Home News KLEM News AM Update June 10, 2010

KLEM News AM Update June 10, 2010

(LE MARS)–A patriotic parade is planned in Le Mars for the Fourth of July holiday on Monday, July 5.

A group of volunteers is arranging a parade and patriotic ceremony on July 5th. This will be the fifth celebration which features a short parade and a ceremony at Plymouth County Veterans Memorial Park.

One of the organizers, Don Law, says a new memorial will be dedicated honoring those Plymouth County Veterans who have died while in the service to their country since September 11th, 2001.

Wayne Thieman, who is working with Law and Mike Donlin, says the parade might be short in distance but it’s long on patriotic spirit.

The parade will begin at 10 a-m on July fifth at the Le Mars Community School’s north lot. Parade participants should be at the lot by 9 a-m to line up. The route is 10 blocks.

Donlin says anyone can be in the parade but patriotic red, white and blue themed entries that aren’t commercial or political are encouraged.

The brief program at the Plymouth County Veterans Memorial Park will begin after the parade. The program begins with the National Anthem, includes prayer, remarks by guest speakers and ends with the 21-gun salute and Taps. A lunch with a free will donation will follow.

(LE MARS)–A source of income for the city of Le Mars is less than expected.

City administrator Scott Langel explains the income streams for local option sales and hotel motel taxes are lower.

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As an example, the city anticipated up to 75 thousand dollars a month for local option sales tax (LOST) income. But Langel says recent Iowa Department of Revenue estimates for the three months through June, are just over 55-thousand dollars a month which is about 20-thousand dollars a month less.

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Council member Delana Ihrke last week voted against funding 10-thousand dollars each year for three years for an Interest Buy-Down program to be used by the Le Mars Business Initiative (LBIC). The program request was for local option sales tax to fund the Interest Buy-Down. Ihrke cited the new information on the revenue after her no vote. Council member Rex Knapp also voted no.

(KANSAS CITY)-Two northwest Iowa feedlot operations are accused of failing to comply with the Clean Water Act.

Chris Whitley of the Kansas City office of the Environmental Protection Agency issued written information about the enforcement actions.

Groeneweg Farm of Rock Valley has been ordered to apply for a Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit. The medium size feedlot has also been ordered to meet requirements that end what it stated were unauthorized discharges of pollutants into an unnamed tributary of the Rock River in Sioux County.

Gradert/Cia-Don /Winterfeld Feedlot of Ireton has been ordered to apply for an NPDES permit and complete wastewater controls on its facility by the end of October of next year. The rural Ireton feedlot operator has also been ordered to end what the E-P-A’s information describes as unauthorized discharges of pollutants into Six Mile Creek in Sioux County.

The press release described the actions involving the feedlots as part of a continuing enforcement emphasis aimed at ending discharges from concentrated animal feeding operations.

 (KINGSLEY)–A smooth ride is being readied for thousands of bicyclists who will pedal out of Kingsley 45 days from now.

Bike riders in the Des Moines Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa (RAGBRAI) July 25th will trek through Kingsley which is along the first day route from Sioux City to Storm Lake.

Plymouth County engineer Tom Rohe will work with a concrete repair crew from Harry Vander Pol’s Orange City business for repairs east of Kingsley on county road C-66.

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Rohe provided the update to the board of supervisors this week. The RAGBRAI riders travel on C-66 to Washta.

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AMES, Iowa (AP) Hours after the primary election ballots were counted, the general election race for Iowa governor began with Democratic Gov. Chet Culver heading to a school and Republican challenger Terry Branstad meeting with business s leaders.

The events Wednesday at a Des Moines elementary school and a business convention in Ames seemed to show the candidatewere trying to appeal to important groups of supporters. For Culver, that’s women, who Democrats believe are strong supporters of early childhood education, and for Branstad it’s the business community.

Both candidates agreed the November general election would offer voters a sharp contrast.

Branstad on Tuesday won a three-way race for the Republican nomination. Culver ran unopposed.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) Michael Kiernan is resigning as chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party, citing health reasons.

Kiernan announced Wednesday he would resign effective Thursday, and in a memo to the party’s Central Committee he explained that in January he had discovered a lump below his right ear. Testing showed Kiernan has a tumor in the deep lobe of his saliva gland.

