(Radio Iowa) – Blood donation centers across Iowa are taking part in an effort next weekend to set a world’s record for most blood donors in a single day.

Danielle West, spokeswoman for LifeServe Blood Center, says as part of the Global Blood Heroes Day campaign, they’re urging people to sign up to donate a pint on Saturday, August 27th. West says donations are typically slow during the summertime though the need for blood is usually higher.

“With the Iowa State Fair and things like that, people are not thinking about giving, so hopefully, they’ll come in after that and come in on this day,” West says. “We do have a lot of great incentives for our blood donors in our online store. We have a great summer promotion t-shirt that people can get. So I’m hoping that this will bring people in or bring awareness to someone who’s maybe never thought about donating before either.”

The current record is around 33,000 blood donors in a single day and the campaign is aiming to shatter that record with 50,000 donors globally. West says she’s hoping Iowans will join in.  “There’s another community blood center in Iowa called ImpactLife and between ImpactLife and LifeServe, we cover about 99.9% of the state of Iowa as far as the hospitals we support,” West says. “So this is a real community blood center effort to hopefully get people into their community blood center which will support their community hospital.”

Donors in 20 countries across six continents are taking part in Global Blood Heroes Day on the 27th. All blood types are in short supply, West says, so they could use some help from all Iowa donors. “People assumed during the pandemic that we really felt the impact, which we did, but we are lower this year than we have been the last couple of years,” West says. “I think people are getting back to their normal lives and vacations and things that they’ve been holding off doing, and we’ve felt the impact with lower donor turnout.”

LifeServe has 11 Iowa offices in: Ames, Ankeny, Cedar Falls, Des Moines, Fort Dodge, Marshalltown, Mason City, Pella, Sioux City, Urbandale and West Des Moines. To schedule an appointment, visit lifeservebloodcenter.org or call 800-287-4903. ImpactLife, formerly the Mississippi Valley Regional Blood Center, has nine offices in seven Iowa cities: Burlington, Cedar Rapids, Davenport, Dubuque, Iowa City, Muscatine and Ottumwa. Contact ImpactLife at bloodcenter.org or call 800-747-5401.

(Radio Iowa) – A new report shows Iowa led the nation in the amount of wind power that came online during April, May and June. Nearly 60 percent of the electricity being generated in Iowa comes from wind turbines and solar installations. Jeff Danielson is a vice president of the Clean Grid Alliance. “The wind is at Iowans’ backs is the message,” Danielson says. Iowa has a trifecta when it comes to so-called clean energy, according to Danielson.

“The future is bright and our batteries are charged up and ready to go because both solar and investment and battery storage investment — Iowa is an attractive place for investment in those two as well.” According to the Clean Grid Alliance, Iowa ranks third in the nation for its capacity to store renewable energy in battery facilities. There’s currently some push back on proposed wind farms near Algona, Shenandoah and Sioux City.

MidAmerican has said its proposed wind farm in Woodbury County won’t move forward if county supervisors update an ordinance requiring more space between wind turbines and homes. Danielson says that resistance isn’t unexpected, as property owner often have strong opinions about what is being built around them. “We’re confident that Iowans see the value and the wisdom of clean energy over the long haul and still today the vast majority of projects are approved,” Danielson says. “The business environment is still really positive in Iowa.”

Landowners who agree to have a turbine on their property, as part of a company’s larger wind farm project, are paid a yearly stipend. Yearly payments are also part of large scale solar installations. “Wind and solar farms in Iowa are long term relationships with the individual land owners,” Danielson says. “It’s actually a farmer’s value added business. It’s another way to diversity their revenue.” That differs from negotiations for the proposed carbon capture pipelines, which involve a one-time payment for property easements.

This is American Clean Power Week. Governor Reynolds signed a proclamation about solar power this week. According to the industry, solar panel related investment last year topped 187-million dollars.

(Radio Iowa) – A Story County man is facing several charges after a homemade explosive device was found at his home. Story County Sheriff’s deputies went to the Ledgestone Meadows mobile home park in Story City where 29-year-old Tyler Hammond lives after seeing an online video of him shooting at traffic signs with a rifle while driving. Deputies found the homemade explosive device during their search and evacuated the mobile home park until the Fire Marshal’s Office disabled the explosive device.

Hammond was charged with having a weapon as a domestic abuse offender, reckless use of a firearm shooting across a highway, and driving under suspension. The Sheriff’s office says additional charges are pending.

(Radio Iowa) – The Democrat running to be Iowa’s top election official says Governor Reynolds and her fellow Republicans in the legislature have made it far more difficult to vote by mail or vote early at a county auditor’s office. “When you’re delivering government services, it’s supposed to be about making things convenient. It’s supposed to be making your product and service more accessible. That’s not what the 2021 laws did.” That’s Joel Miller. He’s been Linn County’s Auditor for over 15 years.

