IOWA ETHANOL PRODUCTION STEADY LAST YEAR
Iowa Ethanol produciton held steady last year at 4.6 billion gallons. While corn yields increased, ethanol demand in the U.S. was stagnant. That resulted in lower farm income. Executive Director Monte Shaw with the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association says the near term solution is to secure nationwid,e year-round E15. Other solutions include devleoping more lowcarbon export markets, and eveloping sustainable aviation fuel using ethanol. Iowa ethanol production was also .4.6 billion gallons in 2023. Last year, U.S. ethanol production was over 16 billion gallons. Iowa’s production was almost 30% of that amount.
IOWA SENATORS SEEK TO MAKE MODIFIED FAFSA RULES PERMANENT
Iowa’s U.S. Senators — Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst — are co-sponsoring a bill to make sure small business owners and farmers don’t have to list land and equipment as assets on their child’s Free Application for Federal Student Aid or FAFSA. Grassley says farmers are land and asset rich, but cash poor, with assets tht can’t be easily sold to pay for college. After an update in the FAFSA forms, Biden Administration rules for the current school year required parents who owned farmland as an investment to list it as an asset — but parents who own land they’re farming on had to list their land as an asset, too and Ernst says it meant farm kids got less federal aid for college. The policy was reversed last year, for the financial aid applications for the 2025-26 school year. The bill Ernst and Grassley are co-sponsoring makes the policy permanent. Grassley says that way a regulation writer in the federal government can’t change it back.
LCSD BOARD ACTS ON BOND SALE
The process of hiring a construction manager for the Le Mars elementary school project passed a deadline this week. Qualifications for potential candidates were to be submitted by Wednesday. Now comes the task of winnowing down the list to find the most qualified candidates. The candidates will be interviewed on April 1 by members of the school board and school district consultant ISG. Three board members, Chairman Aaron Tolzin, Zach Lancaster and Zach Davis volunteered to carry out the interviews.
This week the Le Mars Community School Board also took steps to issue bonds for construction of a new elementary school campus. The school board this week approved an agreement to hire Piper Sandler and Co. to serve as financial advisor for the bond issue. Another agreement names Ahlers and Cooney the legal representative of the board for the sale. The board then passed a resolution authorizing the sale of up to 49.9 million dollars in bonds in order to raise construction funds for the 67 million dollars project. The rest will be covered by the district’s penny tax.
NEW BISHOP NAMED FOR SIOUX CITY DIOCESE
The Sioux City Catholic Diocese will soon have a new bishop.
Pope Francis has accepted the request for retirement of bishop Walker Nickless and has appointed father John Keehner of the diocese of Youngstown, Ohio as the eighth bishop of the Diocese of Sioux City.
Bishop Nickless has served the Diocese of Sioux City since January of 2006.
He formally submitted his resignation and request for retirement to the holy father on May 28, 2022, on his 75th birthday, as is required of bishops by canon law .
He joked about the length of time it took to hear from Rome since that day:
Father Keehner is 59 years old and a native of Youngstown, Ohio.
He was surprised when he received the call January 28th to inform him of the Pope’s decision:
And of course Keehner said yes.
Soon afterwards, Bishop Nickless called him and they have become well acquainted the past two weeks:
Keehner did not grow up a catholic but earned a B.A. in English in 1988 from the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio.
He then began studies at Mount St. Mary Seminary of the West in Cincinnati and was ordained a priest in 1993:
Father Keehner will be ordained as bishop of the Diocese of Sioux City on May 1st at the Cathedral of the Epiphany in Sioux City.
The Diocese of Sioux City is comprised of 24 counties in northwest Iowa with 84,000 Catholics in the diocese, 37 parishes and 36 priests in active ministry.
There are 15 catholic school systems in the diocese.
FEENSTRA IRS BILLS PASS IN COMMITTEE
Wednesday, two bills led by U.S. Rep. Randy Feenstra of Hull are intended to make important reforms to Internal Revenue Service procedures. Both passed the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee.
Feenstra says one bill ensures that the IRS clearly spells out errors on tax forms and helps taxpayers not only understand the mistake but also challenge it if they see fit. The other bill improves customer service and case outcomes at the IRS by finally allowing the nonpartisan National Taxpayer Advocate to hire her own attorneys.
Additionally, Feenstra’s legislation will ensure the National Taxpayer Advocate, the organization charged with protecting taxpayers from abuse, remains independent and insulated from interference by the IRS.
HOUSE BILL CALLS FOR REVIVING BASEBALL PROGRAMS AT ISU, UNI
A bill in the Iowa House would require Iowa State and the University of Northern Iowa to revive their baseball programs. Representative Skyler Wheeler of Hull – the head coach of the Unity Christian High School baseball team — is the bill’s author.
U-N-I last fielded a baseball team during the 2009 season and I-S-U’s baseball program was shut down in May of 2001. Athletics directors for both schools cited budget constraints when announcing those decisions.
Carolann Jenson — a lobbyist for the board that governs all three state universities — suggests a lot has changed since the programs were terminated.
The University of Iowa is the only one of the three state universities to have a baseball program today.
Wheeler, a native of Washington state, played first baseman for Red Raiders of the Northwestern College in Orange City.
N-C-Double-A rules allow division one baseball programs to offer nearly 12 total scholarships — and the roster is limited to 27 players. The bill has cleared a House subcommittee with the support of Wheeler and another Republican. The panel’s other member — Democratic Representative Dave Jacoby of Coralville — says he’ll back the bill if it also requires Iowa State and U-N-I to add women’s wrestling programs.
* [playball5] :12 :state wrestling tournament.” *
Over 200 Iowa high schools had a girl’s wrestling program this year. In 2021, the University of Iowa added a women’s wrestling program.
SENATE OKS SO-CALLED ‘TAYLOR SWIFT’ BILL TO BAN SCALPER BOTS
The Iowa Senate has unanimously voted to make it illegal to use computer “bots” that are programmed to buy big bunches of tickets to concerts, plays and sporting events in Iowa. It’s been nicknamed “The Taylor Swift” bill and is similar to efforts in other states that were launched after tickets to some of the singer’s concerts sold out within minutes due to scalper bots. The bill requires ticket vendors to report scalper bot activities. The Iowa Attorney General would enforce the law and could fine a repeat violator up to a hundred thousand dollars. A similar bill passed the Iowa Senate a year ago, but did not clear the House.
BILL WOULD DENY TUITION GRANTS TO PRIVATE COLLEGES WITH DEI PROGRAMS
An Iowa House subcommittee has approved a bill that would prohibit diversity, equity and inclusion programs at any private college or university in Iowa that participate in the state’s Tuition Grant program. Repesentative Taylor Collins, a Republican from Mediapolis, says D.E.I. is D.O.A. at the state universities and Iowa’s private institutions should worry about President Trump’s executive order barring federal funds from being used for diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Representative Ross Wilburn, a Democrat from Ames, says anti-D-E-I rhetoric is meant to stoke fear. Over 83-hundred students at Iowa private colleges and universities have received an Iowa Tuition Grant this academic year. If the bill becomes law, Iowa’s private college students would be ineligible for a grant if their school has a diversity, equity and inclusion staff or a D-E-I office.
