The Atlantic City Council will hold their regular meeting this evening in their chambers at City Hall. The session begins at 5:30. During the meeting, Atlantic Police Chief Dave Erickson and Officer Christian Holzapfel will explain why they would like to shift away from the standard duty belts that hold multiple pieces of law enforcement equipment, to load bearing vests. The intent is to avoid low back pain (LBP). The vests will cost approximately $5,130 altogether. They have a five-year warranty. City Administrator John Lund researched the vests and is expected to recommend the Council approve the vests, which could be paid for using ample reserves from the Employee Benefits Fund.

In other business, the Council will discuss business incentives using the EDR Loan Fund. The City, Chamber and Cass-Atlantic Development Corporation (CADCO) have banded together with business leaders, to form an informal business task force to try and bring new business to the downtown area of Atlantic. John Lund says the City has the EDR Loan Fund available for economic development. The fund received the refunded TIF dollars provided to a business that failed to live up to its obligations. The Task Force proposes the City pledge $100,000 of the fund for CADCO’s revolving loan program. Chamber and CADCO officials will on hand to answer the Council’s questions on the proposal.

The Council will also hear recommendations in the form of a Transmittal Letter, from the Planning and Zoning Commission, with regard to two requests for changes to the Zoning Ordinance. One involves the lot at 602 Spruce Street, where there was a home that was demolished. The property was then deeded over to the City. A City employee and abutting property owner has requested to purchase the lot and constructing a pole building for use as a place to store his boat and camper. In other matters, the Council will hold a public hearing on an amendment of the FY 2018 Budget.

They’re also expected to act on orders appointing:

• Christina Bateman to the Community Promotion Commission
• Jim Behrens and Roger Herring to the Planning & Zoning Commission
• Dave Knudsen to the Board of Adjustment
• Mike Henningsen to the Airport Commission.

Members of the Exira/Elk Horn-Kimballton Board of Education will meet 7:30-a.m. Thursday, in the Conference Room at the Elk Horn Building. On their agenda is Discussion/Action on: approving a bid for Asbestos Abatement; and Personnel matters, including Resignations, Hires and Transfers.

The Atlantic Community School District’s Board of Education will meet this (Wednesday) afternoon, at the Middle School Media Center. The meeting begins at 4:15-p.m. On their agenda is action on the resignation of Jade Walter, Industrial Tech Teacher, and contract recommendations for:

• Danielle Meek and Erin Ebling, MS ELA Teachers;
• Jeff Ebling, MS Social Studies Teacher/Boys H.S. basketball Coach;
• Michelle Blake, Interim Head VB Coach;
• Faith McCunn, 7th Grade VB Coach, and
• Derek Handel, Volunteer Softball Coach.

Red Oak Police report two arrests took place, Tuesday. At around 4:15-p.m., 21-year old Yessica Lemus, of Red Oak, was arrested after officers were called for reported, alleged drug activity at the City View Apartments. Following an investigation, Lemus was taken into custody for Possession of a Controlled Substance and Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. She was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $2,000 bond.

And, at around 9:50-p.m., 42-year old Jason Neal Beacham, of Red Oak, was arrested for Disorderly Conduct. He was being held at the Montgomery County Law Enforcement Center on a $300 bond.

Hours before Fred Hubbell joins the other five Democrats running for governor tonight (Wednesday) in a televised debate, Hubbell’s campaign has released a short video that reviews a traumatic event from Hubbell’s past. In 1981, Hubbell and his wife, Charlotte, were taken hostage in an airplane that was diverted to Afghanistan, then Syria by three armed hijackers. Another passenger just a few feet from Hubbell was shot and tossed from the plane. Hubbell talked about the experience with Radio Iowa.

“My kids call me steady,” Hubbell said. “I’ve just learned that good things never last forever and bad things, if you’re thoughtful about it and think about it properly, you can get through it.”  Charlotte Hubbell was released after six days. Fred Hubbell, who was 30 years old at the time, spent a total of 13 days as a hostage before he and the remaining passengers were released.

“You inevitably spend time thinking about what you have been doing and what you could have done and what you’d do if you get off the plane, because you don’t know if you’re going to get off. You’re assuming you probably won’t,” Hubbell said. “…I kind of made the decision: ‘Look, if I get a second chance, I need to do more. I need use it — more than I used the first chance.'”

The Hubbell campaign video includes news clips about the hostage crisis and features Hubbell himself speaking about those events in 1981. Hubbell told Radio Iowa his campaign produced the 94-second video because he’s been asked about the experience as he’s campaigned around the state. “Charlotte and I have, from the very day it happened, not wanted to make a big deal out it and not wanted to seek publicity about it. People wanted us to write a book about it many different times and we chose not to do that. I mean, that’s not kind of how we run our lives,” Hubbell said. “But, you know, I’m in a different situation now. I have to talk about my experience and my background and people want to know.”

