Iowa Auditor Rob Sand says the Test Iowa program brought to the state under a $28 million no-bid contract by Gov. Kim Reynolds on recommendation from actor Ashton Kutcher is violating state law in the way it handles test results data. Sand says Test Iowa results first go to two Utah companies contracted to provide testing then to the state’s chief information officer and then to the Iowa Department of Public Health. Sand says this indirect route violates a law requiring laboratories to immediately report infectious diseases to the public health department. Pubic health spokeswoman Amy McCoy says the reporting process follows Iowa law.
A U.S. casino company with 29 properties in 10 states is laying off thousands of employees, citing a slow restart to business following closures due to the coronavirus pandemic. Las Vegas-based Boyd Gaming Corp. said in a statement Monday that an unspecified number of furloughed employees will not return to work. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported 2,500 company workers in Nevada could be affected. The publicly traded company had about 10,000 employees in Nevada and another 14,300 nationally, according to its last annual report. It also has properties in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Police and dozens of volunteers have been searching for a 10-year-old Davenport girl missing since last week. The Quad-City Times reports that law enforcement officials searched an area along River Drive late Monday night after receiving a tip, but found no sign of 10-year-old Breasia Terrell, who was last seen Friday on East 53rd Street. Earlier Monday, dozens of volunteers walked through the woods of Davenport’s Credit Island looking for the girl. Police have also searched the apartment of a 47-year-old convicted sex offender linked to the case in court documents for a separate charge. The man has not been charged in Breasia’s disappearance.
Grinnell College has selected an internal candidate as the school’s newest president. The private liberal arts college in east-central Iowa announced in a news release Tuesday that Anne Harris has been named the school’s 14th president. Harris has been vice president for academic affairs and dean of the college since 2019. Before her move to Grinnell, she spent nearly 20 years at DePauw University in Indiana, where she served as a faculty member and later vice president for academic affairs. Harris was unanimously selected by the Grinnell Colldge Board of Trustees. She has been serving as acting president since July 1, after former longtime president Raynard Kington left to become head of school at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts.
Detectives have charged a man with murder in the June 28 shooting death of another man outside a Des Moines area bar. Polk County sheriff’s deputies charged 35-year-old Gordon Jerome Johnson with first-degree murder and intimidation with a dangerous weapon. Johnson, of Des Moines, was held in the Polk County Jail. Johnson was charged in the death of 29-year-old Sir William Beckish, a chef and former restaurant owner. The shooting happened just before 2 a.m. as a large crowd gathered outside the Karma Bar, just north of the Des Moines. Deputies who had been called by the bar’s staff heard gunshots and then found Beckish had been wounded. He was taken to a hospital but died. Two woman also suffered gunshot wounds but survived.
The board chairman of Make-A-Wish Iowa says the charity’s CEO and president has been fired after the organization discovered financial irregularities during an internal audit. Board chairman Joshua Norton said a statement late last week that Jennifer Woodley had been dismissed. Norton says Rachel Reams, a vice president with the organization, will serve as the interim CEO while the board conducts a search for a new leader. Norton declined to give details on the nature of the financial irregularities. Woodley was named CEO of the group less than a year ago, in August 2019. A publicly listed telephone number for Woodley could not be found Monday.
