(Atlantic, Iowa) – Atlantic School District Superintendent Steve Barber, Wednesday (June 14, 2023), presented the School Board with his final report. Mr. Barber is leaving the District at the end of this month. He mentioned the Atlantic Community School District currently has five teaching positions that have yet to be filled.

Mr. Barber’s replacement, Dr. Beth Johnson, is in the process of interviewing for the Transportation Director’s position left vacant by the resignation of Mark Weis, who is leaving the District effective July 1, 2023.

Steve Barber said most of the summer projects will begin July 1^st, also. They include: The Washington Elementary School playground; High School storage shed; HS Auditorium lighting; carpets at the HS, ELC and Schuler; and Washington EVR units.

The lower elementary Summer Experience count he said is around 140 students, while the upper grades are averaging 50-to 60 students. The Atlantic School Board approved the hiring of Casey Pelzer, as the Middle School Principal.

In other business, the Atlantic School Board, Wednesday, approved an MOU (Memorandum of Understanding), with regard to the iJag (Iowa Jobs for America’s Graduates) program. Steve Barber said Guy Somers “has done a wonderful job [with the program], and that he “continues to look at ways to improve [it].” For the 2023-24 school year, 28 students have registered for the program.

The Board also approved an agreement with the Green Hills AEA for managed services designed to enhance the school district in the continuation of protecting the system, and enhancing cybersecurity measures.

(Creston, Iowa) – The Creston Police Department reports 22-year-old Chase Isaiah Ditzler, of Creston, was arrested at around 4:24-p.m. Thursday, at the Creston/Union County Law Enforcement Center. Ditzler was taken into custody for Violation of Parole, Theft in the 2nd Degree, and Theft in the 5th Degree. He was brought to the Union County Jail and held without bond, until seen by a Judge.

(DES MOINES) – Governor Reynolds, Thursday, celebrated national homeownership month with the announcement of the opening of the second annual Iowa Homeownership Incubator competition. The Iowa Homeownership Incubator is a challenge to Iowa lending institutions and real estate professionals to think innovatively about advancing financial literacy around homeownership among all Iowans, with the winning idea receiving a $20,000 grant to help implement the initiative.

“Homeownership is one of the leading drivers of economic security and wealth creation for Iowans which is why we’re pleased to announce the Iowa Homeownership Incubator to help drive innovation in this area,” said Governor Reynolds. “Iowa is already ranked among the top in the nation for first-time homebuyers and supporting financial literacy efforts will allow us to welcome many more Iowans home.”

“Homeownership benefits Iowans, communities and businesses alike,” said Iowa Finance Authority and Iowa Economic Development Authority Director Debi Durham. “The ability to affordably own a home is a key element to attracting and retaining our workforce but Iowans first must realize that homeownership may be within their reach, which is exactly what this incubator competition sets out to do.”

The Iowa Homeownership Incubator requires partnerships amongst a lending institution or real estate company and a community organization or business, and the winning pitch will be awarded $20,000 to educate Iowans about financial literacy as it relates to homeownership and assistance programs available to them, including IFA’s programs for low to moderate homebuyers. Proposals must be submitted by 5:00 p.m. on Aug. 1. Finalists will be determined by the Iowa Finance Authority and the Iowa Association of REALTORS® and will be invited to make their pitch to a panel of industry judges, who will determine the winner at the HousingIowa Conference in Cedar Rapids on Sept. 6.

“It’s no secret that homeownership is good for Iowans and good for Iowa,” said Iowa Association of REALTORS® CEO Gavin Blair.  “We look forward to seeing the innovative ideas for moving financial literacy around homeownership forward so we can open the door to homeownership for many more Iowans.”

More information about the Iowa Homeownership Incubator, including submission guidelines is available at housingiowaconference.com.

