(Radio Iowa) – Even with the pandemic, some Iowans camped out overnight so they could be the first to enjoy today’s Black Friday deals, but the head of the U.S. Small Business Administration in Iowa hopes the buying fervor will extend into tomorrow — for Small Business Saturday. Jayne Armstrong, director of the SBA’s Iowa District Office, says local merchants have endured a very challenging year and the holiday shopping season is key to their success. “The last few months of the shopping could really make a huge difference in their bottom line,” Armstrong says. “We’re really encouraging people to get out and support your local small businesses. I can’t emphasize enough how important it is, especially as we’re waiting for this next round of stimulus.”

COVID-19 has forced many people to avoid shopping in person in stores and Armstrong says you can equally show support for local businesses by seeking out their websites. “A lot of people are shifting to online this year,” Armstrong says. “One of the smart things that a lot of our Iowa small businesses have done this year during the pandemic is to pivot to more of an online presence.” One economic forecast predicts in-store sales will be down three-percent this holiday season while online sales will be up 30-percent. For those who physically shop in stores, Armstrong says to look for her and other small business backers who will be fanned out in Iowa’s downtowns and shopping districts.

“We’ll be out there with our signs saying, ‘Honk If You (heart) Small Business,’ and ‘Shop Mom and Pop,’ and ‘Be Loyal, Buy Local,’ those types of things,” Armstrong says. “We really try to lift up the spirits of the small business community because these owners have gone through a lot this year.” While some small businesses were forced to close during 2020, she says it’s been a pleasant surprise to see so many new small business start-ups in Iowa succeed. Armstrong says 97-percent of the businesses in Iowa are small businesses.

(Radio Iowa) – The August derecho did millions of dollars in damage to farms, homes, and property — with a majority of the damage covered by insurance. Iowa Insurance Commissioner Doug Ommen says the derecho damage itself should not impact insurance rates. “Even though this even was really substantial — part of the way insurance companies operate — they should be including that risk in their premiums. So, I don’t see any substantial change,” Ommen says. He says insurance rates could be impacted by the larger impact of events nationwide. “If you look across the country, we are seeing more claims generally in property and casualty. Whether you look at some of the wind storms that we are seeing down along the gulf coast and of course some of the fire events that we are seeing out in the mountains and in California,” according to Ommen. “Overall it is showing an increase in claims — which long-term is going to have some impact on premiums.”

Ommen says the crucial thing for everyone is to be sure you have the coverage you need for your situation. “Take the time to look at those insurance policies, to talk to a licensed insurance producer to have a good understanding of what kind of coverage they have,” Ommen says. While federal disaster funds have helped with some of the damages that weren’t covered by insurance in the derecho, Ommen says that is not available with every storm. He says the first line of defense should be your personal insurance coverage.

“So often what we see is, when an event comes through then consumers are frustrated because they don’t have coverage that they thought they had. At the same time, they haven’t really evaluated their coverage — that’s how you end up with losses that are not insured,” Ommen says. ” And again this storm impacted a large part of our state — but frankly, anywhere in Iowa could be impacted by this storm, or the other types of storms that hit our state.”

Ommen says you should go over your insurance coverage each time it comes up for renewal and discuss any changes in the policy, or changes in your situation that need to be covered.

Iowa’s Coronavirus dashboard today (Friday), showed 37 more people have died from complications of COVID-19 for a total of 2,349. There are nine new deaths in the KJAN listening area, including: one each in Audubon, Harrison, Montgomery and Shelby Counties; two more in Pottawattamie County. The number of deaths attributed to a pre-existing condition statewide are at 1,333, while deaths at Long-Term Care facilities amount to 1,055, 17 more than on Thursday. Health officials report one less long-term care facility COVID-19 outbreak, for a total of 151. Those care facilities report 4,628 positive cases and 1,907 recovered. Cass County’s three LTC facilities have a total of 208 confirmed positive cases and 129 recovered.

Officials say there have been 1,266 new confirmed, Positive cases of the virus reported since yesterday, for a total since the pandemic began, of 223,544. New cases were reported in Adair, Audubon, Guthrie, Harrison, Madison, Mills, Pottawattamie, Shelby and Union Counties.

Hospitalizations have fallen again, from 1,269 Thursday, to 1,226 today. There are: 256 patients in intensive care (down from 271 Thursday.); 183 patients have been admitted since 10-a.m. Thursday, and there are 141 people on a ventilator. In western/southwestern Iowa: there are 57 COVID patients in the hospital (down three from Thursday); 18 are in an ICU; seven people were admitted to a hospital, and seven people are on a ventilator.