The 35-year-old Kiernan says he’s working with his doctor on a plan of treatment.

The Central Committee will begin meeting to pick a successor. In the interim, Vice Chairwoman Sue Dvorsky will act as head of the party.

Kiernan became chairman last year. He previously was a partner in a home renovation business and served on the Des Moines City Council. His wife, Erin, is a news anchor for WHO-TV.

WATERLOO, Iowa (AP) A Black Hawk County judge has sentenced a decorated Navy veteran to 15 years in prison for driving his car at a Waterloo police officer.

District Court Judge George Stigler imposed the sentence Wednesday on 38-year-old Deon Lemar Mosley of Waterloo on a charge of assault on a peace officer. Mosley was ordered to serve the sentence concurrent with a fifteen-year sentence on second-degree theft and a five-year sentence for eluding police.

Mosley’s mother, Theresa Mosley, asked Stigler to consider her son’s military service during Operation Desert Storm and his struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Mosley entered a guilty plea to the assault charge Feb. 25 for driving his car at officer Kevin Boyland in June of last year.

Prosecutors say Boyland was attempting to arrest Mosley for a parole violation when the incident occurred.

WEBSTER CITY, Iowa (AP) A Hamilton County District Court jury has begun deliberations in the murder trial of 15-year-old Edgar Concepcion Jr..

The jury received the case about 4 p.m. Wednesday but went home for the evening a few minutes later. Deliberations will continue Thursday.

Earlier today, the prosecution and defense offered closing arguments in the case that accuses Concepcion of sexually abusing and killing his 3-year-old cousin, Krystel Banes, at his family’s Charles City home on July 10, 2009.

The trial is being held in Hamilton County District Court on a change of venue.

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) Police have confirmed that the young woman kidnapped from a Cedar Rapids gas station last month stabbed her abductor before officers arrived.

Cedar Rapids Police Chief Greg Graham said Wednesday that the 19-year-old victim fought back inside Keith Elson Jr.’s apartment on the morning of May 17.

Officers kicked in Elson’s door about seven hours after the victim was abducted at knife point, and found both the 54-year-old Elson and the victim inside.

Medics brought both out on a stretchers. Police said Elson had a stab wound to his chest, but would not originally say who inflicted it.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) A Marshalltown man who won $1 million in the Powerball lottery last year has been charged with supplying alcohol to a minor and prescription drug possession.

Marshalltown Police Assistant Chief Brian Batterson says Ricky Rushton was arrested early Tuesday after officers responded to a complaint about underage drinking at his business, Memories Banquet Hall.

Batterson said Wednesday that officers found an underage employee at the business who was intoxicated.

Rushton was arrested for supplying alcohol to a minor. He was also charged with possession of a prescription drug and violating a city liquor license ordinance.

Rushton on Wednesday called his arrest “a big misunderstanding.” He says he’s in the process of hiring an attorney “to get this cleared up.”

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) A Jacksonville, Florida, man is facing federal charges in the case of a missing Iowa girl.

The FBI charged 35-year-old Justin David Carter on Tuesday with traveling across state lines to have sex with a minor. He was initially arrested on minor drugs charges Sunday, after the missing 12-year-old girl was found in a tent a few blocks away from Carter’s home.

Police in Muscatine, Iowa, were contacted by the seventh-grader’s parents Friday. The parents said they couldn’t reach her since receiving a text message that afternoon.

The girl’s friends had told the parents that she was going to Texas or Florida with an older boyfriend. The girl’s cell phone records led authorities to Carter, who remains in custody.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) University leaders admit they have few answers to a surge in alcohol arrests on their campuses.

University of Iowa President Sally Mason says her school is attempting to analyze what is going on, but has come up with no single or simple answer.

Mason said there could be an increase in charges because UI has significantly increased the number of public safety officers and is assisting Iowa City police with patrolling downtown.

The University of Iowa reported a 53 percent increase in alcohol-related offenses between Jan. 1 and March 31 when compared with the same period in 2009. There also has been a spike in driving-under-the-influence offenses.

Iowa State University saw a 46 percent increase in alcohol-related offenses. The University of Northern Iowa reported marginal increases in disorderly-conduct and drunken driving offenses.

(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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