[Updated 6:18-a.m.] (Honey Creek, Iowa) – Firefighters responded to a structure fire late Wednesday night, in Pottawattamie County. According to KETV in Omaha, crews from at least four area fire departments were called to 27125 Ski Hill Loop at about 11-p.m. They remained at the scene for at least two hours, but weren’t able to put out the flames before the building was destroyed.

Authorities say they believe the property was used to grow mushrooms for area restaurants. No injuries were reported.

(Radio Iowa) – U-S Senate candidate Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids is calling for congressional term limits and pledging to serve just two terms if she’s elected in November. She is one of four candidates running in the Democrat primary in hopes to challenge incumbent Republican Senator Chuck Grassley. Finkenauer is calling for a 12-year term limit for each chamber of Congress.  “You look at somebody like Senator Grassley who has been harping on term limits for almost the entire time he’s been in office but refuses to term limit himself, this is what is wrong with Washington D-C,” Finkenauer says.

Finkenauer served one term as Iowa’s First District U-S House representative after losing a bid for re-election. Finkenauer says she’s in support of two voting rights bills before the U-S Senate this week — and says Grassley should as well.  “If he really cared about bipartisanship he’d be supporting this voting rights act and getting rid of gerrymandering in this country which has created these congressional districts that are so far left or so far right that you’ve got folks who are even afraid to talk to each other because they might get primaried on one side or the other,” Finkenauer says.

Grassley says the voting rights proposals by Democrats are an attempt to federalize elections. Grassley is running for an eighth term to represent Iowa and faces a primary challenge from state senator Jim Carlin from Sioux City.

(By Clay Masters, Iowa Public Radio)

(Radio Iowa) – The federal government plans to distribute 400-million free face masks, in addition to millions more COVID-19 test kits, ideas Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley says are good but may be too little, too late. The N-95 masks are said to offer better protection than cloth coverings and they’ll be passed out, three per adult, at pharmacies and health centers. Grassley says that will likely take a few weeks. “Presumably, unless there’s a new variant of the virus,” Grassley says, “I would say those masks are going to get out at a point where it’s not going to do much good.”

The government website to order the free COVID test kits crashed on Tuesday after being overloaded by heavy demand. “And then there’s a whole bunch of problems with getting the tests out,” Grassley says, “because people that live in apartments have the same address and things of that nature.” The test kits will be sent out in packages of four tests each, one package per household. Grassley says the logistics of labeling, mailing out and delivering millions of test kits over the next few weeks presents its own set of problems. “So, I hope that they’re able to overcome them so the tests can get out,” Grassley says, “even though we may be beyond this Omicron phase that we’re in now.”

To request a test kit, sign up at the website covidtests.gov. The N-95 masks are coming from the Strategic National Stockpile and the White House says this will be the largest deployment of personal protective equipment in the nation’s history.

(Radio Iowa) – The chairman of an Iowa House committee says after careful consideration, he’s decided now is not the time to change state law governing when property may be seized for pipelines. Republican Representative Bobby Kaufmann said last week that he was trying to craft a bill to require that a large percentage of landowners agree to a carbon pipeline before state regulators could approve seizure of the remaining property through eminent domain.

Yesterday (Wednesday), in a written statement, Kaufmann said rushing eminent domain changes through the legislature this year would send the wrong message to businesses AND to the landowners who’ve already signed easements for carbon pipelines and landowners still considering contracts.

Kaufmann says he’s passionate about private property rights, but he says it’s also important to send the message that Iowa’s legal, regulatory and tax structure is stable for new and existing business ventures.

(Radio Iowa) – A bill in the state senate would establish a 50-thousand dollar fine for any Iowa city and law enforcement agency where an officer enforces FEDERAL gun regulations that are stricter than the STATE’S. The bill is part of a campaign that has prompted county supervisors to designate 33 Iowa counties as “second amendment sanctuaries” where federal gun laws wouldn’t be enforced by local officials if the Biden Administration or congress were to enact tougher regulations.

Senator Zach Nunn of Bondurant, a Republican congressional candidate in Iowa’s third district, is the sponsor of the so-called Second Amendment Preservation Act. “We want to protect our law enforcement officers on the front line who are serving the community, but not deputize them as agents of a department or agency to go in and infringe upon an Iowan’s Second Amendment constitutional rights,” Nunn says.

Nunn says the bill needs some changes before it’s considered by a Senate committee. Sydney Gangestad is a lobbyist for “Everytown for Gun Safety” — a national group that supports gun control measures. She says the bill may penalize local police and sheriffs departments that work with federal authorities on gun-related investigations. “We believe this would have a chilling effect and that is a grave concern to us,” Gangestad says.

A lobbyist for the Iowa County Attorneys Association says the proposal could make it difficult for state and local agencies to enforce federal laws that forbid convicted domestic abusers from having guns. A similar bill has been passed in Missouri and nearly 60 Missouri police chiefs filed a lawsuit last week, seeking changes to clarify what is and isn’t permitted. One chief says Missouri’s law appears to prevent police from checking serial numbers to see if a gun is stolen.