(Radio Iowa) – The calendar says we’re in the middle of autumn but it’s now wintertime, at least according to the Iowa Department of Transportation. Craig Bargfrede, the D-O-T’s winter operations administrator, says they’ve been planning for the cold weather driving season for months, and they are prepped for winter every year by October 15th, which was this past Sunday. “From a material standpoint, we’re sitting in a very good position statewide about at 104% of capacity, which is about 253,000 tons of salt stored in the garages all spread across the state,” Bargfrede says. “We have 101 garages across the state and a few offsite locations that the salt is stored in.” D-O-T staffers are staying in good practice and Bargfrede says they’re ready for that first snowfall.

“Training has been underway,” he says. “Each fall, we do hands-on training with the field staff. We have a driving simulator that our field staff take a two-hour course, kind of a refresher course, for the most part.” While October 15th may seem a bit early for winter conditions to set it, Bargfrede says the D-O-T never wants to be caught unprepared.

“Our staff start reporting winter road conditions on 511,” he says. “They start prepping, finalizing equipment prep, calibration on our equipment. There’s a litany of tasks that they have to do and complete and have ready to go around that October 15 timeframe.” The D-O-T is looking for more snowplow operators, especially if you’re C-D-L certified. Call your nearest D-O-T garage for more information, or visit Iowa D-O-T-dot-gov-slash-careers. (iowadot.gov/careers)

(Radio Iowa) – Residents of four Iowa counties may notice there are no red lights now blinking in the night sky. MidAmerican energy spokesman Geoff Greenwood says the company is testing a new radar system where the lights on some 200 wind turbines in Adair, Audubon, Cass and Guthrie counties are only on when needed.”The lights are off all the time, unless our system detects an aircraft in the area within about three miles of the wind farm. And so this system, we expect will reduce nighttime lighting by at least 95 percent. So it’s going to be a dramatic drop in nighttime lighting,” Greenwood says.

He says the commercial jets that regularly fly over Iowa at high altitudes would not set off the system. Greenwood says warning lights have been on top of wind turbines since they started putting them up.”Anything that’s a few 100 feet up into the air, if the F-A-A requires warning lights so pilots know that there is an obstruction in the area,” he explains. “So as you drive in rural Iowa at night, you’ll notice all these red flashing lights.”

He says they just recently started testing the system for the Eclipse the Morning Light wind farms in the four counties.”Area residents would have noticed that the lights were off and probably wondered what’s going on here,” he says. “Well, that’s what’s going on is we’re testing this new system. And we expect that from here on out the lights should be off most of the time at these three wind farms during nighttime hours.” Greenwood says they are looking for input on the change from residents and pilots. “We know the F-A-A has signed off on this and believes it’s safe, we’re confident it’s safe. It will protect nighttime skies for pilots, make sure that they are safe, but it will also darken the nighttime skies. And that’s why we think that the communities where we’re testing this will really be happy with the way this turns out,” he says.

He says they will runs tests throughout the next year to see how everything works. “How weather may impact it, how things like ice may impact it. It just makes sure that it works as advertised,” Greenwood says. “And it’s something that we would like to look at for other Mid American wind farms.”

Greenwood says it may be a system they used with new wind farms and they could also look at a system for other wind farms as they take down components and replace them with new ones.

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports a traffic stop at around 5-p.m. Tuesday in the 2300 block of Highway 71, resulted in the arrest of 64-year-old David Carroll, from Villisca. He was charged with OWI/1st offense with a .147 BAC. Carroll was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $1,000 cash bond.

Police in Red Oak say three juvenile females were arrested Tuesday afternoon, following an incident that occurred as classes were dismissing for the day at the Red Oak High School. Authorities report Police were notified about a fight that happened at the High School. After a brief investigation, a 15-year-old female was arrested for Assault and Disorderly Conduct. another 15-year-old female and a 17-year-old was arrested for Disorderly Conduct.

All the teens were cited into Juvenile Court and released to their parents.

(Radio Iowa) – Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy says some college student groups have made atrocious statements in support of Hamas terrorists who attacked Israel this month, but the answer isn’t to blacklist students.  “They’re students. Sometimes they do silly things. They do dumb things,” Ramaswamy says. “That’s part of what maturation in college is all about.” Ramaswamy says companies have a right to decide not to hire those students, but Ramaswamy says, as a free speech advocate, he believes it would be more productive to have a conversation with those students.

