Iowa’s Attorney General announced seven lawsuits this past week against contractors who hit underground gas pipelines. State law requires contractors to phone Iowa One Call 48 hours before digging to have the lines marked. Iowa One Call communications manager, Ben Booth, says there’s no excuse for contractors who fail to make the call.

He says the call has been mandated since 1992 and became a law in 1993. “If you are a professional working in the industry, there’s no excuse not to know,” Booth says.
The law covers anyone in Iowa, and Booth says they try to keep everyone informed. “We do constantly have outreach…to target homeowners and new homeowners who may not know what the requirements of the law are,” Booth says. “For cases involving professional contractors, you do have to wonder if it is a matter of trying expedite your process and trying to avoid having to wait the required 48 hours — not planning effectively.”

Booth says not planning ahead is not an excuse to break the law. And he says saving a little time by digging without calling can end up costing contractors. “In the long run, you are really potentially opening up a much bigger can of worms by not waiting, by not planning appropriately,” Booth says.

The Attorney General says the seven lawsuits covered five counties. Four of the lawsuits have been resolved or have agreements pending Anyone planning to dig can notify the Iowa Once Call Notification Center or go online at www.iowaonecall.com, or by phone at 811 (or toll-free at 800-292-8989). The center is open 24-hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

(Radio Iowa)

w/ Chris Parks

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (6.3MB)

Subscribe: RSS

A rock-n-roll hall-of-famer is coming to the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines this summer. John Mellencamp will be performing at the Iowa State Fair for the first time in his 35-year career. Fair officials announced Friday that Mellencamp will be featured on the Grandstand stage on the night of Saturday August 19th.

Tickets for the show will go on sale at 10 a.m. on March 3rd. Mellencamp has a new album that’ll be released in April. Some of the other acts scheduled to headline the Grandstand during the Iowa State Fair’s 11-day run include Nickelback, Little Big Town, and Alabama.

More on the web at https://www.iowastatefair.org/entertainment/grandstand/

(Radio Iowa)

The governor’s office late Friday afternoon revealed details about MORE cuts in the present year’s state budget. The spending reduction plan legislators approved a few weeks ago directed the governor’s budget director to make another 11-and-a-half MILLION dollars in cuts on his own. That plan calls for community colleges to pare another one-point-seven MILLION dollars in spending between now and June 30th.

The University of Iowa must cut one-point-two MILLION dollars deeper. Iowa State University must cut nearly a MILLION and the University of Northern Iowa about HALF a million.

The state’s prison system will be required to make another quarter-of-a-million dollar cut and the Highway Patrol will have to cut its budget by more than a HALF million dollars.

(Radio Iowa)

One person died and two others were injured during a crash Friday evening in southeast Iowa’s Mahaska County. The Iowa State Patrol reports a passenger in the vehicle, 52-year old James Lee Franciskovic, of West Burlington, IA, who was not wearing a seat belt, died at the scene. The driver of the vehicle, 35-year old Carrie Ellen Falcon, and another passenger, 25-year old Shane Yorel McCampbell, both of Burlington, IA, were injured and transported by Pella EMS to the hospital in Pella. Both had been wearing their seat belts.

The Patrol says the three were in a 2004 Chevy truck that was traveling west on Highway 163 at around 6:10-p.m., Friday, when the vehicle went out of control on the snow covered road. The pickup entered the north ditch near mile marker 46 and came to rest on its top. Franciskovic was ejected from the vehicle and died from his injuries.

The accident remains under investigation.

A teenage back seat passenger in a vehicle that was on the shoulder of Interstate 80 died Friday evening, when the vehicle she was in was hit from behind. The Iowa State Patrol says 17-year old Angel Martinez, of Medina, OH, who was not wearing a seat belt, died at the scene of the crash that took place at around 6:25-p.m. on eastbound I-80 near mile marker 23, in Pottawattamie County.

Authorities say a 2016 Kia Sportage driven by 52-year old Karen Marchbanks, of Wilmington, NC, was eastbound on I-80 approaching the 22.7 mile marker. A 2005 Honda Civic, operated by 36-year old Fabian Prado, of Brunswick, OH, was parked on the right shoulder near the same location, when the Kia entered the shoulder of the road and struck the Honda from behind.

Both vehicles sustained heavy damage during the collision.  Prado, who was wearing his seat belt, was injured in the crash and transported by Underwood Rescue to Mercy Hospital in Council Bluffs.