(Council Bluffs, Iowa) [UPDATED]— An Omaha, NE., man was sentenced Thursday, June 15, 2023, for conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance. 22-year-old Jerome Wallace, III, was sentenced to 180 months (15 years) in prison following his plea of guilty to conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance. Wallace must serve a ten-year term of supervised release after the prison term. There is no parole in the federal system. Wallace was also ordered to pay restitution reimbursing funeral expenses.

According to court documents and evidence presented at sentencing, on March 2, 2021, the Council Bluffs Police and Fire Departments were dispatched to a home in Council Bluffs to provide medical treatment to an unresponsive male, 20-year-old Jared Ludwig, who ultimately died from a fentanyl overdose. Wallace distributed pressed pills containing fentanyl to the victim. Officers linked Wallace to the fentanyl overdose death after reviewing phone and social media information, and conducting witness interviews.

Wallace along with co-defendants 21-year-old Karlee Rosenthal and 20-year-old Linsey Stisi distributed pressed pills containing fentanyl as part of the conspiracy from January to August of 2021 in Omaha, Nebraska and Council Bluffs.

In January 2023, Rosenthal was sentenced to time served and five years of supervised release, following her plea of guilty to her role in the conspiracy to distribute a controlled sentence. In March 2023, Stisi was sentenced to time served and four years of supervised release, following her plea of guilty to her role in the conspiracy to distribute a controlled sentence. The Council Bluffs Police Department, Omaha Police Department, Southwest Iowa Narcotics Enforcement Task Force, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation investigated the case.

Fentanyl has become the leading cause of drug overdose deaths in the United States. Counterfeit, fentanyl-laced pills often resemble pharmaceutical pills, but contain potentially lethal doses of fentanyl. Visit the Drug Enforcement Administration’s website to learn more about One Pill Can Kill.

(Des Moines, Iowa) – A nursing home caregiver who admitted tying a resident into a wheelchair with a bedsheet and who was also convicted of child endangerment can continue to practice nursing, state regulators have ruled. The Iowa Capital Dispatch reports in January, the Iowa Board of Nursing charged Katherine “Katie” Becker, of Casey, an LPN, with being involved in the unauthorized possession or use of a controlled substance; excessive use of alcohol that might impair her ability to practice nursing; and committing an act that could adversely affect the welfare of a patient. (Note: This is not the same person as Katherine Becker, RN)

According to board records, Guthrie County law enforcement executed a search warrant at Becker’s home in July 2021 and found the home “in an extreme state of disarray, with dirty dishes and food remnants found in the kitchen and animal excrement smeared all over the premises.” During the search, deputies seized three marijuana plants and drug paraphernalia and charged Becker with child endangerment for the state of her residence. Becker later pleaded guilty to the charge, according to the board.

In subsequent discussions with the board staff, Becker allegedly indicated she still worked in a nursing home but had recently “gone on a bender” and blacked out for several days.

According to the board, Becker was working at the Atlantic Specialty Care nursing home last September when she used a bedsheet to tie down, in a wheelchair, a female resident of the home. Becker allegedly defended her actions by saying the restraint was intended to prevent the woman from getting up and wandering.

Board records indicate the incident was reported to the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals, which regulates Iowa’s nursing homes, and the agency concluded the matter did not constitute dependent adult abuse.

The Board of Nursing voted recently to indefinitely suspend Becker’s license, but added that the suspension was being stayed pending the submission of a substance abuse evaluation, successful completion of any recommended treatment and the completion of 10 hours of educational training related to elder care.

If Becker cannot meet those requirements within the next six months, the license suspension will take effect.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Supreme Court will release its decision today (Friday) on the law that blocks abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected. The 2018 state law never took effect after an Iowa district court ruling permanently blocked it. The governor asked the Iowa Supreme Court to review the case, and during oral arguments in April, the attorney for the state argued the injunction against the law should be lifted based on state and federal Supreme Court rulings that abortion is not a constitutional right.

An attorney for Planned Parenthood argued the law was void because it was unconstitutional when it was passed. He also said Iowa procedures do not permit the state’s motion, and there was no change in the law that would justify vacating the injunction.