“I think the right answer to bad speech, especially on a college campus, isn’t suppressing that. it’s more speech,” Ramaswamy says. “It’s actually showing why those ideas are wrong.” Ramaswamy, a critic of cancel culture, has spent more time campaigning in Iowa than his primary Republican rivals. One of his leading proposals is a proposed constitutional amendment to raise the voting age to 25 — with exceptions for young adults who enter the military, work as a first responder or take the test immigrants take to become citizens.

Ramaswamy says if that policy had been in force in 2003 — when he turned 18 — he may have become “far more engaged” in politics. Ramaswamy, who is 38, told the Wall Street Journal he has cast ballots in two presidential elections — voting for a libertarian in 2004 and voting forTrump in 2020. “Keep in mind that when the voting age was lowered to 18, it was in the context of the draft for the Vietnam War and so that made immense sense at that time,” Ramaswamy says. “Today, we don’t have a draft, but I do think that we have also lost our sense of civic duty.”

Ramaswamy says his proposed constitutional amendment would make citizenship mean something. Ramaswamy calls Donald Trump the best president of the 21st century, but he suggests it’s time for the G-O-P to choose a younger nominee in 2024. “How are we going to reunite this country and take our ‘America First’ agenda even further? And I think it’s going to take a member of the different generation to do it,” Ramaswamy says. “…I’m young. I have fresh legs. I can reach that next generation and I am reaching that next generation more so than any other candidate in this race.”

Ramaswamy, a former hedge fund analyst, is the founder of companies focused on the development of prescription drugs. Ramaswamy has so far used about 15 million dollars of his own money on his campaign. After the first two televised debates, Ramaswamy saw an increase in donations of less than 200 dollars from individuals. He got two-point-eight MILLION dollars in campaign contributions from that group of donors in the last fundraising quarter.

(Radio Iowa) – The 10 acre site in Ottumwa where a hospital was demolished in 2019 is under new ownership. St. Joseph’s Hospital in Ottumwa closed in 2015. The Des Moines-based firm called Blackbird Investments acquired the property the same year and announced plans to build housing on the site. After the hospital’s demolition, the lot remained vacant.

According to the leader of a non-profit involved in negotiations, the new owner also plans to convert the site into residential property. The vacant lot has been purchased for an undisclosed price by LifePoint Health. It’s the parent company of Ottumwa Regional Health Center, the 217-bed hospital in Ottumwa.

(Radio Iowa) – Ottumwa police are investigating a fatal stabbing that happened Monday night. Police were called shortly before 11 p-m on the report of a stabbing and officers found a man outside the home. The man identified as 34-year-old Samuel Gallegos-Ramirez of Ottumwa, was transported to the Ottumwa Regional Health Center, where he died.

Police have not released any other details of the stabbing and say the body has been sent to the state medical examiner’s office for an autopsy. Police do say there is no known ongoing threat to the public.

The Glenwood (IA) Police Department reports 43-year-old Zachary Basye, of Glenwood, was arrested today (Tuesday), for Driving While Revoked. His cash or surety bond was set at $1,000.

All four Iowans serving in the U.S. House backed Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan for House Speaker in today’s (Tuesday’s) first round of voting. Radio Iowa’s O. Kay Henderson reports.

Fourth district Congressman Randy Feenstra announced last (Monday) night he notified Jordan last weekend that he’d vote for him. On Saturday, third district Congressman Zach Nunn announced Jordan would get his vote to get the House organized so it can take action on important things happening around the world.

A jury today (Tuesday) found a former Butler County police officer guilty of multiple counts of sexual exploitation of a minor. Mark Pitz reports.

No sentencing date has yet been set. Tobin still faces lawsuits from two sisters who claim he coerced them into sex on multiple occasions while he was on duty. They are also suing the Clarksville Police Department, Chief Barry Mackey, an unidentified City leader and the City of Clarksville. The sisters’ argue that some City officials knew or should’ve known what Tobin was doing and did nothing to stop it. Trials in those lawsuits are currently scheduled for February 10, 2025.