Iowa Auditor Rob Sand says the Test Iowa program brought to the state under a $28 million no-bid contract is violating state law in the way it handles test results data. Sand, a Democrat, 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. But public health spokesperson Amy McCoy maintains the reporting process does follow Iowa law. Republican Governor Kim Reynolds said at her weekly press conference in Webster City that Attorney General Tom Miller, a Democrat, concluded the procedures do follow the law.
Two juveniles have been injured following an ATV accident in Linn County. Sheriff’s officials say it happened just before 1 o’clock yesterday afternoon around the 4900 block of Indian Creek Road. Authorities discovered a 13-year-old male had lost control of an ATV. There were three passengers on the vehicle at the time, identified as two 12-year-old females and one 12-year-old male. No one on the ATV was wearing a helmet at the time of the accident. Two juveniles on the ATV were taken to a hospital for treatment of injures.
The Iowa City Community School District board voted unanimously to approve a motion that would begin the year with an online learning model. The district had been considering online-only, different hybrid models, or in-person learning as possibilities. Students will be offered grab and go meals for breakfast and lunch, according to the district’s Return to Learn plans. Board members also voted to approve a special resolution on budget needs, authorizing up to $500,000 for the superintendent to spend on “health, safety, and security needs.”
A federal grand jury has indicted a Cedar Falls man on weapons charges in connection with a March vehicle chase. 33-year-old Rocky Allen Truax was charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm; the indictment was handed down last week in U.S. District Court in Cedar Rapids. Truax led Waterloo police on a chase after an officer spotted his vehicle running a red light on U.S. Highway 218 just after 3 a.m. on March 6. Officers say he refused to stop…the chase reached speeds of up to 80 mph in a 45 mph zone before the vehicle hit a tree at the dead end of Five Seasons Boulevard. Police found meth in Truax’s jacket, and a .22-caliber Ruger pistol was found in his home. Truax is also awaiting trial for theft and criminal mischief charges in a separate case, where he’s accused of cutting catalytic converters from a car parked on Falls Avenue and a U-Haul truck parked on University Avenue in February.
An antidote for some drug overdoses is being given away for free at Iowa pharmacies. The Iowa Department of Public Health (IDPH) and the Iowa Board of Pharmacy are teaming up on a new initiative to make NARCAN nasal spray kits available to anyone 18 years of age or older, if approved by a pharmacist. State officials say opioid involved deaths in Iowa dropped from 206 in 2017 to 137 in 2018, but then rose to 155 last year. The program eliminates financial barriers to access the overdose antidote.
Investigators have identified a jailed sex offender as a “person of interest” in the disappearance of a 10-year-old Davenport girl who went missing last week. Henry Dinkins has not been charged in connection with the disappearance of 10-year-old Breasia Terrell but Davenport Police Chief Paul Sikorski says Dinkins may have information about her whereabouts. Dinkins is current in jail on a charge of violating sex offender registration requirements. Chief Sikorski said that anyone who has information regarding Dinkins’ whereabouts between July 9 at 10 p.m. to noon on July 10 should contact police immediately.
People traveling from Iowa and Oklahoma to Chicago will have to quarantine for two weeks upon arrival or face possible fines starting Friday. Chicago first issued a quarantine order early this month for 15 other states based on increasing numbers of confirmed cases of the coronavirus. The city updated the order yesterday, bringing the total number of affected states to 17. States are included based on the rate of new confirmed cases per 100,000 residents.
Grinnell College has selected an internal candidate as the school’s newest president. The private liberal arts college announced yesterday that Anne Harris has been named the school’s 14th president. Harris has been vice president for academic affairs and dean of the college for the past year. 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. 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.
A suspect in an Iowa killing has been arrested in Michigan. U.S. Marshals took 25-year-old Deonte Ellison into custody shortly after 10 o’clock yesterday morning in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The Dubuque Police Department says an arrest warrant was issued for Ellison after he was identified as a suspect in the July 2 shooting death of Curtis R. Smothers Jr. Ellison has been transported to the Kalamazoo County Jail, where he awaits extradition to Dubuque.
Authorities say two police officers have rescued a woman from a burning Iowa home. The Muscatine Fire Department says Police Corporal Matt Fowler and Officer Mark Schollmeyer were on patrol yesterday morning when they noticed heavy smoke and found a home in flames. The two officers tried to enter the home through the front door but were turned back by the heat and flames. They then went to the back of the home and saw an 80-year-old woman lying on the floor. The officers then broke open the back door, and pulled the woman to safety.
Two Latino advocacy groups sued the state of Iowa yesterday over a law that prohibits county election officials from using information readily available in the voter registration database to fill in any information missing from a voter’s absentee ballot request. The law approved by lawmakers near the end of the legislative session last month requires county election officials to contact the voter directly by phone, email or mail to confirm any missing information. Supporters say it’s a voter fraud protection measure. But the League of United Latin American Citizens and a group called Majority Forward claim in their lawsuit that the law is unconstitutional.
Cedar Rapids Police confirm that a weekend shooting has broken the city’s homicide record. Department officials said nine homicides in one year is the most since statistics started being recorded in 1959. And there are still more than five months left in this year. The prior record of eight reported homicides was in 2014. 19-year-old Keyshawn Allers of Palo died in the Sunday shooting, around 4 a.m. Allers was a former Kennedy High School student and played football there.
