Harvest Is Progressing Due To Recent Warm Weather
(Des Moines) — The warm weather last week allowed farmers to get in a lot of combine time as the corn harvest moved ahead by 10 percent and the soybean effort by 29 percent. State Agriculture Secretary Bill Northey says after worries about a late start and drought, farmers have been seeing some good
things.
He says some farmers are seeing better yields than they figured to have a few months ago.
The U-S-D-A crop report Monday showed that 23 percent of the corn crop has been harvested — which is the smallest percentage by this date since 2009 and more than two weeks behind average. The bean harvest moved to 61 percent — but is
also the smallest percentage harvested by this date since 2009. Northey says cooler weather doesn’t help with drying the crop — and as we head into the last full week of October — the urgency increases for farmers with crops still in the fields.
When the harvest conditions are right you can see combines crisscrossing the fields day and night.”
Northey farms near Spirit Lake and says he’s gotten all his beans harvested, but not the corn.
Former Farm Bureau President To Run For Agriculture Secretary Position
Former Iowa Farm Bureau president Craig Lang has filed the paperwork to launch a campaign for state ag secretary. Lang, a Republican, says several months ago he told Governor Kim Reynolds he intended to run if current Ag Secretary Bill
Northey resigned. Reynolds will name Northey’s replacement soon after Northey’s wins Senate confirmation for his new USDA federal job.
Lang says he doesn’t anticipate Governor Reynolds would appoint him, so he has made the decision. Lang says as soon as the U-S Senate confirms Northey, he will start his campaign. That means Lang will likely face a G-O-P primary in
2018 against the governor’s choice for state ag secretary. Lang says he wants to spark a statewide conversation about diversity in agriculture, rather than relying primarily on corn and soybean production.
Lang, who is 66 years old, farms with his two sons, a brother and his 91-year-old father.
Lang and his family, milks around 650 cows three times a day. They have a small cow-calf operation with about 50 cows and calves and they farm around 1200 acres. The milk from their farm near Brooklyn is sold to a dairy in Newton where Maytag Blue Cheese is made. Lang’s family plants cover crops on soybean ground and in fields right after corn silage is harvested. Six-hundred thousand acres of Iowa farmland is seeded with cover crops today. Lang says, as state ag secretary, he’d like to set a goal of having cover crops on five MILLION acres.
Lang was the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation’s president from 2001 through 2011. He also served as president of the board that governs the state universities, but Democrats in the Iowa Senate refused to reconfirm Lang to that post after the
conflict about the Tom Harkin Institute for Public Policy at Iowa State University. The institute is now located at Drake University.
Supreme Court Blocks Law Requiring Women To Wait Three Days Before Having An Abortion
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – The Iowa Supreme Court has temporarily blocked part of a new state law that requires a woman to wait three days before getting an
abortion.
The court granted a motion Monday that extends an injunction on the 72-hour waiting period until a lawsuit challenging the provision is resolved.
A district court judge recently upheld the waiting period. It is part of a law approved this year in the Republican-controlled Legislature that bans most abortions in the state after 20 weeks of pregnancy. The 20-week ban is in effect and is not a part of the legal challenge by Planned Parenthood of the Heartland
and the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa.
Gov. Kim Reynolds is named in the lawsuit. Her office says it doesn’t comment on pending litigation.
Crawford County Man Could Face 109 Years In Prison
DENISON, Iowa (AP) – A man convicted for causing a crash that killed a teenage girl will be sentenced in December, when he faces up to 109 years in prison.
A judge set Ramon Hernandez’s sentencing hearing for Dec. 8 in Crawford County District Court.
A Crawford County jury convicted Hernandez of vehicular homicide, three counts of distribution of a controlled substance to a minor and five other counts.
Authorities say Hernandez drove through a farm field with four teenagers in his car before it plunged into the Boyer River on Jan. 19. He and three of the others reached safety. The body of 15-year-old Yoana Acosta was found a week later on Jan. 26.
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Woodbury County Courthouse Needs $12 Million For Repairs
SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) – A consultant says the landmark Woodbury County Courthouse needs $12 million in exterior repairs.
The county supervisors said Tuesday after hearing a report from consultant Pete Franks that they’ll decide at a future meeting when to start the repairs and how to pay for them.
The exterior has deteriorated so much that officials have been able to pull entire bricks from the foundation in some places. County officials last year had estimated the repair price tag at $2.1 million.
The courthouse – considered the largest publicly owned Prairie School-design building in the world – was put on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1996.
The supervisors are planning 100th anniversary activities for the building next spring.
Toyota Passes On Iowa For Future Auto Plant
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) – Iowa has lost out on its effort to land a new Toyota-Mazda manufacturing plant and its 4,000 jobs. State officials had submitted a site in Cedar Rapids for the $1.6 billion project. Iowa Economic Development Authority spokeswoman Kanan Kappelman said Tuesday that the state apparently didn’t meet the project requirements. Neighboring Nebraska learned earlier this month that it, too, was no
longer being considered. The companies haven’t announced yet where the plant will go, but officials have said the three finalists are all situated in the Southeast.
West Des Moines Police To Wear Body Cameras
WEST DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – West Des Moines police will soon join other Des Moines-area departments in requiring its officers to wear body cameras.
The Des Moines Register reports that West Des Moines officers will begin wearing the cameras Nov. 1.
Officers will wear them at all times, but the cameras will only record in certain cases, including during investigations and some contact with the public.
Each video is kept for 90 days if it’s not considered evidence, or 180 days if it is.
West Des Moines paid $120,000 for 72 cameras and the related software. More than half of the funds came from money seized by the department in criminal drug cases.
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