The state’s data shows that 1,196,998 Iowans have been tested for coronavirus. Test results received yesterday amounted to 5,495, with 4,270 coming back Negative and 1,185 Positive. Iowa’s statewide 14-day positivity rate is 18.7%. The Individual Positivity rate is also at 18.7%. Cass County’s Positivity rate is down slightly, to 19.4%.

The IDPH says 127,353 Iowans have recovered from the virus. In the KJAN listening area, here are the current number positive cases in each county, along with the 24-hour change in case numbers {+#}; the number of persons recovered, and the total number of [deaths] (if any), since the pandemic began,

• Cass, 797 cases; 503 recovered; 21 deaths
• Adair, 429 {+4}; 222; 8
• Adams, 164; 84; 2
• Audubon, 294 {+1}; 187; 2
• Guthrie, 738 {+6); 426; 15
• Harrison County, 1,062 {+2}; 710; 29
• Madison County, 673; 385; 4
• Mills County, 1,021 {+4}; 454; 7
• Montgomery, 449; 206; 11
• Pottawattamie County, 6,127 {+18]; 3,520; 69
• Shelby County, 751 {+3}; 440; 10
• Union County,  754 {+4}; 296; 6

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 3:40 a.m. CST

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Iowa added 41 COVID-19 deaths Thursday as three more long-term care facilities reported virus outbreaks. KCCI reports that the Iowa Department of Public Health reported 3,331 new positive COVID-19 cases as of 10 a.m. to bring the total to 222,278. Long-term care facilities have been particularly hard hit, with cases in them accounting for 1,038 of the state’s 2,312 deaths. The three new facilities reporting outbreaks brings the total that have been hit to 152.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — The historically close race for Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District seat has gotten even closer. Democrat Rita Hart has cut Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks’ lead to eight votes out of more than 394,400 cast, with recount boards in all but one of the district’s 24 counties reporting the results of their recounts. On Wednesday, Hart netted 26 votes in Scott County and another vote in Jasper County after their recount boards adjourned. Clinton County’s recount board will meet on Saturday to finish reviewing about 5,000 absentee ballots.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — The Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska is creating the nation’s largest tribal national park on a forested bluff overlooking the Missouri River and a historic site of its people. The tribe says the 444-acre park will allow it to tell the story of the Ioway people and provide a rustic getaway where people can hike, camp and bird-watch. The Omaha World-Herald reports that the Ioway Tribal National Park will overlook a historic trading village once used by the Ioway people to barter for buffalo hides and pipestones with other tribes. That site includes three burial mounds that date back 3,000 years.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — A University of Iowa fraternity has been suspended for hazing, with a report citing verbal abuse and and an incident where new members were required to drink dangerously high amounts of alcohol. The university says the violations were by the Acacia Fraternity. The Cedar Rapids Gazette obtained an investigative report through a public records request. The suspension lasts through 2024. One allegation said that in the spring semester, new members were ordered to stay in the fraternity house attic until they consumed alcohol that included 60 to 90 cans of beer, along with vodka and a gallon of a drink called Jungle Juice. Several new members got sick.

Police in Council Bluffs late Thursday night, said a shots-fired incident took place outside of a gas station/convenience store at around 9:46-p.m.  As the results of an investigation, authorities say an adult female patron went into the gas station at 1305 N 25th Street for coffee. Upon returning to her vehicle, she noticed a white male party walking rapidly towards her. The male began to fire shots at the female, so she drove away fleeing the area.

The victim’s vehicle was struck by two rounds, but she was not physically injured. The motive for the incident was unclear at the time of the report. The suspect fled the area and has not been located. The suspect was a white male, no further description. He was with two white females and they were in a newer model black Mitsubishi SUV.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Council Bluffs Police Department at 712‐328‐ STOP. The victim was aware of what was going on around her. She took immediate decisive action, preventing any further harm to herself. Bluffs Police remind citizens, that “As the holidays approach, criminals tend to look for easy marks. Be vigilant and have a plan of action to keep yourself out of harm’s way.”

(Radio Iowa) – Creighton University economist Ernie Goss says this year’s increase in farm income is leading to an increase in farmland prices. “Farmers are out there and they’re feeling better about the economy, but unfortunately we’re not seeing it in the businesses on what we call ‘Rural Mainstreet,'” Goss says. Every month, Goss surveys rural bankers for a Rural Mainstreet Index. His latest survey indicates the economy in Iowa and nine other states in the Great Plains and Mountain West will dip in the current 4th quarter.

“It looks like we’re hitting a hiccup in the global economy and a hiccup in the US economy and, for that matter, in the regional economy,” Goss says. “Growth is just slowing down and potentially moving what was a V shaped recovery into a W shaped recovery — in other words, back down into the recession.” But Goss says farmland and commodity prices have beem climbing fairly dramatically this fall, leading to optimism in the ag sector. About a third of U.S. farm income this year will have come, though, from the Trump Administration’s payments to make up for trade losses and Goss says those are likely to end with the Trump presidency.

