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Greenway says Vikings preparing, not watching Favre situation

August 5, 2008 By

Whether or not Brett Favre eventually plays in Minnesota this season the Vikings are preparing for their pre-season opener on Friday night at home against Seatlle. Former Iowa standout Chad Greenway enters his third season with the Vikings and says this is not being treated as a game week just yet.

Greenway says they’re focusing more on doing things in practice, as this game is treated more like a practice than game week. After nearly two weeks of practice Greenway says everyone is ready for a game. He says it’s a grind from the start, and after this first game, the fun starts.

Greenway feels good about how strong the defense may be this season, as he says they’re getting to know the new guys and the team has gotten tighter. He says being a close knit unit will hopefully make for a better season.

 

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St. Ambrose name pre-season favorite in Mid-States league

August 5, 2008 By

The St. Ambrose football team has been named as the pre-season favorite in the Mid-States Football Association Midwest League. The Fighting Bees have eight starters back from last year’s team that won a second straight league title and advanced to the NAIA national playoffs.

Second-year coach Mike Magistrelli says they have high expectations every year and the preseason ranking is based on last year’s season, but does provide momentum. Magistrelli says the conference race will provide a number of difficult tests. He says if you take someone lightly you will find yourself losing the game, and says his team has done a good job of keeping its focus.

The Fighting Bees will be tested right out of the gate. They open August 30th with a visit to the University of South Dakota.

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Polk County leads in amount of alcohol purchased

August 5, 2008 By

Iowa’s most heavily populated county led the state in liquor sales by a large margin in the last fiscal year, and the first in the nation caucuses could be part of the reason.

Iowa Alcoholic Beverages Division administrator, Lynn Walding says the state had $188-million in sales for the fiscal year that ended June 30th. About $40 million worth was sold in Polk County.

Walding says that translates into one-in-five drinks in the state being sold in Polk County, and was quite a large margin over Linn County, which came in second in sales at 17 million. Walding says Polk County has traditionally led in sales because of its population, but says the large margin this time was likely due in part to the Iowa Caucuses.

Walding says conventions and tourism contribute to it, but he says the political activity in Polk County during the election cycle all help drive sales, as overall he says sales in Polk County were "fairly significant" in relation to other counties.

While Polk Count led in sales, a smaller county led in another category. Walding says little Dickinson County in northwest Iowa led in consumption of alcohol per individual in the county with per capita consumption of 5.61 gallons. Walding says the summer tourism industry the reason for the high consumption there.

Walding says the flooding did have some impact on sales. He says sales for May and June were down around two percent as they couldn’t make deliveries to areas like Cedar Rapids, while overall sales were up nearly seven percent. Walding says the overall economic impact was evident too.

Walding says things have slowed a little, as sales had increased in the double digits, or near double digits the past four years. Walding says people had been on a trend of buying more expensive liquor, or "trading up", but now "People aren’t quite reaching as high up on the shelf as they once were."

Walding says Iowans are tending to buy the moderate priced liquor instead of the more expensive drinks. Overall he says the state-run liquor business has held its own.

"I think Iowa has weathered the economy better than most states, as a result it hasn’t been a huge impact," Walding says. He says other states have seen sales level out completely or go down, and they’ll have to wait and see if that changes.

Walding does say in July, the first month of the new fiscal year, there was a 25% increase in sales. Walding says the state ended up with nearly 88 million dollars in profit for the fiscal year, which was up about four percent. 

Filed Under: Politics & Government, Recreation & Entertainment Tagged With: ,

Iowa communities take part in Night Out Against Crime

August 5, 2008 By

Communities across Iowa are holding ice cream socials and pot luck dinners tonight as part of the 25th annual Night Out Against Crime. Cedar Rapids Police Sergeant Cristy Hamblin says residents everywhere are urged to leave the porch lights on, get outside and get to know the folks living next door.

"We’re such a fast-moving community that we don’t have time to be neighborly and this is one night of the year we want you to be," Hamblin says. "We want everybody to go outside their house, sit around and talk to their neighbors. You may’ve lived next door to someone for a year, two years, three years, and you don’t even know their names." She says it’s important for neighbors to connect with one another.

