The Adair County Board of Supervisors will hold a special session 9-a.m. Thursday at the courthouse in Greenfield. During their meeting, the Board will hear Fiscal Year 2019 funding requests from the following:

• Fair Board
• Historical Society
• Library
• SICOG (Southern IA Council of Governments)
• Board of Health
• Adair County Tourism
• Midwest Partnership
• Southern Iowa Trolley

And, County Auditor Mindy Schaefer, Medical Examniner, Clerk of Court, Sanitarian and Data Processing Departments will present their FY 2019 requests.

County law enforcement officials are asking Iowa lawmakers to create half a dozen regional “triage” centers for people who are having a mental health or addiction crisis. Susan Cameron Daemen is the lobbyist for the Iowa State Sheriffs’ and Deputies’ Association. “ISSDA proposes establishment of six crisis stabilization centers, kind of like triage centers, in Iowa where individuals who are committed voluntarily or involuntarily or who need immediate mental health or substance abuse services can go to be assessed for the right type of treatment in the correct setting,” she says.

Addressing the “crisis” in Iowa’s mental health care system is the association’s “highest priority” for the 2018 legislative session. “Currently, individuals who are committed are being placed in the highest-cost level of care: hospitals, jails or prisons,” Cameron Daemen says. “Iowa may have enough acute mental health care beds, but we don’t have the right types of treatment programs in all parts of the state.”

The State Sheriffs’ and Deputies’ Association is calling for more community-based treatment programs as well as more options for Iowans who need in-patient treatment for a mental illness. According to state officials, at least a third of Iowa prison inmates are suffering from a severe mental illness. Cameron Daemen says improving the state’s mental health care system and getting the mentally ill appropriate care before they commit a crime is “less costly to the taxpayers.”

(Radio Iowa)

VINTON, Iowa (AP) — The Benton County sheriff killed in the line of duty nearly 80 years ago is being memorialized. A bust of Benton County Sheriff Leland Fry was unveiled Tuesday at the courthouse in Vinton. Cedar Rapids station KCRG reports that the bust will be displayed inside the building until May and then be moved to a pedestal on the lawn outside.

Fry lost his life in 1938 trying to arrest someone who escaped from custody. Organizers say the county didn’t have the money for a memorial project during the Depression years and World War II. His slaying was largely forgotten until little more than a year ago, when a committee formed and raised more than $12,000 in donations.

The Creston Police Department reports the arrest Tuesday night, of 18-year old Keaton Wambold, of Creston. Wambold was arrested at the Union County Law Enforcement Center on a Union County warrant for Failure to Appear on an original, Possession of a Controlled Substance, charge. His bond was set at $1,000. And, early Monday morning, a Creston man residing in the 400 block of N. Maple Street, reported that someone threw a coffee cup through the front window of his residence. The incident, which happened sometime around 2-a.m., Monday, caused about $200 damage.

(7-a.m. News)