(Des Moines, Iowa – Officials with the Iowa Economic Development Authority (IEDA) report the IEDA Board has approved awards for three companies, which will assist in the creation of 84 jobs and result in $96.3 million in new capital investment for the state. These projects are located in Dubuque and Knoxville. Innovation funding was approved in support of four startups located in Ames, Coralville and Des Moines.

The board also approved 15 Butchery Innovation and Revitalization program awards. Among them was three businesses in southwest/western Iowa:

• Atlantic Locker LC, in Atlantic, was awarded $39,750 (total project cost is $79,500)
• Corning Meat Processing Service Inc. in Corning was awarded $50,000 (total project cost is $100,500)
• and Country Meats Inc. in Arcadia was awarded $50,000 (total project cost is $100,000).

The Butchery Innovation and Revitalization Fund was designed to provide financial assistance in the form of grants to businesses for projects relating to small-scale meat processing, licensed custom lockers, and mobile slaughter units. The program was created during the 2021 Iowa legislative session and signed into law by Governor Kim Reynolds with a $750,000 allocation.

The maximum award amount is $50,000 and no more than 50% of the eligible project expenses may be paid with these grant funds. By administrative code, an application must score an average of 75 or more to be considered for funding. Fifty-four applications, requesting more than $2.4 million, received an average score of 75 or above. Based on available funding, the IEDA Board awarded 15 applications that received the highest average score. A list of the businesses that were awarded can be found here.

(Updated; Radio Iowa) -The Mount Ayr School Board has voted to cancel classes in the district Monday through Wednesday in the face of mounting student and staff sickness. Mount Ayr School Superintendent Jason Shaffer says the closings are due to mounting absences of students and instructors from a variety of illnesses–including COVID-19.

Shaffer says 20 high school students are out with COVID and 25 others with unspecified illnesses — for a 16 percent absentee rate. There are 15 elementary students out sick with COVID, eight with the flu, and another 25 with unspecified illnesses — for a total of 19 percent out. At the same time, he says Mount Ayr is experiencing the same shortage of substitute teachers as other area districts. Shaffer says the buildings will be cleaned during the three-day shutdown.

Shaffer says students and staff will be asked to wear masks for two weeks after returning from the break.

The three days missed next week will be made up at the end of the school year.

(Radio Iowa) – The former owner of a northeast Iowa trucking company has been sentenced to 21 months in prison for failing to pay more than one-point-four MILLION dollars in taxes over a seven year period. Court records indicate 57-year-old Mark Warm of Jesup was in charge of issuing paychecks to Warm Trucking employees. Federal income taxes and contributions for Social Security were subtracted from those paychecks –but the taxes weren’t paid to the I-R-S.

An I-R-S agent based in St. Louis says Warm made a conscious decision to cheat his employees. In his plea agreement, Warm admitted he also failed to pay other taxes that Warm Trucking owed.

(Radio Iowa) – A bill just starting to navigate its way through the Iowa legislature would provide 200-thousand dollars in state tax money to support the commissioning of a Navy submarine bearing the state “She will be powered by a S9G reactor, which is a life-of-the-ship powerplant,” James said, “so she will represent this great state for the next three decades.” Once the U-S-S Iowa is in service, it will spend most of its time three stories below the surface of the world’s oceans. “We will make our own water. We will make our own air. The only limiting factor for us will be our ability to load food, so at some point we’ll have to come up (for provisions),” James said. “But the crew is extremely excited about representing the state and feels kinship.”

Some of the 135 crew members assigned to the U-S-S Iowa started visiting the state in 2019 and a few spent this past Thanksgiving in Iowa with host families. State Representative Todd Prichard of Charles City is a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve, however his dad and two uncles served in the Navy and Prichard notes this will be the fourth U.S. Navy vessel to be christened the U.S.S. Iowa. “This is a proud tradition for our state,” Prichard says, “and this is just a new way for us to continue that tradition of quiet service.”

This is the SSN 774, the USS Virginia. It’s sister submarine, the Iowa, is under construction.

Prichard was a member of the House subcommittee that gave initial approval to spending 200-thousand dollars in state money on the U.S.S. Iowa. Private fundraising is underway as well to raise more than twice that much. The state and private funds will being used to outfit the U-S-S Iowa with some Iowa-themed furnishings and support the formal ceremonies surrounding its launch later this year.

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Flood Center is unveiling a new tool to help Iowans living along the Missouri River prepare for flooding. Larry Weber, co-founder of the Iowa Flood Center, says the interactive map will give people who may be impacted by flooding the information they need in a times of crisis.  “If your home happens to be within the area that’s flooded, then with your mouse, you can just click by your house, and it’ll tell you the depth of water,” Weber says. “All of that is to help them to respond to floods to protect your property.”

The system is one part of a larger initiative to help impacted communities recover. Weber says the number one priority was making the technology accessible to everyone and the project took collaboration from the U-S Army Corps of Engineers, the National Weather Service and the University of Iowa-based Iowa Flood Center. “The Corps and the Weather Service and ourselves, we’re all flood experts, but but we can’t be there helping every individual homeowner and landowner, they need to help themselves,” Weber says, “but we can provide the tools to them that allow them to be able to do that.”

Weber says the flood prediction tool can also help them see how increasing the number of wetlands or watersheds in the area could stem flooding. The Iowa Flood Center started to develop the system after the damaging floods of 2019.

(Kendall Crawford, Iowa Public Radio)

(Atlantic/Griswold, Iowa) – The Atlantic Chamber Ambassadors were hosted by Michelle & Randy Roy, owners of Randy’s Computer, on Thursday, January 20th, 2022. The Ambassadors joined the couple in celebrating the opening of their new location in Atlantic.

Randy Roy was living in Southern California when a friend asked him for help reassembling a desktop computer. It was then he realized his passion for customer service and computer repair. That was 25 years ago and since then, Randy & his wife, Michelle, have had many generous people offer them opportunities that they just couldn’t pass up. Fast forward to November 2021, they opened their doors to a second location in Atlantic. Randy and Michelle have been overwhelmed by the amount of support they have received in the past few months. The couple is grateful and excited to become a part of Atlantic’s tight knit community and look forward to continuing to support other small businesses.

Photo courtesy the Atlantic Chamber of Commerce

Randy’s Computer specializes in computer sales and repair, hardware and software updates, backup solutions, computer education and training and more. The Atlantic location is open 8:00AM-5:00PM, except on Thursdays and Sundays. The Griswold location is open 8:00AM-5:00PM, except Thursdays and weekends.

Randy’s Computer is located at 513 Chestnut Street in Atlantic and also located at 511 Main Street in Griswold. For more information about Randy’s Computer, call 712-590-0083 or visit their website, www.randyscomputer.com

(Radio Iowa) – A young child was accidentally shot with a handgun in Storm Lake. Authorities were called to a Storm Lake residence around 7:30 Wednesday evening. A nine-year-old child had received a lower body gunshot wound. Police determined that another child in the home located an unsecured handgun and unintentionally discharged it, and it struck the nine-year-old. The nine-year-old was transported by ambulance to the hospital in Storm Lake for non-life threatening injuries. The incident remains under investigation.