(Radio Iowa) – New data shows 19-and-a-half percent of the applications for new, state-funded accounts to cover private school expenses are for students who live in the two largest counties in the Des Moines metro. By last Friday, 18-thousand-627 Education Savings Account applications had been approved. About a thousand applications are pending, waiting on a parent or guardian to confirm their annual income is at or below 300 percent of the federal poverty line.

Data released by the Iowa Department of Education shows how many approved applications came from each county. Over 31-hundred are for residents in Iowa’s largest county, Polk County, and about 500 more were for private school students who live in neighboring Dallas County. Just over six percent of approved applications came from northwest Iowa’s Sioux County, which is Iowa’s 19th largest county. Linn County — the Cedar Rapids-Marion metro — accounted for about seven percent of the approved E-S-A applications.

While applications have been approved, parents have to secure enrollment in a private school for their child and the state will announce this fall how many of the state-funded accounts have been activated. A previous state report indicated about 60 percent of the applications for the 76-hundred dollars in state funding were for students already enrolled in private school.

There are only three counties where no state-funded Education Savings Accounts applications have been approved. They are Decatur and Ringgold Counties along the Missouri border in southern Iowa, and Louisa County along the Mississippi River in southeast Iowa. As of August 4, students have been approved for ESAs in 96 of Iowa’s 99 counties.

Here is the full list of applications from each county:

Polk County 3,144
Linn County 1,318
Scott County 1,306
Sioux County 1,183
Black Hawk County 942
Woodbury County 916
Dubuque County 882
Johnson County 572
Dallas County 505
Carroll County 427
Plymouth County 411
Pottawattamie County 383
Webster County 369
Cerro Gordo County 338
Marion County 297
Delaware County 282
O’Brien County 250
Marshall County 231
Clinton County 217
Lee County 212
Warren County 197
Lyon County 196
Mahaska County 188
Kossuth County 183
Boone County 170
Winneshiek County 168
Muscatine County 159
Des Moines County 157
Buena Vista County 152
Crawford County 152
Jackson County 145
Jasper County 144
Clay County 142
Washington County 140
Bremer County 118
Floyd County 113
Alamakee County 113
Story County 112
Jefferson County 112
Wapello County 111
Jones County 111
Buchanan County 93
Howard County 87
Humboldt County 83
Palo Alto County 75
Benton County 71
Iowa County 64
Poweshiek County 55
Union County 52
Shelby County 49
Hamilton County 49
Chickasaw County 46
Page County 46
Pocahontas County 43
Fayette County 37
Madison County 35
Calhoun County 30
Sac County 29
Winnebago County 27
Franklin County 26
Butler County 26
Clayton County 25
Cedar County 23
Grundy County 21
Mills County 21
Henry County 20
Osceola County 18
Hancock County 17
Hardin County 17
Cherokee County 17
Adair County 15
Ida County 14
Monona County 13
Dickinson County 12
Harrison County 10
Green County 9
Worth County 8
Lucas County 7
Audubon County 7
Davis County 7
Wright County 7
Tama County 7
Keokuk County 6
Adams County 5
Van Buren County 4
Taylor County 4
Appanoose County 3
Guthrie County 3
Mitchell County 3
Fremont County 2
Wayne County 2
Monroe County 2
Montgomery County 2
Cass County 2
Clarke County 2
Emmet County 1

(Creston, Iowa) – In an update to our earlier report, the Iowa State Patrol, Monday, released the names of two people involved in a single-vehicle crash Saturday night, in Creston. The Patrol says a male passenger in the car, 27-year-old Young Seok Moon, of Creston, died at the hospital, from injuries suffered in the crash. The driver, 26-year-old Myung Jo Kang, of Creston, was injured and flown to Mercy Hospital in Des Moines.

As previously mentioned, that crash happened at around 9:45-p.m. Saturday, in Creston. The Iowa State Patrol reports a 2001 Ford Mustang was traveling south on Highway 25 in Creston, when the driver lost control near the intersection of Sumner and Howard Streets.

The car left the roadway to the left and struck a parked vehicle before vaulting and striking the front of two houses on the east side of the road. The vehicle flipped over and came to rest on its top at 313 Sumner Avenue.

Both occupants were wearing their seat belts.  The State Patrol was assisted at the scene by Creston Police and the Union County Sheriff’s Office.

CORALVILLE – Steven Andrew Mauck was pronounced dead due to natural causes at 12:35 a.m. on Friday, August 4, 2023 while in hospice at the Iowa Medical and Classification Center where he had been housed due to chronic illness. Mauck was 41 years old at the time of his death.