Hamblin says it can be a simple gesture, like sitting on lawn chairs in the driveway to talk with neighbors, while some communities are holding organized events like root beer float socials. With the severe flooding Cedar Rapids endured during June which did widespread damage, Hamblin says tonight’s "Night Out" event is more of a celebration.

"We weathered the storm with amazing success," Hamblin says, crediting residents, law officers, firefighters, churches, everyone who pitched in during the city’s terrible time of need. 

Filed Under: Crime & Courts

Agriprocessors plant in Postville faces charges of child labor violations

August 5, 2008 By

A kosher meatpacking plant in northeast Iowa, that was the site of the largest immigration raid in U.S. history in May, is now facing the potential for roughly a million dollars in fines for child labor violations.

Kerry Koonce, spokesperson for the Iowa Division of Labor, says the investigation at Agriprocessors in Postville could be the biggest child labor investigation ever conducted in the state."Without going back and looking through the records, I would say it’s certainly one of the largest," Koonce said.

The state’s investigation has produced 57 individual child labor violation cases, with multiple violations in each case. Koonce says some of the alleged violations include minors working in prohibited occupations, exposure to hazardous materials and exceeding the allowable hours that 14 and 15 year olds can work.

The case has been turned over to the Iowa Attorney General’s Office for prosecution. Koonce says Agriprocessors, if found guilty of all the allegations, could face fines of up to a million dollars. The state’s investigation was hampered by the federal immigration raid, which led to the arrest of nearly 400 suspected illegal workers.

The Labor Commissioner’s Office is still waiting for paperwork from the feds which could lead to additional child labor violations. "There’s also a separate wage violation investigation going on, meaning whether employees were paid their appropriate wages" Koonce said. "That investigation is separate from the child labor investigation."

Earlier this year, Agriprocessors was assessed $182,000 in fines for 39 violations of workplace health and safety. The Labor Division reduced the fines to just under $43,000 after Agriprocessors officials promised to correct the problems identified in the plant. Koonce says any fines levied against the company in the child labor investigation won’t be reduced by the state agency.

"The negotiation processes for child labor is not the same as what you would have for violations of health and safety," Koonce said. "Violating child labor laws is actually a criminal prosecution. Therefore, at this point and time, it would be up to a judge to make any decisions and the Attorney General’s Office to make any settlements." The child labor investigation at Agriprocessors was launched in January of this year. 

Filed Under: Agriculture, Business, Crime & Courts Tagged With:

Two die in crash near Knoxville

August 5, 2008 By

Two people were killed in a three-car collision in south-central Iowa Monday. The crash happened just after 5 p.m. in a construction zone along Highway 5/92 west of Knoxville.

The Iowa State Patrol reports 56-year-old Janet Padget of Hedrick was driving a car east and swerved into the westbound lane to avoid rear-ending another vehicle that had slowed to make a turn.

The Padget vehicle collided head-on with a car driven by 37-year-old Diane Herzberg of Cumming. Padget and Herzberg were both killed in the crash. Both were wearing seatbelts. Nobody else was injured.

 

Filed Under: Fires/Accidents/Disasters

HUD sending $85 million to Iowa for rebuilding

August 5, 2008 By

An even 100-million dollars is being allocated for emergency Midwestern flood relief by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley says the majority of that 100-million is coming to Iowa, which had widespread flooding during June that demolished several thousand homes.

Grassley says, "We did get 85-million of HUD money yesterday announced for the state of Iowa, which can be used with a lot less strings attached for the cities than the FEMA money." Two other states will share the 100-million in federal funds, with ten-million going to Indiana and five-million to Wisconsin. Grassley says the HUD money is for community development block grants — which he explains.

Grassley says, "A block grant is money that comes to cities that has a lot more flexibility in how cities can spend it, like in helping businesses to recover as opposed to just city infrastructure."

The HUD funding that was allocated on Monday was part of a spending bill that was signed into law by President Bush on June 30th. It included more than 2.6 billion dollars in disaster funding.

Filed Under: Politics & Government Tagged With: ,
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