“We used to have 40 days of early voting in 2016. Now we have 20,” Miller says. “It used to be the deadline to submit an absentee ballot request to a county auditor was three days before the election. Now it’s 15 days before the election.” Miller says 101 Linn County voters missed that deadline to vote early in the June Primary and half of them wound up NOT voting. Other county auditors saw a similar drop off according to Miller. “That can have huge ramifications this fall,” Miller says. Miller is challenging Republican Secretary of State Paul Pate’s bid for reelection. Miller questions why Pate is spending resources on his Iowa Businesses Against Trafficking initiative.

“I am against human trafficking. I’m sure you’re against human trafficking, but there’s an office to combat human trafficking within the Department of Public Safety that’s been there almost 10 years,” Miller says. “Go look up the duties of the Secretary of State. You will not find any duties related to human trafficking…Yes, he’s bringing visibility, but he’s wasting tax dollars.” Miller made his comments on the Des Moines Register’s Political Soapbox at the Iowa State Fair.

The Secretary of State’s office is where businesses in Iowa register their trade names and earlier this year Pate says he aims to build a statewide coalition of businesses who share the goal of ending human trafficking in Iowa. An Iowa Republican Party spokesman says Pate’s record of safe and secure elections speaks for itself, as turnout has been increasing alongside new election integrity measures.

(Radio Iowa) – Researchers at Iowa State University say they’re making progress toward finding ways so people don’t get “cybersick” when using virtual reality headsets. Jonathan Kelly, an I-S-U professor of psychology and human computer interaction, says cybersickness can be temporarily debilitating — and a big turnoff toward using the technology.  “It commonly includes nausea, sweating, dizziness, headache and eyestrain,” Kelly says. Earlier studies showed that more than half of first-time virtual reality headset users experienced cybersickness within ten minutes. The new I-S-U research is finding the more a person uses V-R, the less woozy they become.

“Exposure to virtual reality seems to gradually reduce this experience of cybersickness,” Kelly says. “This is similar to other forms of motion sickness, car sickness, sea sickness, where for most people, if they experienced that sickness initially, it will eventually reduce over repeated exposures.” Studies involving about 150 I-S-U undergrads found that most experienced little to no cybersickness after three V-R sessions of 20 minutes each. Kelly says there are tools that can be used to minimize cybersickness. “They generally degrade the visual information in the virtual world, but by doing so, they reduce the experience of cybersickness,” Kelly says. “So we’re interested in whether adaptation under those circumstances will also serve the purpose of adapting them to cyber sickness so we can later open up the visual world to them more fully.”

ISU student Taylor Doty using VR. (ISU-photo)

V-R isn’t just for playing video games. It’s being used in all sorts of professions from military training to health care. Since so many people get sick during their first attempts, Kelly says it makes sense to ease users into V-R.  “You could imagine that someday there would be kind of a training protocol,” Kelly says. “That would gently adapt virtual reality users so that they can be immune to cyber sickness and other applications that they might explore later on.”

As internet connections improve and prices on V-R gear come down, Kelly predicts most people will at least be exposed to virtual reality either through entertainment or their jobs.

(Radio Iowa) – Democrat Tom Miller, the nation’s longest serving attorney general, says if he’s elected to an 11th term, he’ll continue to pursue cases against companies that scam Iowans.  “I just feel very lucky to be attorney general because we get to use the law to serve the interests of ordinary Iowans,” Miller says. Miller says consumer protection efforts in the office extend to farmers and the current investigation of sky high fertilizer prices. “Most of all, we’re communicating the message: ‘Somebody is watching,'” Miller says. “We’re working with the Department of Ag, with (U.S. Agriculture Secretary) Tom Vilsack and with the farm groups.”

Miller made his comments on the Des Moines Register’s Political Soapbox at the Iowa State Fair. Brenna Bird, the Republican running against Miller this year, spoke at the same venue earlier this week. Bird vows that as attorney general, she would go to federal court to challenge Biden Administration policies. “It looks like our attorney general is Biden’s attorney general,” Bird says. “…He joined a lot of lawsuits against the Trump Administration. Remember that?” Miller says Bird would pursue a partisan agenda as attorney general. “Her passion is for this extreme anti-regulation, extreme economics,” Miller says.

Bird also accuses Miller of failing to actively engage with local law enforcement. “I meet all the time with sheriffs that have never met him, not once, not even shook his hand,” Bird says, “so you know that will certainly change when I’m attorney general.” In response, Miller says he and his staff each year work on up to 13-hundred of the toughest criminal prosecutions in state court. “We’ve developed a great relationship with law enforcement. We work a lot with them on these cases — Department of Public Safety, but local law enforcement as well,” Miller says. “It’s a relationship of respect, trust and common good. We really see the need to protect Iowans.”

Miller was first elected attorney general in 1978. He did not seek re-election in 1990 when he ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic Party’s nomination for governor. Miller was re-elected attorney general in 1994 and is currently serving his 10th term.