newton says. “De-escalation is a huge concern for people in our community, and so the more training we can do on de-escalation, the better off we all are.” I-S-U researchers envision offering additional training with the simulator to rural police departments from across Iowa.

“I really see this as an opportunity for our entire state,” Newton says. “Iowa State University is an asset for everyone. I know some of the smaller departments have smaller, tighter training budgets. This is just another tool that we can use to put them through real-life situations and hopefully learn and develop a better police officer.”

Researchers plan to assemble a focus group with I-S-U students from Alpha Phi Sigma, the national criminal justice honors society, to create a curriculum with the simulator for upper-level classes.