(Radio Iowa) – Despite recent rain, most of Iowa is still rated as abnormally dry or in moderate to extreme drought and fire officials are urging extreme caution when it comes to fireworks. “We still haven’t had enough rain to get a lot of moisture build up, so it’s still dangerous,” Estherville Fire Chief Richard Beaver said. “The best thing I can say is if you’re going to light them, be very, very, very careful. Have a water hose handy and watch what’s going on.”

Beaver warns a grassy area that looks green can still catch fire. “It’s not the green stuff that you catch on fire, it’s the dead brown stuff underneath that catches fire and then once it catches fire, the green stuff will burn,” he said. If you do intend to shoot off fireworks, Beaver’s advice is to do so in an open area where you can see where they land.

“If you can’t see where they’re coming down at, they can land in the grass and lay there and smoke for a long time and then all of a sudden you’ve got a fire after you’ve gone to bed,” Beaver said.

(Radio Iowa) – The housing market in Iowa continues to be strong with bidding wars, and realtors struggling to find houses for their buyers. Iowa Association of Realtors president, Jen Burkamper of Ames, says that issue hasn’t dampened interest in the profession. “No, actually we make it look easy — so everybody wants to get in,” Burkamper says. She says more people have joined the realtor ranks in the past couple of years.

“At the Iowa Association of Realtors we just broke eight-thousand-members,” Burkamper says. “In my 21 years we’ve always ranged around that 78-hundred, 77-hundred, and we just broke eight-thousand members.” Burkamper says the pandemic has had a lot to do with the increase. “With the changes in jobs and unemployment and everything in the pandemic, I think it’s caused people to want to get into this industry,” she says.

Burkamper says quick sales and higher selling prices may draw people to the business — but she says you have to be ready for the long haul. “It looks easy when things are selling quickly, but they don’t see all the work involved in what that takes,” according to Burkamper. She says Iowa is a good place overall to be a real estate agent. “We are pretty steady — we’re not like the coasts where you have high fluctuations and then you have high drops — we sit pretty steady,” Burkamper says. “So as long as you are on top of your game and doing what you need to do, you are probably not going to see a problem in sales. You’ve got to work hard.”

Burkamper calls the most recent market the craziest she’s seen in her career, and expects things will eventually return back to a more normal situation.

Two people were injured in separate Adair County accidents, Wednesday. The Iowa State Patrol reports 22-year-old Jeffrey Kempf, of Harrison, Ohio, suffered minor injuries when the semi he was driving struck a cable barrier, overturned and came to rest in the median. The crash happened on Interstate 80 eastbound about two-miles west of Stuart, at around 7:30-a.m.  Authorities say Kempf was driving a 2020 Freightliner when he fell asleep at the wheel.

The second accident happened at around 12:20-p.m. on I-80 eastbound about a mile east of the Menlo exit. The Patrol says a 2018 Ford Transit Van driven by 57-year-old Tammy Brock, of Cleveland, OH, and a 2004 Ford E-450 driven by 57-year-old Lee McCleary, of Vernon, AZ, were traveling eastbound near mile marker 89, as traffic was slowing to accommodate a lane closure near mile marker 91.

A 2011 Honda CRV being towed behind the Ford was struck by the van. Both vehicles came to rest in the right lane of I-80 at about the 89.6 mile marker. Tammy Brock was transported by Stuart Rescue to Iowa Methodist in Des Moines. Adair County Sheriff’s Deputies, Stuart Rescue and Adair Rescue assisted at the scene.

The injured drivers in both accidents were wearing their seat belts.

(Radio Iowa) – A study finds Iowa communities with high levels of nitrates in the drinking water tend to be low-income communities. The Environmental Working Group report found 85-percent of the towns with the highest nitrate pollution were lower income. Nitrate largely stems from farm practices like the overuse of fertilizer and manure. Study author Anne Schechinger says the pollutant is linked to higher rates of cancer and birth defects, even at levels well below the current federal standard.

“We know, since this nitrate in drinking water problem is getting worse, that voluntary conservation is not enough to fix this problem,” Schechinger says. “We really need farmers that are required to stop pollution from going off their farm fields.” Nitrate removal is very expensive, and while some larger water systems may be able to afford treatment, Schechinger says many smaller, rural systems cannot.

