The Audubon City Council, Monday, voted to accept a bid from Monte Drehr for the collection of residential solid waste and recyclables. Audubon Mayor Clarke “Sam” Kauffman told KJAN Dreher’s bid will save the City $28,200 over the course of the next three-years.

Dreher’s bid was $99,800 per year, while Bohlmann & Sons, who have been the City’s contractor for about the past 8-years, was $109,200 per year. The three-year contract with Dreher begins on January 1st, 2014.

w/ Ric Hanson

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ONAWA, Iowa (AP) – A 44-year-old western woman has pleaded not guilty for a crash that killed her uncle.  Sioux City television station KTIV says Judith Krohn, of Mapleton, is charged with felony vehicular homicide while driving intoxicated. The accident occurred April 20 along Iowa Highway 141 near Mapleton. Authorities say Krohn was driving when her vehicle left the road on a curve and rolled into a ditch.

Her uncle, 59-year-old Albert Butler, of Mapleton, was partially ejected. He was pronounced dead later at a hospital.

A traffic stop in Red Oak early this (Tuesday) morning resulted in an arrest. According to the Red Oak Police Department, 24-year-old Amanda Kate Carlson, of Red Oak, was arrested in the 400 block of North 4th Street.  Carlson faces charges that include driving while barred, possession of drug paraphernalia, and interference with official acts.

She was brought to the Montgomery County Law Enforcement Center and held on $2,000 cash bond.

EARLHAM, Iowa (AP) — More than a dozen farmers worked with six combines to harvest a crop near the central Iowa community of Earlham, a little more than a month after the owner died of cancer. Dave Boyle, of Earlham, told KCCI-TV, “That’s what neighbors are here for.” The farmers decided to help out after 64-year-old Dennis Scar died of lung cancer on Sept. 25.

The harvest normally would have taken days to complete, but the volunteers finished it in about three hours, Monday. Scar’s daughter-in-law, Nikki Scar, says the sight of the machinery pulling in brought her to tears. She says, “We’re just very blessed to have family and friends and live in a small town I guess.”

The corn and soybean harvest moved ahead quickly in the last week. The latest U-S-D-A report shows 20-percent of the corn crop was harvested last week and 17 percent of the soybeans. That puts the bean harvest two days ahead of normal — marking the first time all season soybean progress was ahead of the five-year average.

Pam Johnson farms with her husband in north central Iowa ’s Floyd County. She says she’s thankful that the weather has been favorable at the end of the season after the way it started. The spring was cold and wet spring — leading to a very small planting window — and to get the corn in Johnson says they planted both night and day for three days and the beans didn’t go in until June. “It’s been a struggle all the way along, and then of course, mother nature shut the rain off in August,” Johnson says. But Johnson says they’re now really pleased that they’ve had a long growing season. “We were afraid of all the things that could happen, we would have an early frost and we have not, so the weather has been good to us at the back end of the growing season and we’re pleasantly surprised by the yields that are out there despite the weather,” according to Johnson.

Fifty-five percent of the corn has now been harvested, which is five percentage points behind normal. Moisture content of all corn in the field was estimated at 21 percent while moisture content of corn harvested was 19 percent. The soybean harvest is now 87-percent complete.

(Radio Iowa)

Tomorrow (Wednesday) Republican Congressman Steve King and Democratic Senator Tom Harkin will meet for the first time with the 38 other members of a House-Senate “conference committee” appointed to come up with a Farm Bill compromise.  “I’m glad that we have two Iowans that are conferees,” King says. “We are now and have been for some weeks working to line up those issues that we disagree between the House and the Senate and line them up in order of difficulty.” According to King, the dispute over federal funding for “food stamps” is the most difficult to resolve.

House Republicans have voted to cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by 40 billion. The bipartisan Farm Bill that cleared the Democratically-led Senate in June called for four billion in cuts to the food stamp program — 10 times less. King has asked House Republicans leaders to present him some “creative ideas” for bridging that 36-billion dollar divide. “I don’t want to tip any hand on it. I chair the subcommittee that deals with nutrition and so what I say — it might affect the negotiations,” King says. “But I want to get to the end of this thing and I want a bill on the president’s desk I said before the snow flies. I know in part of Iowa I’m already too late on that, but we’re going to try to get this done and I think we get it done by the end of the year.”

There are a variety of other proposals that are unresolved as well, like a so-called “payment cap” that bars farmers with an adjusted gross income above 750-thousand dollars from getting federal subsidies to buy crop insurance. King is urging other members of the conference committee to negotiate the details in private rather than in public. “Let’s sit down and see if we figure out how we can agree before any of us take such a public position that we can’t compromise or back up from it,” King says.

If the Farm Bill doesn’t pass congress by January 1st, farm policies will revert to the 1949 Farm Bill and the first impact consumers would see would be a dramatic increase in milk prices. King made his comments during a weekend appearance on Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Press” program.

(Radio Iowa)

Police in Shenandoah report one person was arrested following a traffic stop, Sunday.  25-year-old Christopher Still, of Shenandoah, was taken into custody on charges of disorderly conduct and public intoxication. Still was taken to the Fremont County Jail and held on $1,468 bond.

A southwest Iowa teen suffered non-incapacitating injuries during a rollover accident Saturday morning. According to the Page County Sheriff’s Office, 16-year old Sydney A. Casteel, of New Market, was ejected from the 1997 Pontiac Grand Prix she was driving, after it went out of control and slid into the north ditch towards the east, along the north ditch edge of the road. The vehicle rolled more than once before coming to rest on its wheels in the ditch. Rescue workers found the teen laying next to her car. Casteel was transported by helicopter to Creighton University Medical Center in Omaha.

Sheriff’s officials say the accident happened northwest of New Market on 210th Street, near the intersection with Willow Avenue.

The driver and passenger of a semi that was hauling cattle were injured Monday night when the vehicle overturned on southbound Interstate 29 in Council Bluffs. The Omaha World-Herald reports a man and woman in the truck were critically injured and transported by ambulance to Creighton University Medical Center, in Omaha. One of the accident victims was reportedly trapped in the vehicle and had to be freed by rescuers. Their names had not been released as of early Tuesday morning.

The accident, which happened just after 11-p.m., left more than a dozen cattle roaming near the Interstate.
Two dogs that had been in the rig apparently were not seriously injured. Police closed north- and southbound I-29 near 35th Street and Avenue G because of the hazard of the loose cattle. Officers requested equipment to remove downed animals. Animal control officers were called in to help.