From the Associated Press:
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) — Cedar Rapids police are still searching for a driver who hit an officer with a vehicle before fleeing after a traffic stop. Police said Saturday that the officer fired at the fleeing vehicle after being struck by the vehicle shortly after 8:30 p.m. Friday. The confrontation began when the officer tried to pull the vehicle over in Cedar Rapids but the driver refused to stop. After a short chase the vehicle stopped when the road reached a dead end at a construction site. But when the officer got out to confront the driver, the vehicle spun around and accelerated toward the officer. Officials said the officer sustained minor injuries.
WINNESHIEK COUNTY, Iowa (AP) — Two teens died and three more were seriously hurt when the SUV they were riding in rolled three times. The Iowa State Patrol said the crash happened around 10:30 p.m. Friday in a rural part of Winneshiek County between Decorah and Cresco. According to an accident report, the driver of the SUV lost control and tire marks show the vehicle went sideways before veering into a ditch on the west side of the road. Investigators believe the SUV rolled three times before landing on its tires. Everyone inside the vehicle was under the age of 18, but their names were not immediately released.
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The president of Planned Parenthood’s affiliate in the upper Midwest says she is stepping down from her position next year. Sarah Stoesz oversaw the organization for nearly 20 years and grew it into one of the largest Planned Parenthood affiliates in the country as it expanded from Minnesota and South Dakota to incorporate North Dakota, Iowa and Nebraska, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported. The five-state organization provides health care to more than 100,000 patients each year. Stoesz does not plan to step down until October while the organization searches for her replacement.
ANKENY, Iowa (AP) — An Iowa-based convenience store chain has completed the purchase of 40 stores from Knoxville, Tennessee-based Pilot Corporation. Casey’s General Stores Inc. announced in a news release it closed the sale as part of a three-year plan to add 345 new stores nationwide. The company describes itself as the third-largest convenience store retailer in the United States, with more than 2,400 stores nationwide. Casey’s says the purchase will expand its footprint in Tennessee and Kentucky. The Knoxville News Sentinel reported that the Haslam family, which owns a controlling share of Pilot, intends to leave the convenience store business, while maintaining some travel centers. The Pilot convenience stores were owned and operated independently from Pilot’s travel center and energy businesses.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — At least two dozen tornadoes tore through parts of Nebraska and Iowa earlier this week as part of a powerful storm system that swept across the Great Plains and Midwest earlier this week. The National Weather Service on Friday confirmed tornadoes that stretched across a swath from south-central Nebraska to northeastern Iowa. The service says more tornadoes in those states are likely to be confirmed as storm teams continued to assess damage on the ground Friday. The service says nine of those tornadoes rated an EF2, with wind speeds of 111-135 mph. The others were moderate EF1 or weak EF0 tornadoes.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The number of confirmed cases of the highly transmissible omicron variant of the coronavirus has increased to 18 in Iowa. The Des Moines Register reports that the variant has been detected in residents of Black Hawk, Jefferson, Johnson, Linn, Polk, Scott and Story counties. Iowa Department of Public Health spokesperson Sarah Ekstrand says residents “should expect that community spread of the omicron variant is occurring. She said that 13 of the 18 cases were confirmed Friday. They included infections in people who had not traveled recently.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Property owners who ask to remove their names from online property searches to make finding their address more difficult may keep their names confidential under a ruling published by the Iowa Supreme Court on Friday. The case stems from a 2017 request by a Des Moines Register reporter for the Polk County assessor to release the names of people who wanted to disable the search-by-name function in property records online searches. The Iowa Public Information Board and a state judge concluded that the list of names was public record. A majority of justices on the high court, however, said the list falls under an exception to the public records law and should remain confidential.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Gov. Kim Reynolds’ office has announced a new system for handling open record requests, a day after three media organizations sued her, alleging she has repeatedly violated the state’s open records laws by ignoring requests for government records. Reynolds’ spokesman Alex Murphy says in an email Friday that the coronavirus pandemic created increased records requests and they are still being processed. He says reporters with outstanding requests will be notified of their status. The change comes after the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa filed a lawsuit claiming groups they represent have not received requested documents months after requests and in some cases after more than a year.
