The Iowa Veterans Home in Marshalltown has come a long way from the first resident in 1887 to the campus of over 150 acres now. It is one of the largest veterans’ facilities in the nation. You can learn more about it today (Thursday, March 25) at 1 pm, via Zoom. Carolyn DeLay will present the history of the Iowa Veterans Home from its inception to the present day. Born and raised in Marshalltown, she has a special connection to the place. As a retired veteran’s former spouse and an RN who has worked at Veterans Hospitals, she is familiar with Veterans and. their needs.

Along with undergraduate and graduate degrees in Bible, Psychology, Nursing and music, Carolyn DeLay has long had a passion for history and genealogy. She has given many programs to various genealogy societies and chapters of Iowa Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. on genealogy research, women’s suffrage, American Revolution and Civil War.

Get the Zoom link on Atlantic Public Library web. Go to Calendar and click on March 25. Cass County Genealogical Society offers the program to all interested persons.

(Radio Iowa) – Low-income Iowans could qualify for federal assistance to cover back rent or overdue utility bills that have accumulated during the pandemic. Debi Durham is director of the Iowa Finance Authority, which has received 195 MILLION dollars in federal money from the pandemic relief package congress passed in December. The money can help low income Iowans who in the past year lost a job, saw their income cut or suffered some other financial calamity due to Covid.

“The household must also be able to demonstrate a risk of experiencing homelessness or housing instability which may include a past-due utility or rent notice or even, unfortunately, an eviction notice,” Durham says.

Federal officials estimate as many as 86-thousand Iowans are behind on their rent and assistance may be available for up to 12 months. A separate program is making up to 36-hundred dollars available to low income Iowans who are behind on their mortgages.

Applications for both programs will be available online, starting at 2 p.m. Monday, at IowaHousingRecovery.com.

(Radio Iowa) – Governor Kim Reynolds is reviewing legislation that would make state permits to buy handguns or carry a concealed weapon an option rather than a requirement.  “I’m waiting for that to come to my desk,” Reynolds says. “We’ll do a thorough evaluation as I always have.”

In 2010, Reynolds voted as a state senator to establish Iowa’s “shall issue” permit system and she’s called it good policy, but the governor is also expressing an openness to doing away with it. “I said I thought the policies were good that were in place, but I will continue to take a look at new legislation that is presented and I think that’s the appropriate approach and that’s what we’re doing right now,” Reynolds says. “and I’ve been very consistent on my messaging on that.”

Republicans in the Iowa House passed the bill to make gun permits voluntary last week. Senate Republicans gave it final approval Monday, before Colorado officials that evening confirmed a gunman had killed 10 at a Boulder grocery store. In 2018, a G-O-P lawmaker said Reynolds had asked senators to table a similar bill that had been scheduled for debate 24 hours after a mass shooting at a Florida high school.

“I’ve been pretty clear that when we are talking about gun violence, we need to take a holistic approach,” Reynolds says. “There’s not a single answer. We need to be following the laws that are on the books. We need to make sure that coordination is in place between the agencies. We need to do everything we can to address mental health and behavioral health issues.”

The bill does not do away with the permit process, as some gun owners will be able to show their Iowa permit and be able to carry a concealed weapon in some other states.

(Radio Iowa) – Republicans in the Iowa Senate are proposing a major change in property tax policy. County property taxes would no longer be used to finance Iowa’s mental health system by July 1st, 2022. Republican Senator Dan Dawson of Council Bluffs says the plan would shift to financing the system entirely with state revenue, like sales and income taxes.  “And make sure that all Iowans, wherever you’re at, you actually have the same per capita distribution for mental health funding,” Dawson says.

Shelly Chandler is C-E-O of the Iowa Association of Community Providers that represents organizations that provide mental health services throughout the state. She says the bill could help refocus the conversation about how to improve Iowa’s mental health system. “We all hate property taxes. I hate property taxes,” she said. “We don’t want having conversations about the mental health system to be about property taxes.”

Leslie Wood, a lobbyist for Iowa Mental Health Advocacy, says she’s prefer a combination of state taxes and local property taxes being used to finance mental health services. “When a state has a bad economic year, one of the first things that usually gets cut is mental health funding,” she says.

Matt Steinfeldt, a lobbyist for the Iowa Farm Bureau, says paying for mental health care with property taxes creates inequities. “Our members believe the state should make mental health a priority in their budget and assume the cost of the system,” Steinfeldt says, “removing this from the backs of property taxpayers.”

The bill addresses a wide variety of other tax issues. For instance, it would phase out 152 million in state payments to cities, counties and schools that were set up when state lawmakers reduced commercial property tax rates.