(Red Oak, Iowa) – Police in Red Oak, Monday evening, arrested 48-year-old Jason Neal Beacham, of Red Oak, on a Harassment charge. Authorities say Beacham was taken into custody in the 2400 block of N. 8th Street in Red Oak, at around 6:10-p.m.  He was charged with Harassment in the 1st Degree, an Aggravated Misdemeanor. Beacham was transported to the Montgomery County Jail and held on a $2,000 cash bond.

(Shenandoah, Iowa) – A Shenandoah Police Officer who responded to an accident over the weekend, was assaulted, and the suspect transported to a hospital, with charges against him pending completion of an investigation. According to the Shenandoah Police Department, at around 8:40-a.m., Saturday, an Officer with the Department was dispatched to the 1200 block of West Nishna Road, following a report of a two-vehicle accident.

Authorities says upon the Officer’s arrival, a 41-year-old male from one of the vehicles, without provocation, attacked and began assaulting the officer. Police say the unidentified man was able to remove the officer’s service pistol from its holster during the assault, before the officer regained control of the weapon. Additional officers were dispatched and arrived on scene to help detain the individual.

The suspect was transported to the Shenandoah Medical Center by police and later to a medical center in Council Bluffs for treatment of injuries suffered during the accident. The officer suffered minor injuries in the altercation.

An investigation into the incident remains ongoing. The Fremont County Sheriff’s Office along with several citizens assisted the police department at the scene.

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa – Seventeen-year-old Deshawna Green has been safely located. Law enforcement thanks the public for their assistance. (updated 1:19-p.m. 3/5/24)

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa – The Iowa Department of Public Safety has issued an Endangered Person Advisory on behalf of the Marshalltown Police Department, for 17-year-old Deshawna Green. She was last seen at a Marshalltown residence around 11:00 p.m. on March 3, 2024. Deshawna is a black female with brown eyes and long black hair. She is 5 feet 7 inches tall and 135 pounds.

She may be with 20-year-old Davontrez McCuddin. Davontrez is a black male, 5 feet 7 inches tall and 185 pounds.

Law enforcement is concerned for Deshawna’s wellbeing and is asking for the public’s assistance in locating her.

Deshawna Green

Anyone with information on the whereabouts of Deshawna Green or Devontrez McCuddin is asked to call their local law enforcement or the Marshall County Crime Stoppers at 641.753.1234. Tips may also be sent via text to 274637 and “Marshall” followed by tip message or submitted online at marshallcountycs.com.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Senate has voted to name the American Cream draft horse as the official horse of Iowa. It’s one of several breeds of work horses that pulled plows and harvesting equipment for Iowa farmers before horses were replaced by tractors. Senator Annette Sweeney of Iowa Falls says the American Cream draft horse originated in Iowa.

“The American Cream draft horse is the only breed of draft horse that can claim it is native to the United States,” Sweeney says. “In fact, it was foaled in my hometown of Radcliffe back in the early 1900s.”

The welcome sign to Radcliffe notes it is the “cradle” of the American Cream draft horse. Mature draft horses can be as tall as six feet and weigh well over a ton. American Cream draft horses have a cream colored coat, a white mane and, Sweeney says, they were not as tall or heavy as Clydesdales, Percherons or Belgians. “And they were more easily handled within our small farms that we had in the early 1900s,” Sweeney says.

American Cream Draft Horse (Photo from Horse Illustrated)

In the middle of the last century, the state of Iowa recognized the American Cream as a breed of draft horse. However, according to the American Cream Draft Horse Association, there are fewer than 400 American Cream horses alive today. Three senators voted “nay” on the idea of naming the American Cream as the state horse, but 43 senators voted yes. The proposal has to win the approval of the Iowa House, too, before this particular horse breed would official become the state horse. As you may have heard, the Iowa House voted earlier this year to name the Iowa Darter as the state fish.

The legislature has unanimously approved a a bill designed to set new guidelines for the “wholesaling” of single family homes or properties with up to four residential units. Senator Mike Bousselot, of Ankeny, says the bill requires that only licensed real estate brokers can act as a wholesaler — negotiating a contract with the property owner for an agreed upon price and then selling the home to someone else or an investor.

“Many of us have probably seen the signs around the state and in our communities where they say: ‘We will buy your property.’ Oftentimes, though, those folks aren’t actually taking title to that property, but may be in fact taking advantage of the folks trying to sell their house, in the need of that cash for their home,” Bousselot says. The bill requires more transparency in these kind of wholesale real estate transactions. Bousselot says research shows private equity firms engaged in wholesaling are driving up not only the sale price of homes, but also rental costs.

“By 2030, institutions may hold some 7.6 million homes, or more than 40% of all single family rentals on the market,” Bousselot says. “We need to make sure Iowans have the informtion they deserve when they are selling their home, whether that’s to a wholesaler or to an institutional investor who might be taking advantage of them.” Senators approved the bill Monday (today). It passed the House last month and now goes to the governor for her consideration.

MARION COUNTY, Iowa [KCCI] — Why did the turkey cross the road? Well, it didn’t. Instead, it crashed into a passing semi-truck on Highway 14 in Marion County on Friday morning.

The Marion County Sheriff’s Office posted on its Facebook page that a turkey smashed through the windshield of the semi-truck, causing significant damage. Thankfully, the driver sustained only minor cuts from the shattered glass.

The turkey did not survive. No word on what the truck driver had for dinner on Friday night.