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 4:00 a.m. CST

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A budget aide to Gov. Terry Branstad has released details about $11.5 million in cuts that will help close a mid-year budget shortfall. The Iowa Legislature earlier passed a budget bill with roughly $117 million in cuts. David Roederer, with the Iowa Department of Management, indicated at the time that $11.5 million of that amount would come from unspecified cuts. He’s now disclosing that includes an extra $2.7 million in cuts to Iowa’s public universities and $1.7 million to community colleges.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska State Patrol says all lanes of Interstate 80 have reopened after being closed earlier Friday because of blizzard-like conditions. A slow-moving storm dropped more than 2 feet of snow in parts of western Nebraska as it moves east through Iowa. A winter weather advisory remained in effect late Friday afternoon for east-central Nebraska and parts of western Iowa into northeastern Iowa. A blizzard warning remained in effect for a portion of northwestern and northern Iowa.

BETTENDORF, Iowa (AP) — A man shot by an officer during a standoff at a Bettendorf store has pleaded not guilty to several charges. Court records say 19-year-old Joshua Price filed the written pleas Thursday to kidnapping, burglary and assault. Authorities say Price had taken the store manager hostage on Dec. 19 after ordering him to evacuate the store. Authorities say Price was carrying only an airsoft gun that looked like a deadly handgun.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A civil liberties group is taking up the case of a central Iowa transgender high school student who was ordered to wash “love trumps hate” written on his arm or be sent home. The American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa says the incident happened in November at Newton High School. The ACLU says a teacher also repeatedly referred to the student as “girl,” even though he openly identifies as male.

(**UPDATE 8-a.m. 2/25…meeting to take place at the Bridgewater Community Center)… An event set to take place Tuesday, Feb. 28th, in Bridgewater, is aimed at curbing the proliferation of methamphetamine use in the community. Organizers say the “Take Back Bridgewater, Iowa” campaign began to take root after some citizens were outraged over someone spray painting the word “Meth” and an arrow pointing toward Bridgewater, on a county road rock storage pile at the intersection of Highway 92 and the Bridgewater Road.

The Mission Statement for the community-based effort is “Working in partnership with citizens to address criminal activity and improve the quality of life in and around Bridgewater.” A Facebook page has been set up with the same goal in mind.

County Road rock pile near Bridgewater (Photo submitted)

The organizational meeting is tentatively set for 7-p.m. Tuesday, at the Bridgewater Community Center** (Old Elementary School) 605 North Main Street in Bridgewater). The first meeting is to designed organize and develop a strategy, with a later public meeting to be held in order to moderate discussions and further plan actions for the group.

Agenda for the organizational meeting will be as follows: Introduction; State initiative purpose; Determine citizen interest; Establish initiative leadership; Establish action direction; Discussion on next public meeting; Adjournment

Additional information can be found on the “Take Back Bridgewater, Iowa” Facebook page.

A judge in western Iowa, Friday, sentenced a Mills County man to a little more than seven-years in prison for possession of child pornography. 69-year old Daniel Logan Walden, a former Glenwood resident was sentenced to 87 months in prison by Senior United States District Court Judge Robert W. Pratt. Walden’s term of imprisonment is to be followed by 10 years of supervised release.

The U-S Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Iowa says on October 7th, 2016, Walden entered a guilty plea to a federal indictment charging him with possession of child pornography on or about May 9th, 2014. The charge was the result of an investigation by the Glenwood Iowa Police Department into an allegation that Walden sexually assaulted a minor female.

Law enforcement obtained a search warrant and during the May 9, 2014, search of Walden’s residence, numerous images of child pornography were recovered, both in printed form and on computer storage devices.

The investigation was conducted by the Glenwood Police Department, the Ralston Nebraska Police Department, the Mills County Attorney’s Office, and the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, Cyber Crimes Unit. The case was prosecuted by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Iowa.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A top budget official for Gov. Terry Branstad has released details about $11.5 million in cuts that will help close a mid-year budget shortfall. The Iowa Legislature passed a budget bill earlier this year that included roughly $117 million in cuts to cover the shortfall. David Roederer, with the Iowa Department of Management, indicated at the time that $11.5 million of that amount would come from unspecified cuts to operational expenses, such as supplies and equipment purchases.

Roederer said in a Friday afternoon news release that the $11.5 million in cuts would include an additional $2.7 million in reductions to Iowa’s three public universities and about $1.7 million to community colleges. Lawmakers had already ordered the schools to cut $21 million from the current budget, which began last July.