Six museums in Omaha and Council Bluffs are hosting events this weekend to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Pacific Railway Act which established Union Pacific and the Trans-Continental Railroad. Abby Cape with Union Pacific Railroad has helped organize displays at the Durham Museum, Lauritzen Gardens, the Union Pacific Museum, the General Dodge House, Joslyn Art Museum and RailsWest Museum. History buffs have a chance to see a document that is on loan to the Durham Museum from the National Archives in Washington D.C.

“Durham has part of the Pacific Railway Act in the building right now so you can actually see the document that started the Trans-Continental Railroad,” Cape said. Railroad Days 2012 is both Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tickets can be purchased at any of the venues and will allow admission into all six museums.

 “You can go to any of the locations and park there, whatever is close to you, and we do provide transportation between the locations as well,” Cape said. More information is available at Omaha Railroad Days dot com (http://omaharailroaddays.com/).

The Cass County Board of Health will have their regularly scheduled meeting Monday.

On the agenda is an Environmental Health Report, Public Health Budget Review, Linkage Report, Epidemiology Report, and Public Health Complaints/Calls.

The meeting of the The Cass County Board of Health will be Monday at 12:15 at Cass County Home Care.

The CAM School board will have their regularly scheduled meeting Monday.

On the agenda is the appointment of a school business official/board secretary/treasurer.  The CAM School Board will also designate a newspaper for official publications and appoint a school attorney.  Towards the end of their meeting the board will discuss contracts and  set 2012-13 student fees.

The meeting of the CAM school board will be Monday at 7 PM at the CAM High School in Anita.

HONOLULU (AP) – Political controversy persists over a conference planned for federal judges on Maui, with Republican Iowa Senator Charles Grassley calling for the event to be canceled or at least scaled back. Grassley is questioning the need to hold the August conference at the Hyatt Regency Maui Resort and Spa. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has said the gathering will be for serious business meetings and the venue is within the circuit’s jurisdiction.

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) – The chief executive of an Iowa-based commodities brokerage accused of embezzling $200 million in customer funds has appeared in court. Russell Wasendorf Senior made his initial federal court appearance in Cedar Rapids yesterday on charges that he made false statements to financial regulators. Wasendorf appeared healthy during the hearing. He’d been hospitalized after attempting suicide outside the company’s headquarters on Monday.
 
SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) – A Sioux City man is charged with vehicular homicide and drunken driving in an accident that killed a passenger last winter. Eighteen-year-old Oscar Ramirez appeared in court yesterday. An arraignment is set for July 27th.
 
PARK RIDGE, Ill. (AP) -The Big Ten and Pac-12 have scrapped their plan to schedule games against each other in all sports. Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany said yesterday that the league recently learned from Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott that coordinating a non-conference football schedule for 24 teams across two leagues was too complicated to pull off.

An accident in Atlantic Thursday caused about $2,500 damage.

At about 12:45 Thursday afternoon, vehicles driven by Brittany Frazier of Atlantic and Georgenia Chamberlin of Atlantic were legally parked in the Dollar General Store parking lot.  Frazier started to back up and struck Chamberlin’s vehicle in the left rear corner.  Total damage was about $2,500.

Frazier was cited for no proof of insurance.

New rules implemented by the Federal Communications Commission could delay further expansion of broadband services in rural areas — and bring higher bills. The Universal Service Fund, a source of revenue for providing rural areas with investment in telecommunications service, is being replaced with the Connect America Fund. It directs half of the money from the fund toward larger companies like CenturyLink and Verizon that aren’t spending as much on expanding broadband in rural areas. Tom Lovell, general manager of Clear Lake Independent Telephone Company, says local communications providers like C-L-Tel have invested 235-million dollars in expanding broadband services, and now the FCC has cut off a major funding stream to continue expanding.

He says most of that is through loans the companies have made. Lovell says some of the money now has been shifted by the FCC from the smaller carriers to the larger companies. Also, they’re cutting back some of the access fees some of the long-distance carriers would pay the smaller companies to transmit data and voice over their networks and shift that more onto the customer. Lovell says the independent companies have been on the leading edge of building up broadband, especially in rural areas, while the larger companies haven’t because they don’t expect much return on that investment.

He says the independent companies have a different philosophy on what and when they want to invest in while the larger companies just have to keep the stockholders happy. Lovell says the independents have been doing the investment and now the FCC is not telling those companies that they’ve done a great job in expanding broadband but instead is shifting money to the larger companies that don’t want to make that investment. He says it’s creating a problem because now it’s tough maintaining and continuing those upgrades. Lovell hopes the situation can be resolved so rural areas across the country — like in Iowa — can be able to expand broadband services in the future.

He says the new rules are going to have an impact on rural America and people should contact their representatives in Washington D.C. and ask them to make sure whatever rules are passed, that everyone can have access to broadband services in the future. Connect Iowa, a broadband advocacy group, estimates 26-thousand jobs are created or saved with every seven-percent increase in broadband adoption.

Two southwest Iowa school districts will be looking to fill new positions after resignations.

The Panorama School District will be looking for a new transportation director.

The Guthrie Center Times reports Jim and Kelly Hummel resigned from their transportation duty positions on June 27.  Jim Hummel had served as transportation director while Kelly Hummel was transportation secretary.

Interviews are slated begin for a new transportation director.  The Guthrie Center Times reports that Panorama Schools superintendant Kathy Elliott says the transportation secretary position will not be filled.  Instead those duties will be split among other staff members.

In other resignation news, the Harlan School Board will have to replace a school board member.  The Board will meet this Monday to address that matter.

The Harlan School District office confirmed to KJAN news that school board member Jay Christensen is moving out of the district.  The board will have 30 days to fill his term which runs through September 2013.

A special election might have to be held to replace Christensen.

The Meeting of the Harlan School Board is this Monday at 4:30 in the Board Room at Harlan Community Schools.

Residents of Panora could see their water rates increase.

The Guthrie Center Times reports water rates could go up by about three percent.  The minimum charge in Panora for up to 3,000 gallons would increase a little more than a dollar to $32.61.  Officials say the increase is needed for the cost of upgrading the water plant.  Its unknown when the change in water rates might go into effect.

Federal environmental officials say Iowa is not properly regulating manure discharge permits for livestock confinement operations and must fix its procedures.

The Environmental Protection Agency says the Iowa Department of Natural Resources has failed in several cases to take timely enforcement actions against livestock facilities violating the Clean Water Act and it did not assess adequate penalties.

The EPA says Iowa does not have an adequate program to assess whether livestock operations need certain federal waste discharge permits.

The EPA says Iowa has about 7,000 animal feeding operations and must have a process that complies with federal law.

The state has 60 days to respond in writing on how it will correct the problems.

The EPA’s notice is in response to a petition filed by environmental groups.