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KJAN News can be heard at five minutes after every hour right after Fox News 24 hours a day!
Keep up-to-date with Fox News Radio, Radio Iowa, Brownfield & the Iowa Agribusiness Networks!
(Des Moines, Iowa) – Iowa’s state parks and forests are gearing up for a busy Memorial Day weekend, the traditional start of the outdoor summer recreation season. Sherry Arntzen, chief of the DNR’s State Parks, Forests and Preserves Bureau, says “Park visitors are excited to get outside and enjoy the beautiful weather after a long winter inside. Our parks offer a variety of activities for all enthusiasts from hiking the trails to picnicking, fishing and swimming. There’s something for everyone while enjoying the outdoors.”
Campers are urged to plan ahead when visiting Iowa state parks and forests for Memorial Day weekend. Most electrical and full hookup sites in busy parks are already reserved, so campers may want to consider non-electric sites or at “hidden gem” parks a little further away from home. Additionally, Iowa state parks and forests offer around 950 non-reservable sites available on a first-come, first-served basis, with most people choosing to stay Thursday through the weekend.
To find site availability and make a reservation, go to https://iowastateparks.reserveamerica.com/ For an up-to-date list of park and trail closures due to renovations or weather-related alerts, visit: http://www.iowadnr.gov/Places-to-Go/State-Parks/Alerts-and-Closures
Park visitors can help take care of the parks by cleaning up trash after themselves, and carrying out what they brought in. Please park vehicles in designated parking lots and not along roadways. If visiting beaches, be aware that most swimming areas do not have a lifeguard on duty, and pets must be kept off beaches and be on a leash.
Arntzen says “We hope that campers enjoy their time and make memories while staying in our parks and recreational areas, and do so safely and return again.”
Tips
(Elk Horn, Iowa) – The Exira/Elk Horn-Kimballton School Board held a public hearing Wednesday evening with regard to a 2023-24 Budget Amendment. Superintendent Trevor Miller said there was only one person who attended the hearing, and they simply wanted to ask a question.
The other aspect to the the Budget Amendment was additional staffing, and purchasing, with the idea being there is enough money to cover any such needed expenditures.
Miller says the District facilities project will begin next Tuesday (May 28), with demolition in the Elk Horn building.
The Board, Wednesday, approved Cross Country sharing with Audubon.
And, the school board approved a new hire and a resignations.
Mr. Miller says the Board agreed to change their Summer meeting dates to June 19th and July 16th at 5:30-p.m., on both dates. That’s not unusual. They do that to try and accommodate everyone’s schedule. The last day of classes at Exira-EHK was held Wednesday. Beginning July 1st, Trevor Miller will serve as the shared Superintendent for the Audubon-EHK School Districts. Dr. Angela Huseman will serve as the shared IKM-Manning/Tri-Center CSD Superintendent. Previously, Dr. Huseman served as high school principal in Tri-Center.
(Creston, Iowa) – Officials with the Creston Police Department say a woman from Pottawattamie County was arrested, Thursday. 38-year-old Alicia Nicole Bothe, of Council Bluffs, was arrested at around 11:35-a.m. at 612 New York Avenue, for Driving While Suspended. Bothe was cited and released from the scene, on a Promise to Appear in court.
(Greenfield, Iowa) – If anyone is wondering how to help the residents of Greenfield by donating cash or supplies, please see the St. John’s Catholic Church Facebook page, as that is a GREAT resource of information. The link is pinned to the kjan.com Facebook page.
An updated needs list (as of late Thursday) to help loca residents, include: Casey’s gas cards, Fareway gift cards, Dollar General gift cards (those stores we have here locally). Many residents lost everything, and many have lost power.
St. John’s officials say tarps are not currently needed, as they have an ample supply now. Plywood is also not needed, because there is a good supply on-hand. Clothing was collected at the Adair County Health and Fitness Center, and St. John’s says as of Thursday, they had enough clothing. Residents in Greenfield in need of clothing are invited to come in and shop. Friday’s hours are 8-a.m. To 6-p.m.