Mauck had been serving a 25-year maximum term for the crime of Sex Abuse – 2nd Degree from Des Moines County. His sentence began on January 22, 2020.

DES MOINES – Fermani Jose Maldonado, convicted of Robbery 1st Degree, Willful Injury and Conspiracy to Commit Forcible Felony in Polk and Marshall Counties, failed to report back to the Fort Des Moines Reentry Center as required last Friday.

Maldonado is a 26-year-old black male, height 5’9″, and weighs 219 pounds. He was admitted to the work release facility on March 28, 2023.

Fermani Jose Maldonado

Persons with information on Maldonado’s whereabouts should contact local police.

(Radio Iowa) – The Mega Millions jackpot is estimated at an all-time high for the game for Tuesday’s drawing of one-point-55 BILLION dollars. Iowa Lottery spokesperson, Mary Neubauer, says big jackpots often lead to people pooling their money to buy tickets, and you need to keep a record to avoid issues. “Write down everybody who was in your group how much they contributed and when they did it that way there’s not a question later about who was in and who was out,” she says. Neubauer says you should document the tickets to keep everyone in the loop.

“Take pictures on your phone or photocopy the tickets before the drawing happens,” she says. “And make sure that everybody in the group has a copy of the tickets that were purchased for the group — again then there’s no question about what the tickets were what the numbers were that were on the tickets.” If you are buying tickets for your group, you might want to take another precaution.

“If you’re also buying tickets for yourself, you might want to consider buying them in two separate places — meaning going to one store for one purchase and another store for the others,” Neubauer says. “You just want it to be abundantly clear like here are the tickets for the group and here are the tickets that would be for me.” There is one standard safety measure whether you buy tickets in a group, or just buy one for yourself.

“If you are someone who wins a significant prize the first thing that we always tell people is sign the back of the ticket. That way it identifies the ticket and any prize you have won as belonging to you,” she says. Neubauer says all the tips for purchasing tickets in a group are on the Iowa Lottery’s website.

The Mega Millions cut off for buying tickets in Iowa is 8:59 p-m Tuesday. The drawing is at 10 p-m.

(Radio Iowa) – A state senator from southeast Iowa is being sued by his daughter. Korynn Dickey, the daughter of Senator Adrian Dickey, a Republican from Packwood, alleges her father purchased a vehicle for her in 2020, but then forged her signature to place a lien on the vehicle. In May, Korynn Dickey’s vehicle was totaled in an accident, but her insurance company refused to pay on the policy because of the lien. Senator Dickey has denied the allegations.

Another defendant in the lawsuit is Jefferson County Treasurer Mark Myers on allegations of civil conspiracy. Myers’s attorney, Jefferson County Attorney Chauncey Moulding, is seeking to have the charges dropped, stating Myers could not have known that the signature was forged. Judge Lucy Gamon has scheduled a court date to hear the county’s motion for dismissal which will be held on August 28th. A court date for the lawsuit has not yet been set.

Dickey indicated he has documents showing his daughter knew he held the lien on the vehicle and he did so to prevent her from selling the car for quick cash or trading it in for a vehicle she could not afford. Dickey says that he paid for the entire car, no one else has ever paid a dime for it. Dickey says the lawsuit does not affect his constituents since neither his daughter nor his ex-wife live in the area.

(Radio Iowa) – When the pandemic forced Iowa State University to switch from in-person to remote learning in the spring of 2020, I-S-U psychology professor Jason Chan feared unsupervised online exams would unleash rampant cheating. Chan figured students would be at home where they could look up anything in the textbook or online. When scores came back, Chan was surprised to see they were very close to the scores students got before moving online.

It led to an I-S-U study of the scores of nearly two-thousand students in 18 classes. Chan says students who were receiving Bs before the lockdown were still pulling in Bs when the tests were moved online and unsupervised.

While the study results indicate online exams still provide a reliable assessment of student learning, Chan warns there are potential weak spots, especially with the emergence of Chat-G-P-T and A-I writing tools.

(Radio Iowa) – The states of Iowa and Nebraska are suing the Environmental Protection Agency. The attorneys general for the two states are accusing federal regulators of illegally delaying year-round sales of gas with a 15 percent ethanol blend. Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird says they sent a notice to the E-P-A that they were going to sue.

Governor Reynolds and the governors of six other Midwest states asked the E-P-A in 2022 to allow E-15 sales in their states THIS summer. Bird says the E-P-A has done nothing and they are dragging their feet. The E-P-A has restricted sales of E-15 in the summer months, citing concerns about air pollution.

In a written statement, Reynolds said the E-P-A is showing its disdain towards clean, renewable, American-produced ethanol.