“On the flip side, we’re likely to see the Biden Administration be a little more positive on trade,” Goss says. “…You’ve got some positives and some negatives. I expect 2021 – at least as we sit here now — to be pretty good for the agricultural sector given the expansion on trade.” And Goss says rising global oil prices are generally good news for the state’s ethanol industry as well.

(Radio Iowa) – Most of us won’t likely remember 2020 fondly but as we enter the year’s home stretch, Iowans are urged to find something beautiful and capture an image of it. Kevin Techau, executive director of Keep Iowa Beautiful, says the organization’s 20th annual photography contest is now accepting entries. “We have five categories: Iowa Landscape, Iowa Water, Iowa Cities, Iowans in Action and Iowa Wildlife,” Techau says. “Contestants can enter as many times as they’d like in any of these categories to capture the beauty of Iowa and we do have prizes to award the best photography.”

Keep Iowa Beautiful was co-founded by former Governor Robert Ray in 2000 as a way to help communities make the state a better place to live, work and raise a family. Photography was one of Ray’s favorite hobbies, so the photo contest has been an annual staple ever since. A panel is being assembled to narrow down the best entries. “We’re going to have a round of judges that will pick winners from each of the five and those will go into the Robert D. Ray Best of Show Award,” Techau says. “In fact, Governor Ray’s eldest daughter, Randi Ray, will be one of the judges who helps make that decision.”

The contest was expanded this year in honor of the 20th anniversary. “The first prize winner in each of the categories, the prizes are $100, $75 for second and $50 for third place, and then in the Best of Show, first place will be $500, second place $250 and third place $100, and then we’ll have a public award where the public can vote for their favorites and we’ll have $100 prize for the winners in that category.”

There’s a $5 fee for each photo entered with a deadline of December 18th. The rules and entry forms can be found at the website: www.keepiowabeautiful.com.

(Radio Iowa) – University of Iowa president Bruce Harreld — preparing to retire next year — predicts the competition among the state’s higher education community for scarce state support will escalate in coming years.  “Resources have been constrained for many a year,” Harreld says, “and they’re apt to stay that way.” The state’s community colleges, private colleges and universities as well as the three state-supported universities in Ames, Cedar Falls and Iowa City also will be competing for a smaller pool of potential students. That’s because the birth rate dropped during the so-called “Great Recession” of 2007 and 2008.

The number of high school graduates is projected to decline by 15 percent by 2026. “There is going to be a lot of hand-wringing here as some of these headwinds play themselves out,” Harreld says. “I’m worried that there could well be a struggle for a number of us.” Harreld says the University of Iowa should position itself as a “destination university” and compete for students internationally as well as in-state and around the U.S.

“The better we are, I think the better we’ll be able to weather the headwinds that are coming at us,” Harreld says. Harreld is a former business executive who was hired to lead the University of Iowa five years ago. A search for his successor has begun and Harreld has said he’ll stay in the job until his replacement is named.

More State and area news from KJAN News Director Ric Hanson.

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(Radio Iowa) – An Algona High School student and her teacher are asking for the public’s help in finding information about a graduate of the school who died nearly 59 years ago. Marine Corps Private William George Turner died in 1941 following the attack on Pearl Harbor. Algona history teacher Brian Connick says he and his student, Isabelle Gibbs, haven’t been able to find any family still living in the area. “Basically, we know he graduated from Algona High School in 1936, so boy, if there was somebody out there that knew of someone that was from that graduating class or someone that might have known the Turner family or Mr. Turner himself, we would love to be able to sit down and talk to them and try to get a little richer understanding of who he was as an individual here in Algona.”

Connick and his student were scheduled to go to Hawaii this past June for an event sponsored by the National History Day organization, but the trip has been postponed until next June, due to the pandemic. Connick’s student is scheduled to give a eulogy for Private Turner at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, where he is buried. “That eulogy is going to include information from his background living here in Algona, his military life,” Connick says, “his training and his service in World War II which is unfortunately very short because of his injuries that took place at Pearl Harbor and his subsequent death of December 12th of 1941.”

Connick and Gibbs are one of 16 student-teacher teams that will travel to Hawaii next summer to take part in the “World War II in the Pacific Student-Teacher Institute.” “Boy, we’d love to hear from anyone that knew Private Turner,” Connick says. Turner was born in February of 1919 and was 22 when he died at Pearl Harbor. The Mason City Globe-Gazette reported at the time that Turner was the first Algona citizen to die in the war. The newspaper account listed his mother, brothers named Robert and Lee and a sister named Ruth as his survivors.