Grief and Trauma Counseling will be in Greenfield over the next few days.
If you’d like to make an online donation, please use the Greater Greenfield Community Foundation‘s paypal link: https://www.paypal.com/donate/…
This is the official way to give online! Designate ‘Tornado Relief’.
(Area) – Severe storms that formed in Nebraska early this (Friday) morning raced into western Iowa, causing the National Weather Service to issue Tornado Warnings for some areas (including in Cass County), where radar detected rotation in the atmosphere. The storms reached Atlantic at around 3:30-a.m., bringing heavy rain and damaging winds that caused some large tree limbs to fall and block the road, at 7th and Linn, and other locations. Downed tree limbs were also reported to have blocked some roads in Red Oak.
A complete list of storm events/timing/damage (if any), can be found under the Storm Reports story on the Weather page at KJAN.com. Winds were the primary factor in the damage that occurred, with sustained gusts estimated at anywhere from 60-miles per hour in Glenwood, to 75-miles per hour in Greenfield, where they are trying to recover from Tuesday’s deadly EF-4 tornado.
North of Glenwood. Photo courtesy Shannon Kennedy Barton.
The Weather service reports:
There were no immediate reports of injuries associated with this latest round of severe weather.
(Radio Iowa) – Continued rains across the state brought more improvement in the latest U-S Drought Monitor for Iowa. D-N-R Hydrologist Tim Hall says the two most severe categories of drought are no longer found on the map. “So we’re just down to just over 20 percent of the state is rated in the D-1 moderate drought, so we don’t have any severe drought, no extreme drought in the state anymore,” Hall says. Nearly 67 percent of the state now has no form of drought, which compares to only three percent with no drought in January. Hall says the northeast part of the state is still the driest area, but it’s a lot better now.
“Tama and Benton counties, the last three years, it’s been the driest three years on record for those particular counties in the state,” Hall says. ” And that’s even drier than the dustbowl years of the 30s or the drought of the 1950s. So they were very much in a whole drought wise, and it’s just going to take those parts of the state longer to recover.” Hall says his discussion with the state climatologist indicates we could see spring flip from record dry to record wet conditions this year. “We could very well see a top ten wettest spring season on record by the time all is said and done with here,” he says. The plentiful rain has had some farmers worried about finishing planting, and at times it leaves ponds of water in fields.
Hall says he’s not worried about that at this point. “The fields in the areas that routinely run into inundation problems are seeing that right now with the rain we’ve had, but I don’t think it’s a widespread or catastrophic problem around the state,” Hall says. “I think we’d become used to the dry conditions over the last four years, and we just have gotten out of the habit of seeing saturated fields and standing water.”
Hall says it’s good to see the groundwater and stream flows come back to normal for the first time in a long time. And he says June is normally the wettest month of the year, so the pattern is likely to continue.
(Iowa Capital Dispatch) – Democratic congressional candidate Melissa Vine and her former campaign manager Lou McDonald were each fined $500 by the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board on Thursday after the board’s investigation found the two made contributions to a state political action committee in other people’s names.
The board’s investigation, launched a week earlier, was into a complaint made by Iowa Unity Coalition, a progressive PAC. The complaint was over potential illegal contributions leading up to the PAC’s endorsement vote for Iowa’s 3rd congressional district race. Participants had to pay $20 to the coalition to vote for who the group would endorse in the race: Vine faces Lanon Baccam, a former U.S. Department of Agriculture official and Biden campaign staffer, in the June 7 Democratic primary.
Mitch Henry, chair of the coalition, said that the day of and day prior to the April 30 online endorsement vote, the PAC saw a sudden increase in membership, and that there were large quantities of votes submitted in a one-hour period — largely in support of Vine — during the 24-hour voting process.
Henry said that the activity was flagged as suspicious, and the Iowa Unity Coalition launched an audit of the votes the day after voting ended. The group audit found that 41 votes were submitted by people who were not members of the group, and 43 votes were submitted under names that were linked to the same address and credit card information, and who had email addresses linked to Vine’s campaign. Additionally, 125 people attempted to register for the Iowa Unity Coalition using ActBlue, largely from April 30 through May 1, and 76 registrations were flagged as fraudulent.