Sitting for days on that plane helped Hubbell come to this conclusion:  “If I can survive something like this, I can survive a lot of things.”  Once Hubbell and his wife returned to the United States, friends and relatives gave the couple stacks of newspaper clippings about the hostage crisis. The Hubbells stuffed the articles in paper grocery bags and those bags sit today, still unread, in the basement of the couple’s home. The hijacking ended peacefully. Pakistan agreed to free 55 political prisoners after the hijackers threatened to execute Fred Hubbell and two other Americans on board.

(Radio Iowa)

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 3:35 a.m. CDT

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A lawsuit challenging the nation’s most restrictive abortion law has been filed in Iowa. If allowed to take effect, the restriction would ban most abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, around the sixth week of pregnancy. Abortion-rights groups say that’s a point when many women don’t know that they are pregnant. For years, Iowa was largely left out of Republican efforts to overturn abortion protections. Its Democratic attorney general has refused to defend the law.

DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) — Gov. Kim Reynolds is defending her decision to appoint her 78-year-old father to a panel that helps select judges in central Iowa. Reynolds told reporters Tuesday in Davenport that her dad, Charles Strawn, “wanted to volunteer and give back, just like hundreds of other Iowans that we appoint to boards and commissions.” Reynolds appointed Strawn to an unpaid six-year term on the District 5A judicial nominating commission, which recommends candidates for judicial openings in four counties.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, a leading supporter of corn-based ethanol, says he’ll call for Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt’s resignation if Pruitt doesn’t work to fulfill federal ethanol mandates. Grassley is showing frustration with Pruitt’s lack of action to uphold the Renewable Fuel Standards law.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Iowa House Republicans have announced a new chairman for a key tax-writing committee. House Speaker Linda Upmeyer on Tuesday named Rep. Peter Cownie, a West Des Moines Republican, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Cownie replaces Rep. Guy Vander Linden, an Oskaloosa Republican who is not seeking re-election.

DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) — Gov. Kim Reynolds on Tuesday defended her decision to appoint her 78-year-old father to a panel that helps select judges in central Iowa, saying he was “just like” many others who serve on state boards.

Reynolds last month appointed her father, Charles Strawn, to an unpaid six-year term on the District 5A judicial nominating commission, which recommends candidates for judgeships to the governor in fast-growing Dallas County and three other counties outside of Des Moines.

Democratic critics of the Republican governor and some who follow the legal system have called the appointment unusual. A recent Quad-City Times newspaper editorial called it an example of “brash nepotism.”

In his April 13 application, Strawn wrote that he was “invited” to serve on the board. He was appointed four days later. The governor’s office announced the appointment May 1 along with dozens of others in a press release that didn’t mention that Strawn, of St. Charles, was her father.

Speaking to reporters after an event in Davenport on Tuesday, the governor said her father was a retired factory worker for John Deere and farmer. “This is an individual that loves the state and wanted to volunteer and give back, just like hundreds of other Iowans that we appoint to boards and commissions,” she said. “That’s a simple fact.”
Reynolds added that her dad had coached Little League baseball teams and been involved in county government.

The 11-member commission Strawn has joined will meet on Thursday in Indianola to interview finalists for an opening created by the retirement of District Judge Paul Huscher. The commission will recommend two finalists to the governor, who will make the pick. Iowa law doesn’t bar government officials from appointing relatives to unpaid jobs.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Twenty attorneys general (including Iowa’s A-G) are challenging Trump administration rule changes they say will reduce access to family planning services. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said Tuesday that the president is playing politics with patients by changing rules that would shift federal family planning funds toward organizations that stress abstinence.

The AGs filed a brief supporting lawsuits filed in Washington two weeks ago by Planned Parenthood groups in Wisconsin, Ohio and Utah, and the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association. The lawsuits target proposed rule changes for about $260 million in family planning funds.

The supporting brief was also signed by prosecutors in Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, and the District of Columbia.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Iowa House Republicans have announced a new chairman for a key tax-writing committee. House Speaker Linda Upmeyer on Tuesday named Rep. Peter Cownie, a West Des Moines Republican, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Cownie replaces Rep. Guy Vander Linden, an Oskaloosa Republican who is not seeking re-election.

Cownie was the floor manager for the tax cut legislation passed by lawmakers in the final hours of the session earlier this month. He has been the chair of the House Commerce Committee since 2013. He was first elected in 2008.

Cownie will face Kristin Sunde, a West Des Moines Democrat, in the November general election. Neither faces a primary opponent. If Democrats win control of the House, they would appoint their own members to chair committees.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have arrested 78 people in a five-state immigration sweep in the Midwest. Officials say the arrests happened over six days. Iowa and Nebraska each saw 25 arrests, while there were 15 arrests in Minnesota, 10 in South Dakota and three in North Dakota.

ICE says the operation targeted those who have criminal records, are public safety threats or violated immigration laws. Sixty-two of the people arrested had prior criminal convictions; 31 had illegally re-entered the United States after having been previously deported.

Most of the people arrested are from Mexico. The arrests also included people from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Kenya, the Ivory Coast and Sudan. They will remain in ICE custody pending additional proceedings.