A just completed study at the University of Iowa’s Driving Safety Research Institute found there is more work to be done to create an automated vehicle that can safely navigate on Iowa’s rural roads. Institute deputy director, Omar Ahmad, oversaw the study. “Most of the testing is taking place in larger urban areas, or on interstates. But the fact is, that while a smaller portion of the population lives in rural areas, half of all traffic fatalities occur on rural roadways,” Ahmad says. One of the goals of the research was to see if automated vehicles can provide help to elderly residents with mobility, vision, or other challenges who can’t drive themselves. Ahmed says they created an automated shuttle bus designed to deal with the unique situations in rural driving, like navigating on gravel.

“You drive a gravel roadway in the center of the road and then you give way as you approach somebody and then you more or less go back to the center because that’s the best part of the gravel roadway,” he says. “As you get towards the edge, the gravel starts to get looser, and especially in bad weather, it can almost pull you in or off the road.” He says their automated vehicle had trouble discerning when to move to the middle of the gravel, especially in wet weather conditions. “It would stay towards the edge regardless of whether the weather was good or bad,” Ahmed says. “And we would want it to be smarter like a human and drive more towards the center and only go towards the edge when it sees somebody approaching.” The automated vehicle also had trouble sensing what was a hazard and what was not — sometimes slowing down for dust clouds created on gravel roads. Another issue came at intersections with low visibility, or where the rural road came to a highway.

Automated driving vehicle (UI-photo)

“If the sensors can’t see around the corner, or because the traffic is moving so fast, if they don’t see the traffic until it’s almost too late, that can be very challenging. And that was certainly something that we experienced, as we were making turns onto highways where we were at a stop sign and the traffic was approaching really fast,” he explains, “our sensors weren’t able weren’t look far enough ahead in either direction.” They used a safety driver in the bus as they drove a 47-mile route multiple times a week, round trip between Iowa City, Hills, Riverside, and Kalona. For each drive, the bus began and ended the route at one of the four pre-arranged locations to pick up residents who were volunteer research participants. Ahmad says they collected a lot of data and says there is a lot of work ahead.

“The technology has a lot of potential, it has a lot of promise, but it’s simply not there yet in terms of its reliability to be able for us to feel confident driving without a safety driver,” he says. Ahmad says there is a lot of potential for automated vehicles to make a driver safer, but taking the driver completely out of the equation is not going to happen anytime soon.   “They are not yet a replacement for the driver. And I would say it’s fairly hard to predict when they will be, but my own personal guess would be that it will be quite some time,” Ahmad says.

The U-S Department of Transportation awarded eight institutions a seven-million-dollar grant for automated vehicle research. Ahmad says the U-I was one of three to study rural driving conditions and the first of the three to complete the data collection portion of their project. He says they will now share the good and bad issues they found with rural roadways and automation with the other institutions.

(Des Moines, Iowa) – Officials with the Iowa Pharmacy Association have announced an Atlantic native is the winner of the 2023 Thomas R. Temple Mentorship Award. The award was presented Thursday to CoraLynn Trewet (MS, PharmD, BCPS, CDE), of Ankeny. The Thomas R. Temple Award recognizes an individual who has mentored, supported and sponsored pharmacists in a transformative way. The pharmacist for whom the award is named, and the inaugural recipient, Thomas R. Temple, inspired and mentored through his career as CEO for the Iowa Pharmacy Association (1979-2011) and beyond.

The IPA says Trewett “Began her journey with the IPA in 2001 as the Executive Intern.” She was “mentored by CEO Emeritus Tom Temple,” his staff and many IPA members. A graduate of Drake University, Dr. Trewett worked for several years at the University of Iowa as an Associate Clinical Professor, practicing in family medicine. She currently serves as the Senior Medical Science Liaison in cardiovascular disease, at Bristol Myers Squibb.

