(Council Bluffs, Iowa) – Connections Area Agency on Aging is looking for new members to join the organization’s Advisory Council. The Council meets bimonthly on the second Thursday from 10:00a.m.-12:00p.m at our regional offices in Council Bluffs, Creston, or Sioux City, or by zoom.  Officials say the advisory council helps to manage and guide Connections Area Agency on Aging’s work in the twenty-county region including Adair, Adams, Cass, Clarke, Cherokee, Decatur, Fremont, Harrison, Ida, Mills, Monona, Montgomery, Page, Plymouth, Pottawattamie, Ringgold, Shelby, Taylor, Union, and Woodbury counties.

Currently there are vacancies in most counties. If you are interested in learning more contact Aubury Krueger-Kutchara at 800-432-9209 ext 8132 or akrueger@connectionsaaa.org

Connections Area Agency is one of six Area Agencies on Aging in Iowa, and part of a nationwide network. With a mission of enhancing the quality of life for elders in 20 counties through education, planning and coordination of services, Connections Area Agency on Aging is the premier agency for assisting elders, caregivers, and their families to access the information and services needed for independence and life transitions. Offices are in Council Bluffs, Creston and Sioux City.

For more information, contact Connections AAA at 800-432-9209 or at www.connectionsaaa.org

Coralville, Iowa – Officials with the Iowa Department of Corrections, Monday, said 75-year-old Jeffrey Lynn Hannah was pronounced dead due to natural causes at 6:47 a.m. on Friday, May 19, 2023 at the Iowa Medical and Classification Center.

Hannah had been serving a 25-year maximum term for the crime of Sex Abuse – 2nd Degree from Kossuth County. His sentence began on June 3, 2015.

(Radio Iowa) – State Auditor Rob Sand says a bill sent to the governor that would limit the auditor’s access to some confidential information could lead to a lot of extra time in court. “If the governor signs the bill then we’re going to have to see how it’s applied and what it is that they do to prevent our access to records — and at that point and every point thereafter we’ll be trying to figure out whether or not there’s a challenge on a constitutional basis that’s worth bringing,” Sand says.

Sand, who is the only Democrat holding a statewide office, spoke to the Sioux City Rotary Club and later held a town hall in Onawa. He says the bill has been a hot topic. “I think there’s actually a pretty surprising level of knowledge but a surprising level of concern about it and I’m gonna keep talking about it until every Iowan in the state knows exactly what it is and what it does,” he says.

Sand says if the governor signs the bill the state auditor would need to get approval from a three-member panel to take a state agency to court. The auditor, the department being audited and the governor would each appoint someone to the panel. Sand says they would let everyone know which agency is trying to “hide” information. “That’s again one of the things where I think that I’m not sure that the people who are advocating this bill have really thought through it,” Sand says. “Because if they deny us access to records we have a legal and ethical obligation to disclose that and then everyone is going to be left wondering what it is that they’re hiding.”

Rob-Sand.-(KSCJ-photo)

He says taxpayers should be concerned about the potential information the panel could allow to stay hidden. “Corruption and waste at the government level is your tax dollars. This is our government. And the idea that people in trust and power in those positions would use that power to reduce oversight of themselves and make it so they could sweep things under the rug is, I think an affront to our Constitution the idea of self governance but also to your pocketbook,” Sand says.

Governor Kim Reynolds has not commented on the bill.

(Red Oak, Iowa) – Two men were arrested on separate warrants Monday, in Red Oak. According to Red Oak Police, 45-year-old Chad Michael Hill, of Red Oak, was arrested at around 10:50-p.m., on an active Mills County warrant for Driving While Barred. Hill was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $2,000 cash-only bond.

And, a little after 7-p.m. Monday, 52-year-old Richard Bryan Jenkins, of Red Oak, was arrested on an active Montgomery County warrant for Failure to Appear on an Unlawful Possession of Prescription Drug, charge. Jenkins was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $1,000 bond.

(Radio Iowa) – Historic buildings that used to be part of Maytag’s campus in Newton will be renovated into a hotel and an apartment building. The former Maytag campus was donated to Des Moines Area Community College in 2016 — nine years after Maytag closed. The college has sold nearly four acres to a Des Moines developer who plans to repurpose four buildings and open the hotel and apartments next year.

Kim Didier , the executive director of business resources for DMACC, says the two buildings that will become a boutique hotel have “The Maytag Company” written in large letters along the rooftops.  “Very iconic for the community and for Maytag over the years,” she says. The two buildings were built in the early 1900s. Another building nearby, completed in 1914, will be converted into 70 apartments.

“A brick building, exposed rafters, wooden floors — just very historic,” Didier says. “Kind of a warehouse, factory feel to it.” A smaller building next door will have some amenities for the apartment dwellers. According to a DMACC news release, the hotel and apartment building project will cost about 35 million dollars. DMACC will continue to have an academic center nearby.

“DMACC on the Newton campus has a baking program,” Didier says, “and we’re very hopeful we’ll be able to have that kind of collaboration and synergy where the baked goods that would be offered in the hotel restaurant or just as a cafe would be coming from our culinary program, our baking program.” Didier, who used to work at Maytag, has lived in Newton for 24 years. She says there’s been a lot of collaboration in the community to get this latest project going.

“It’s monumental and transformational,” Didier says, “and we think will continue to propel the redevelopment of the rest of the buildings that were part of the Maytag headquarters.”A couple of other former Maytag buildings already have been turned into commercial space. A brewery and a pub are among the 18 tenants. “We’ve had this vision of really creating this mixed use neighborhood that would have the residential component,” Didier says, “that would have the retail.”

Maytag was founded in 1893 and by the 1920s one of every five washing machines in America was made in Newton. The company was sold to Whirlpool in 2006 and a year later operations in Newton were shut down. There were three previous owners of the emptied out Maytag campus until DMACC took over. The State of Iowa is providing a 14 million dollar “reinvestment district award” that will support the development of the apartments and hotel as well as several other related projects in Newton.

(Corydon, Iowa) – Two people were injured during a head-on crash Monday afternoon, east of Corydon, in Wayne County. The Iowa State Patrol reports a 2014 Dodge van driven by 72-year-old Norman George, of Allerton, was traveling west on Highway 2, and was attempting to pass a 1967 John Deere 40-20 farm tractor pulling a hay trailer, when the van hit the rear of the tractor/hay trailer, causing the van to be pushed into coming traffic. The tractor was operated by 68-year-old George H. Harders, of Corydon.

The van then struck a 2014 Chevy Sonic head-on before rolling over. The impact resulted in the car entering the north ditch. The tractor/hay trailer stopped on the right shoulder of the road. The crash happened at around 2:35-p.m.

Norman George, and the driver of the Chevy Sonic, 34-year-old Robert W. Schuler, of Seymour, suffered severe injuries and were flown by Mercy One helicopter to Mercy Hospital, in Des Moines.

The Patrol says George was not wearing a seat belt.