Clarinda Police Chief Keith Brothers says no one was killed or injured during a bizarre accident Tuesday afternoon. Brothers reports a 2007 Ford Taurus driven by 85-year old Violette Henneman, of Clarinda, was pulling into a parking stall at 402 West Willow Street at around 3:30-p.m., when Henneman hit the gas pedal instead of the brake.

Her car drove over a curb and down a yard before crashing into the Clar Haven Apartment building. Even though her car was inside an apartment rented by Merlin Cavner, Henneman still had her foot on the gas, as evidenced by a burn mark on the carpet which was caused by the fast-spinning front left tire.The collision also damaged a box spring mattress in an apartment.

Henneman told authorities she was not hurt, but the woman was transported to the Clarinda Regional Health Center for examination. Damage to the building and box spring was estimated at $20,150 altogether, while the car sustained  $10,000 damage.

The Shelby County Board of Supervisors moved one step closer to approving the 2014 Fiscal Year budget. In a special board meeting Tuesday morning, Shelby County Auditor Marsha Carter introduced eight options for the 2014 budget. After much discussion from the Board, the taxable valuation increase options were narrowed down to two, and finally one.

Shelby County Supervisor Steve Kenkel said the option they narrowed down called for “Ag property 5-percent, Land 5-percent, no increase for residential and minus 4 to Commercial. That was a total of 4.6percent.”  Auditor Marsha Carter told the board even if the option was approved, the County needed to be aware of changes to Mental Health Dollars.  Carter said “We have always been limited since 1993 when the state as froze our Mental Health tax dollars, they were funding with growth dollars to fill the deficit on the county level. Now the state has regionalized, at this point the max we can tax is $47.28 per capita which is a decrease of about $300,000. So that is taken into consideration when talking about the percentage of increase.”  She said the state could change the number later on and would affect the budget.

Before approving the option, Kenkel said every department was well prepared. “I appreciate the process you guys go through. We spent about three partial days and I thought all the department heads were very prepared when they came. We froze some budgets and we raised some for the cost of business and cut some too. We have a good process here and everything was well put together.”

The Shelby County Supervisors approved the Fiscal Year 2014 proposed Budget and set the hearing for Tuesday, February 19^th at 9-am in the basement of the Shelby County Courthouse.

(Joel McCall/KNOD)

The Cass County Board of Supervisors are expected to act this (Wednesday) morning, on approving an agreement for the Use of a Local Agency Road as a detour, while a bridge is being replaced. The bridge is located over a small stream one-mile west of Iowa Highway 148 on Highway 92.

In other business, the Board will review and discuss proposed Fiscal Year 2014 departmental budgets. The meeting begins at 9-a.m. in the Supervisor’s Board Room at the Cass County Courthouse in Atlantic.