(Cumberland, Iowa) – Rescue crews and law enforcement were dispatched at around 4:50-a.m., to a single-vehicle accident near Cumberland, this (Tuesday) morning. According to dispatch information, a vehicle struck a deer, causing the airbags to deploy in the vehicle, which was on the traveled portion of the road in the opposite lane of travel.

Cumberland-Massena Rescue, Wiota Rescue, Cass EMS were responding to the scene near 680th and Lansing. A Cass County Deputy reported a 32-year-old female in the vehicle was reportedly having some chest pain, but no other injuries were immediately noted. Rescue crews were deployed to check out both occupants. Additional information is not currently available.

Gowrie, Iowa/KCCI — A former teacher in Webster County has been arrested and charged with sexual exploitation by a school employee. According to KCCI, 29-year-old Brandon Louis is the former choir director at Southeast Valley High School in Gowrie.

His arrest comes after a yearlong investigation involving search warrants and dozens of current and former students interviewed.  Louis resigned last fall amid allegations he sent inappropriate messages to students. Sexual exploitation by a school employee is a Class D felony.

Brian Johnson, the superintendent of Southeast Valley Schools, told the TV station the district has cooperated since the beginning of the investigation.

(Radio Iowa) – A district court judge has ruled an Iowa law that blocks Medicaid coverage of gender confirmation surgery is unconstitutional. The A-C-L-U of Iowa filed a lawsuit after Aiden Vasquez and Mika Covington were denied state-paid Medicaid coverage for surgeries their doctors said were medically necessary to treat gender dysphoria. Judge William P. Kelly’s ruling says those denials violated the Iowa Civil Rights Act and Iowa’s Constitution.

The legal director for the A-C-L-U of Iowa says it’s a historic win for transgender Iowans. A spokesman for Governor Kim Reynolds says the governor’s office disagrees with the ruling and is exploring all options, including appealing the district court’s ruling to the Iowa Supreme Court.

(Radio Iowa) – U.S. Senate candidate Abby Finkenauer is calling on congress and the Biden Administration to close a corporate tax loophole AND temporarily suspend the federal gas tax. “Immediately action that could be felt across Iowa and across the country for the families who need it most,” she says. According to Triple-A, the average price in Iowa for unleaded gasoline is three-dollars-and-14 cents a gallon. Finkenauer, a Democrat from Cedar Rapids, says the 18-point-four cents per gallon tax should be suspended while oil companies are investigated over allegations of price gouging.

“As folks are struggling right now with gas prices as they are and as they continue to rise even though we’ve seen the price of oil go down, I just want to make sure that we have leaders in D.C. who are holding those companies accountable if they are doing something wrong, but again aren’t just yelling about the problem but are also trying to find solutions for families who need it right now.” In 2008, presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and John McCain both proposed a gas tax holiday, while Barack Obama called the proposal a short-term quick fix that did nothing to address underlying problems in the market. Finkenauer says she’s not calling for getting rid of the federal tax forever, but a temporary suspension.

“We need an immediate fix,” Finkenauer says, “and we need something that can be felt during the holidays and that’s why this is so important here.” To make up for the reducton in the federal gas taxes that pay for transportation projects, Finkenauer says congress should immediately close tax loopholes for American corporations that outsource jobs to other countries. Finkenauer is one of four Democrats running for their party’s 2022 U.S. Senate nomination and the chance to challenge Republican Senator Chuck Grassley’s bid for an eighth term.

(Radio Iowa) – The number of people who have gotten cards to be eligible for medical marijuana has gone way up. Program Bureau Chief, Owen Parker, spoke about the numbers at the recent meeting of the board which oversees the program. He says at the beginning of November they surpassed eight thousand patients, and he says they continue to see some of their higher patient numbers. “If we go back to this time last year, it’s a 44 percent increase. This time last year we were about 45-hundred patients,” Parker said.

He says an increase in the number of practitioners who can prescribe medical marijuana, new products, and the new T-H-C limit have all contributed. “If you think back to last year or the year before we were processing 100 or between 100 and 200 applications — in the month of October we did 750 — so the volume continues to stair-step up,” he said. Vaporized products began selling in August of 2019, and were nearly 51-percent of sales in 2020. Products with a high T-H-C level made up nearly 65 percent of sales. Parker says the increase in patients has led to an increase in sales.

“During the first ten months of 2021, we’ve done almost five million dollars in sales as a program. If we go back to the cumulative number of sales that dispensaries were doing last year –that’s quite a bit of an increase. Again that is largely due to some of those new formulations,” Parker said. Parker said they also had been down two dispensaries — but the new Iowa City dispensary opened in October — which is also part of the increase in sales. Another new dispensary will open soon.

The Mills County Sheriff’s Office on Monday (Today), reported three arrests. On Friday, 26-year-old Ruben Toledo, Jr., of Council Bluffs, was arrested at the Pottawattamie County Jail, on a warrant for Burglary in the 1st Degree, and Domestic Abuse Assault. His bond was set at $11,000. And, 34-year-old William Dean Meredith, of Glenwood, was arrested at the Pott. County Jail Friday, on a warrant for Domestic Abuse Assault, and Violation of Probation. His bond was set at $5,300.

Sunday afternoon, 47-year-old John McCormack Lewis, Jr., of Malvern, was arrested at the Mills County Jail, on a warrant for Harassment in the 2nd Degree, with bond set at $1,000.

And, officials say a woman complained of neck pain following an accident Sunday afternoon, in Mills County, but she refused medical treatment from Glenwood Fire Medics. The Sheriff’s Office says a 2007 Ford driven by Paul Burk, of Clarinda, had pulled into a driveway on 221st Street at around 1:20-p.m., when – according to Burk – a 2004 Toyota driven by 18-year-old Madalin Kuder, of Glenwood, crossed over the west side fog line and struck his vehicle.

Kuder said she was going straight and that Burk pulled in front of her. A woman in Burk’s vehicle who complained of pain, said she was looking to the east and did not see the Ford, but felt it when the vehicles collided. Burk claimed there was a third-party, non-contact vehicle behind him that saw the Toyota hit the Ford outside of the roadway, but authorities said that person was not on the scene, and no contact information was available to confirm Burk’s assertion.

Deputies issued Burk a written warning for Failure to Yield upon left turn, based on the evidence available at the scene.