RURAL DEVELOPMENT GRANTS AND LOANS
Some northwest Iowa projects are receiving grants and loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
USDA Rural Development State Director Theresa Greenfield says the agency is investing over $28-million dollars in 11 projects across the state.
North West Rural Electric Cooperative received a million dollar loan to help Northwestern College to build a residence hall on the Orange City campus.
Alta Municipal Utilities will receive a $10,405,000 loan and a $2,995,000 grant to provide clean drinking water to the city by constructing a reverse osmosis treatment facility.
Alta will also replace asbestos cement pipes to bring their aged distribution system up to modern standards.
The city of Linn Grove in Buena Vista County received a $994,000 loan and a $1,7-million dollar grant to help connect its water system with Iowa Lakes Regional Water’s bulk-treated water supply.
IOWANS TO HELP TEXANS WITH BORDER SECURITY
Governor Kim Reynolds is sending a small group of Iowa law officers and dozens of Iowa National Guard soldiers to assist Texas authorities with border security. This is the third time Reynolds has deployed Iowans to Texas. One hundred-ten Iowa National Guard soldiers will start a month-long tour of duty Monday with the Texas Military Department. Eight state troopers and two Iowa Department of Public Safety sergeants will leave Iowa Sunday for a 28 day stint in Texas. Reynolds says Texas faces nothing short of an invasion with historic levels of illegal immigrants and the Iowans she’s sending south will be frontline help for Texas. All the people the governor’s deploying to Texas are volunteers and Reynolds says she’ll use pandemic relief money to cover their expenses.
GRASSLEY IMMIGRATION
US Senator Chuck Grassley says states should protect their own borders if the federal government does not.
Grassley referred to laws in Texas and Iowa which allow them to return illegal immigrants to their home countries.
States can constitutionally protect their borders if the President does not.
Grassley says defending the US border should be a priority
The U.S. welcomes people who come to the this country through the regular channels.
ANOTHER TRY AT EXPANDING BENEFITS FOR FIRST RESPONDERS
Lawmakers in the Iowa House are making another attempt to change benefits for first responders covered by Iowa’s municipal retirement system. Under current law, firefighters, police and EMTs are eligible for disability as well as death benefits if they’re diagnosed with one of 14 types of cancer. Earlier this year, the House unanimously approved a bill to extend disability and death benefits for Iowa police and firefighters diagnosed with any type of cancer, but the plan failed to pass a senate committee by a mid-March deadline. Today (Wednesday), the same bill cleared the House Ways and Means Committee. The bill also says police and firefighters qualify for accidental disability benefits if a mental injury, including P-T-S-D, is linked to an on-duty incident.
DNR RELEASES FISH KILL NUMBERS FROM RED OAK FERTILIZER SPILL
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources says the fertilizer spill near Red Oak in Montgomery County earlier this month killed nearly all the fish in an almost 50-mile stretch of the East Nishnabotna River to the Missouri border. NEW Cooperative in Red Oak notified the D-N-R March 11th of a release after a storage tank valve was left open. Approximately 265-thousand gallons of liquid nitrogen fertilizer flowed into a drainage ditch, then into the East Nishnabotna River. D-N-R Fisheries staff counted more than 749-thousand dead fish in the East Nishnabotna and Nishnabotna Rivers downstream of the spill. The kill continued in Missouri’s portion of the Nishnabotna River and ended near the confluence with the Missouri River. The D-N-R says it is working with its legal staff to determine what action they might take.