“We think we have safe drinking water and that it’s regulated by the federal government so it should be totally okay to drink and not have any health impacts that come from what we’re consuming,” she says, “but it’s just devastating that people have to experience things like cancer just from drinking water every day.” Schechinger says the state needs mandatory conservation practices to limit nitrates from reaching water supplies.

(By Kate Payne, Iowa Public Radio)

Recipient/Projects/Total Project cost (TPC)/Match Amount  in this area include:

• Adair: Old Macs Grill Redevelopment (total project cost: $221,400; local match $121,400)
• Coon Rapids: 517 Main Renovation & Development ($230,900; $130,900)
• Creston: Creston “You Are Beautiful” Building ($217,099; $117,099)
• Neola: 101 4th Street Building Project ($388,450; $288,450)
• Stuart: Hotel Stuart/Black Swan Developers, LLC ($260,000; $160,00).

• Converting the historic Tierney Building in Waukon into a restaurant
• Transforming the former Irish Hospital Building in Forest City into eight apartment units
• Restoring a vacant iconic building in Centerville into a commercial wellness studio and eight loft-style apartments

Two arrests were reported from over the past week, in Harlan. On Friday, 33-year-old Tamara Leigh Dryer, of Harlan, was arrested on an active Shelby County warrant. Dryer was transported to the Shelby County Jail.

And, on Monday, 27-year-old Cody Allan Segebart, of Denison, was arrested following an accident investigation. Segebart was transported to the Shelby County Jail where he was charged with driving a non-registered vehicle and driving while suspended.

COUNCIL BLUFFS, IOWA–A Council Bluffs man was sentenced on Tuesday, June 29, 2021, by United States District Court Judge Rebecca Goodgame Ebinger to 41 months in prison for felon and drug user in possession of a firearm. The prison term is to be followed by three years of supervised release.

According to court documents, Garrett Duane Hanika, age 33, of Council Bluffs, was attempting to elude officers and speeding — 60 mph in a 35 mph zone — down the center turn lanes on Broadway in Council Bluffs until he crashed the vehicle and attempted to run. Hanika was apprehended and a loaded Bryco Amrs, Model 48, .380 caliber pistol was found in his car.

Acting United States Attorney Richard D. Westphal of the Southern District of Iowa made the announcement. The Council Bluffs Police Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives investigated the case.

The Iowa DOT reports (as of 12:56-p.m.) the right lane of I-80 eastbound in Adair County is currently blocked due to an accident. The incident occurred between Exit 86: IA 25 and Exit 88: County Road P20 (near Menlo). The right lane is blocked due to a crash. http://www.511ia.org/forwarding/viewevent.asp?type=event… [Click link for current status]

Additional details are currently not available.

(Radio Iowa) – About 200 people attended a concert in Grinnell Tuesday night, to help raise money for the reward fund for Xavior Harrelson of Montezuma, who’s been missing since May 27. Joy VanLandschoot, of Brooklyn, is the organizer of Mollie’s Movement, a group that helps locate missing people. She says over five-thousand dollars was raised. “I didn’t have a specific number I was expecting, but any amount is wonderful to bring awareness for finding Xavior,” she says.

Tuesday night’s tally would raise the reward fund to more than 30-thousand for information on finding Xavior. “We haven’t heard anything,” Vanlandschoot says. “We just hope that this will get tips in…or someone will see Xavior or remember something.” A representative of the missing boy’s family read a statement during the concert, describing Xavior as helpful, kind, funny and always happy and thanking people helping in the search.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Supreme Court has reversed a district court decision, so a state law can go into effect that bars Planned Parenthood from getting state grants for sex education programs. The law was passed in 2019 by the Republican-led legislature, but Planned Parenthood and the A-C-L-U of Iowa filed a lawsuit and it’s been on hold as the case made its way through the courts. The law prohibits organizations that provide abortion from getting grants from two state programs aimed at preventing teen pregnancy.

Governor Kim Reynolds, who signed the bill into law, says she is proud to be a pro-life governor and the ruling is a strong statement in support of the idea that taxpayer dollars should not fund abortion.

The president and C-E-O of Planned Parenthood of North Central States says for more than a decade Planned Parenthood has provided comprehensive, age-appropriate sex education for young Iowans and the ruling is a major setback for public health.