The board’s investigation found that McDonald, then Vine’s campaign manager, registered those people and attempted to participate in the endorsement vote using his personal credit card. The action violated state laws that ban individuals from making contributions or expenditures in the name of another person.
Melissa Vine
Vine informed the board that she was aware of the actions taken by McDonald, Zach Goodrich, executive director of the ethics board, said in the meeting. Vine fired McDonald earlier in May in relation to the PAC contributions, saying in a statement that McDonald “took actions that do not reflect our values, and he is no longer a part of our campaign.”
In statement to the board through attorneys, both Vine and McDonald said they were not aware the action violated Iowa’s campaign finance laws, believing they were purchasing “memberships” — a separate action from making contributions to the PAC. Goodrich said that “intent” is not applicable to the board’s action of imposing penalties for breaking the law.
If the case goes before a criminal court, the issue of whether the law was violated “knowingly” would become relevant. Henry has said he referred the issue to the Polk County Attorney’s Office and Iowa Department of Criminal Investigation. In addition to the state board action, there could be action from the Federal Election Commission, as federal law may have been violated by using congressional campaign money to make contributions on behalf of individuals to a PAC.
The state ethics board voted unanimously Thursday to impose the maximum $1,000 total penalty for the state law violation. But in an atypical procedure, that fine was split between McDonald and Vine.
CENTERVILLE, Iowa – Officials with the Iowa Department of Public Safety said today (Thursday), a Centerville man originally charged with Child Endangerment Causing Death, a class B felony, faces an additional charge of Murder in the First Degree, a Class-A Felony, following an ongoing investigation into the death in late January, of 2-year-old Journey Marberry. The suspect, 48-year-old Roger Gillespie, was advised of the charges Thursday, while in custody at the Appanoose County Jail. Gillespie has remained in the jail since his arrest on January 27.
Gillespie
On May 22, 2024, the Johnson County Medical Examiner’s Office (JCMEO) released the final findings from the autopsy of Journey Marberry. The JCMEO ruled that Journey’s death was the result of a homicide caused by blunt force trauma.
Original story:
On Friday, January 19, 2024, at approximately 12:50 p.m., Centerville law enforcement and emergency services were dispatched to 1417 Drake Avenue on the report of an injured child. Responding officers and EMS providers found 2-year-old Journey Marberry injured inside the home. She was immediately taken to MercyOne Hospital in Centerville and then to the University of Iowa Hospital in Iowa City.
On Saturday, January 27, Journey succumbed to her injuries and served as a donor to aid other families. Gillespie, who was Journey’s caretaker at the time of her injuries. He was taken into custody without incident.
Journey Marberry
Note: A criminal charge is merely an accusation, and the defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.
(Greenfield, Iowa) – Three of the four victims of Tuesday’s deadly tornado in Greenfield have been identified. Funeral announcements posted by Lamb Funeral Home in Greenfield said Dean and Pam Wiggins, and 74-year-old Micheal Jensen, all of Greenfield, died as a result of the tornado.
Dean and Pam Wiggins
Services for all three victims are currently pending at Lamb Funeral Home.
Micheal Jensen
WASHINGTON – Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) will hold public town meetings in Atlantic and Glenwood on May 28, Corning on May 29 and Dakota City on May 30 as part of his annual 99 county meetings across Iowa.
Grassley says “Representative government requires continued dialogue between elected officials and the people we represent. I look forward to hearing directly from Iowans in Cass, Mills, Adams and Humboldt counties. Their insights will inform my work in Washington.”
Sen. Grassley (Radio Iowa photo)
This is Grassley’s 44th consecutive year holding at least one meeting in each of Iowa’s 99 counties. During the meetings, Grassley takes questions or comments on any subject. Iowans set the agenda.
Town meetings are open to the public. Details:
Tuesday, May 28
Cass County Town Meeting: 9:45 – 10:45 a.m.
Iowa Western Community College Cass County Center, 705 Walnut Street, Atlantic
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