Dr. Coralynn Trewet (center) receives the IPA 2023 Thomas R. Temple Award. (Photo submitted)

Dr. CoraLynn Trewett lives in Ankeny with her husband, Matt, and their three children.

The Iowa Pharmacy Association takes great pride in recognizing individuals for their contributions of leadership, patient care, professional involvement and public service. These awards serve to capture Iowa pharmacy’s spirit of service and its culture of professionalism.

(Radio Iowa) – A new national political action committee is calling on Iowa lawmakers to set up a commission that would investigate and discipline county attorneys who refuse to enforce certain laws. Republican presidential candidate Larry Elder spoke on behalf of the PAC at a Des Moines news conference and began by criticizing local prosecutors in Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Baltimore and Philadelphia. “The number one job of the government is to protect people and property and the number one job of government is not being fulfilled,” Elder said.

Elder and the group, though, are starting their national campaign for a crackdown on local prosecutors in Iowa, which hosts the kick off event of the GOP presidential campaign, and Elder criticized Polk County Attorney Kimberly Graham. Graham said as she campaigned for the job last year that she wants to end prosecution for first time offenders caught with a small amount of marijuana. “The soft on crime DA knows she’s being watched and, so far, she’s not done anything egregious,” Elder said.

Neither Graham, nor an official with the Iowa County Attorneys Association were available for comment on the idea of a new commission in Iowa to police local prosecutors. Elder’s next appearance for the Enforce the Law PAC will be in New Hampshire, which hosts the first presidential primary. The group’s initial proposal is patterned after a Georgia law.

“One of the things that this commission will do is it will serve as a deterrent,” Elder said. “Even if no action is taken, the fact that these DAs know that something like this exists and there’s a possibility that they could be removed I think will make them behave far more responsibly.”

A spokesman for the group said the draft of their proposal for the 2024 Iowa legislature is not yet ready and the commission concept will be adjusted to fit the legal framework in each state. The spokesman also said Elder is not a paid spokesman for the PAC, which has not yet filed a report with the Federal Election Commission.

(Radio Iowa) – A new Navy submarine named for the state of Iowa will be christened tomorrow (Saturday) morning at a shipyard in Connecticut. Tom Hudson is executive director of the U-S-S Iowa’s commissioning committee.) “I’ve been to that shipyard many times. I’ve seen the submarine as its gone from individual pieces to a completed, welded together submarine that’s ready to be put into water and go to sea,” he says.

The ceremony starts at 9 a.m. Iowa time tomorrow (Saturday). Former Iowa First Lady Christie Vilsack has been designated by the Navy as the ship’s sponsor. She’ll be the person breaking the champagne bottle over the submarine’s bow. “The submarine will not slide down and go into the water,” Hudson says. “They don’t do that anymore, so this will just be a symbolic opportunity where the champagne bottle is broken and celebrated that the major construction milestone is done and sometime in the next few weeks the submarine will then be placed in the water and start its trials.”

The U-S-S Iowa will be tested at sea for about a year before it’s officially commissioned and placed into service as an active warship. Hudson spent 20 years on active duty in the U-S Navy and he’s lead the group of volunteers who’re raising money to support events like the christening and travel to Iowa for sailors who’ll serve on the U-S-S Iowa. The group’s fundraising will also help outfit the sub with things like exercise equipment and mattresses for the sailors’ bunks that aren’t part of the construction budget.

USS Iowa SSN797 awaits christening in a Groton, CT dry dock

“I served on board two different submarines during my career,” Hudson says. “That’s what kind of got me interested in participating in this program now that I’m retired, some way to get connected and stay in tune with what’s going on.” Hudson will be out of state Saturday for a family event and will watch the sub’s christening online. Watch parties are also planned in nine Iowa cities.

The watch parties will be held in Dubuque, Waterloo, Cedar Rapids, Hiawatha, Des Moines, Van Meter, Fort Dodge, Creston, Council Bluffs and Sioux City.