(Radio Iowa) – Local officials in about a third of Iowa counties have issued outdoor burning bans. National Weather Service meteorologist Rod Donovan says over the past week and a half the satellite data for Iowa shown lots of hot spots and radar has picked up smoke plumes from a lot of field fires.

“We actually had a pretty big fire just west of Colfax going across some grassland yesterday,” Donovan says.

It doesn’t take much to spark a fire in current conditions according to Donovan. “Part of the issue we’ve had across Iowa is really our abnormally short winter, at least abnormally dry and warm across the area,” Donovan says, “…not having a prolonged period of snow cover, a lack of precipitation.”

These conditions have extended the drought. Donovan says pastures, cropland and grassy areas enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program are “extremely combustible” right now.

Counties in western/southwest Iowa with a Burn Place in effect (as of March 3, 2024)

“It doesn’t take much for an ignition source to create hazardous fire weather conditions,” Donovan says, “warm, very dry, low humidities in addition to these very strong springtime winds that we get across the state.”

The forecast for Iowa indicates March temperatures are likely to be above normal. Donovan says to expect more red flag warnings from the National Weather Service until plants spring to life and fields start turning green.

(Radio Iowa) – The updates to the Free Application for Federal Student Aid or FAFSA process delayed the normal opening of applications and is holding up the aid awards.

UNI financial aid director Tim Bakula says all three state schools had financial aid offers out to students last year by mid-February. This year some students weren’t even able to get their FAFSA completed right after the process opened. “I myself am a parent of a high school senior. I attempted to log in on January first and was met with outages that basically informed me that the FAFSA would only be open for several hours a day,” he says. “And that lasted for potentially up to the first week of January, with wider expanses of time being available as the month of January wore on.”

Bakula says the universities should be seeing the results in the next couple of weeks. “The massaging out of the Department of Education indicates that the first half of March is when all colleges nationwide would be receiving their first batch of institutional student information records or FAFSA results there,” Bakula says. He says they hope to begin awarding financial aid around the middle of April, which he says will impact students. “It presents from a family’s perspective, a much more condensed timeline to make decisions on which colleges to attend, especially for those students that were waiting on awards to ensure that the school they were selecting was accessible and affordable for them from a financial standpoint,” Bakula says.

University of Iowa financial aid director Brenda Buzynski says the colleges and universities have been the guinea pigs for the upgraded system. “They’ve had limited time for testing. And bottom line, what’s happening is that schools, we at the universities basically are ending up being their testers,” she says. Buzynski says they have learned to plan and program for the unknown. “We’ve had very little concise information, and there’s been changes to just about everything midstream,” Buzynski says. Undergraduates students receive 67 percent of the student financial aid at the UI, ISU and UNI. In 2223, 41% of the regent’s undergraduate financial aid came from the federal government, 41% from the regents institutions, 18 % from private organizations and 1% from the State of Iowa.

Buzynski and Bakula made their comments in a report during last week’s Board of Regents meeting.

(Atlantic, Iowa) – The first day of filing nomination papers in Cass County (IA) in advance of the June Primary, saw two candidates submit their papers with the required number of signatures. The candidates include Kathy Somers, Republican incumbent for Cass County Auditor, who was elected to the position 2022 to fill a vacancy , and Republican John Westering for Cass County Sheriff.

In January, current Cass County Sheriff Darby McLaren had announced he was not running for re-election. He stated he was throwing his support behind Westering in his bid for Sheriff. Westering has served the past 15-years as Deputy Sheriff in Cass County.

Candidates for County Office have until 5-p.m. March 22, 2024, to file their nomination papers.

(Atlantic, Iowa) – The Atlantic ® RAGBRAI Committee is ready to entertain cyclists, visitors and community members alike at “Atlantipalooza” on Monday, July 22, 2024.

Kelsey Beschorner, Publicity Committee member, says “The ride from Red Oak to Atlantic is 40 miles, and we anticipate the riders and supporters spending a good amount of time in Atlantic. With that in mind, the committee went with a music festival theme and plan to have live entertainment all afternoon and into the evening.”

The tag line “Technically, it’s all downhill from here” pays tribute to the RAGBRAI 2024 route being the “hilliest” route to date, and with Atlantic being at the highest elevation, it’s technically all downhill from here. T-shirts will be printed with the new logo for sale in the community and to RAGBRAI guests.

Atlantic last served as a host community in 2019, welcoming just under 20,000 people to town. The committee, made up of 25 committee chairs, and over 300 day-of volunteers, raised a record $50,000 that was divided between the Atlantic Police Department, Atlantic Volunteer Fire Department, Atlantic School Boosters Club and the Atlantic Area Chamber of Commerce. Chamber Executive Director Bailey Smith says she’s looking forward to having another record year.

The official Atlantic RAGBRAI website, www.atlanticragbrai.com, is live and will be full of information in the coming weeks. This will be the hub for local community members and for RAGBRAI riders to get information about housing, vendor opportunities, entertainment, maps, volunteering and more. If you are interested in lending a helping hand, fill out the volunteer form found on the website.

The Atlantic RAGBRAI Committee will continue to meet regularly to plan various activities for the July 22nd overnight celebration. As information is available, it will be shared with the community and on the website. In the mean-time, everyone is encouraged to follow Atlantic RAGBRAI on Facebook at www.facebook.com/AtlanticRAGBRAI for all things RAGBRAI Atlantic.