Waterloo is assembling a task force to create sustainable solutions for the Cedar Valley’s homeless population. The first step for the group is to identify and catalog Waterloo’s available homeless resources, which range from transportation to shelter and rehab services. Mayor Quentin Hart says the task force will look at solutions both inside and outside the city. The task force is made up of philanthropists, city officials and other community leaders, while Hart says voices from the homeless population itself will be key to the group’s success. The task force expects to start its work in May.

(Radio Iowa)

The Archbishop of the Dubuque Catholic Diocese says a priest has been charged with sexual abuse that allegedly occurred during his time in Iowa. A statement from Archbishop Thomas Zinkula says Father Leo Riley has been charged in Florida with five counts of second-degree sexual abuse from allegations of abuse committed in Dubuque from 1985 to 1986. An allegation was first made in May of 2023, and a second allegation was made after the Archdiocese asked anyone with information to come forward. The Archdiocese statement says an allegation of abuse had been made against Riley in December of 2014, but it is their understanding the Dubuque County Attorney’s Office chose not to investigate because the statute of limitations had expired. Riley had moved to Venice, Florida in 2002 and was most recently assigned to Port Charlotte, Florida.

(Radio Iowa)

(Radio Iowa) – The University of Iowa is moving forward with plans to construct a new hydraulic modeling facility for the College of Engineering. U-I Vice President Rod Lenhertz in a presentation to the Regents, says the facility will provide space for future growth. “To consolidate a lot of their work around the research related to as the as the docket item suggests and indicates canal, large rivers, dams, spillways and other projects they do,” he says. Lenhertz says the Hydroscience & Engineering program is a world-renowned center for education, research, and public service focusing on fluids. He says it requires a specific facility for the work.

“Generally large volumes of space with the equipment and water that are needed to model different bodies of water at the project sites that they’re working on. We would start the planning immediately and would come back to the Board of Regents with a with a budget and design,” he says. The budget right now is estimated at 32 to 40 million dollars. The Board of Regents also gave Iowa State University permission to expand the existing two wards at the Lloyd Veterinary Medical Center Large Animal Hospital. I-S-U vice president, Heather Paris says they would also add a new third ward.

“This project would expand the facility by over 17-thousand square feet to include expansion of current large animal reproductive services as well as enhancement of our professional student and resident training opportunities,” Paris says. She says they would expand in multiple phases. “With the first focused on the equine I-C-U stall, reproductive services, feed and bedding storage and shared storage space,” Paris says. “The total proposed budget of nine-point-two million would be funded by College of Veterinary Medicine funds, with construction scheduled to begin in spring of 2025.”

The Lloyd Veterinary Medical Center Large Animal Hospital was built in 1976. The Board of Regents approved the two projects at their meeting last week in Ames.

(Red Oak, Iowa) – Sheriff’s deputies in Montgomery County, Monday, arrested 28-year-old Rebecca Sue Warren, of Council Bluffs. Warren was taken into custody on Pottawattamie County warrants, Possession of Methamphetamine/4th Offense, and for being a person ineligible to carry weapons. She was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $2,000 bond.