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Lottery finds 50% of retailers not getting signatures

March 12, 2009 By

Lottery education poster on signing tickets. The Iowa Lottery says retailers passed the test when it comes to paying out the proper amounts in prizes, but only half passed the test when it comes to doing the paperwork.

Iowa Lottery spokesperson Mary Neubauer says lottery fraud in Canada and California prompted them to make unannounced security checks to retailers across the state.

Neubauer says there doesn’t appear to be any problems in Iowa, but they felt they should do checks to be sure.

Lottery security officials posing as customers check 126 retailers last month. She says the security officials presented retailers with a winning tickets that ranged up to $100.

Neubauer says in every instance the retailers paid the exact amount the person should have been paid. The lottery last year began requiring a signature for someone to check if a ticket is a winner or to cash in a winning ticket. Neubauer says the retailer compliance for that requirement was not good.

She says about half the locations did not require a signature and so the Iowa Lottery will go back to those locations and explain why the signature is a requirement and why they are doing it. Neubauer says they hope to get retailers to comply with the signature requirement before taking any action against them.

Neubauer says they do have a process where retailers can be given a warning and if there are repeated violations, they can suspend the retailers license. She says they believe they can take care of the situation with some retraining.

Neubauer says it’s also important for the public to realize that requiring a signature is done to protect players from any type of fraud. Neubauer says anyone who has a concern about the lottery, its products or operations can contact the lottery at 515-725-7900.

Filed Under: Recreation & Entertainment Tagged With:

House votes to extend duration of unemployment benefits

March 12, 2009 By

The Iowa House has given final legislative approval to a bill that would extend unemployment benefits to laid-off workers who are training for a new job.

Representative Wayne Ford, a Democrat from Des Moines, says at no time in his 57 years on the planet has he seen the economy this bad. "This economy’s falling apart," Ford says. "That’s why we need this."

Ford says he’s "scared" by the distress the economy is causing for individuals, and worried about the decline in state tax revenues. "If people ain’t working, they ain’t payin’ no taxes," Ford said. "Stevie Wonder can see that."

The federal economic stimulus plan will forward $71 million to Iowa to give unemployed Iowa workers another 26 weeks of jobless benefits. Representative Lance Horbach, a Republican from Tama, says that’s a good idea, but he worries Iowa businesses will find their taxes going up to continue financing these extended benefits for unemployed workers who’re training for a new job when the federal money runs out in two years. "All I’m saying it’s a great bill, (but) it is absolutely a disaster when it comes to funding," Horbach says.

Horbach voted for the bill, as did all but 13 of the 100 members of the House. The legislation now goes to Governor Culver, who is expected to sign the bill into law.

Filed Under: Business, Politics & Government Tagged With: , , , ,

House approves doubling fines for child labor violations

March 12, 2009 By

The Iowa House has approved a bill that was drafted in response to child labor violations at the meatpacking plant in Postville. Over 300 illegal immigrants were rounded up in a federal raid at the plant last May, but a separate investigation found children were illegaly working in the plant, too.

Representative John Beard, a Democrat from Decorah, represents the town of Postville. "I find it quite extraordinary that here in the 21st Century we’re working on a bill that addresses child labor. Oscar Wilde once commented that there are people who know the price of everything and the value of nothing," Beard says. "The people in my district know all too well the staggering cost of worker exploitation and exploitation of the environment."

According to Beard, Allamakee County — home to Postville — now has an unemployment rate of 11.5 percent. "Let’s take a moment to reflect on what we value. Let’s reflect on the fact that a meatpacking job in this state once used to be a high-paying job," Beard says. "I would like us all to think about the true cost of devaluing labor and exalting profit."

The bill which cleared the House would double the daily fine for companies caught employing kids. If this bill would had been on the books, legislators say the child labor fine against AgriProcessors would have been $50 million.

The bill got the support of every member of the House who was there to vote today. "I think we can all agree that Postville was an absolute tragedy for the state and an embarassment," said Representative Peter Cownie, a Republican from West Des Moines. "and this bill is a good step in correcting that for the future."

Representative Todd Taylor, a Democrat from Cedar Rapids, was the bill’s floor manager. "I think this is an opportunity that we have to encourage employers to do the right thing and not to abuse our workers and exploit our children," Taylor said.

The bill is expected to pass the Iowa Senate as well, enroute to Governor Culver for his final approval. 

Filed Under: Agriculture, Business, Fires/Accidents/Disasters, Politics & Government Tagged With: , , , ,

Defending champ faces top ranked team in 1A final

March 12, 2009 By

Friday night’s 1A championship will featured the defending champion against the state’s top ranked team. Fifth ranked Cedar Falls NU High made only three of 14 shots in the second half but played well enough in the second half to post a 42-38 win over seventh ranked Laurens-Marathon 42-38 in the semifinals.

Tannker Cooke was one of three Panthers to finish with eight points, and says the shots were definitely not falling. He says they were doing everything they could to get shots and they take pride in their defensive play and the way it helps the offense.

NU High coach Paul Elser says the Panther’s struggle against the Chargers pressure defense. Elser says the 24 turnovers could be the most they had in one game. He says Laurens-Marathon gets the credit for making it tough and playing scrappy defense. Elser says they are back in the title game and it doesn’t matter what the win looked like.

Laurens-Marathon rallied in the third quarter after trailing by ten at the half. They fall to 21-3. Chargers coach Matt Winter says he’s as proud of the players today as he was the first day of practice, and says the kids have been good on the court and off.

Number-one Rock Valley got 25 points, nine rebounds and five assists from 6-9 junior Marcus Heemstra to down third rated Iowa Mennonite 61-54. Heemstra says they knew it would be a fight and says they didn’t have a great first half, but had a really good second half.

After trailing by three at the half the Rockets outscored IMS 16-7 in the third quarter. Heemstra says they got out and played great defense and pushed the ball on offense and got a lot of easy layups.

Iowa Mennonite would not overcome Rock Valley’s size advantage and was outrebounded 34 to 24. Coach Dwight Gingrich says he’s real proud of the effort as the team gave it everything they had. 

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Iowa among top states for cutting land line phones

March 12, 2009 By

Cellphone Iowa ranks number-five in the nation for percentage of households that have clipped landlines and gone wireless.

More than one in five Iowans are now all-cellular, compared to states like Vermont, where only one in 20 homes are wire-free.

Greg Schwartz, an I-T professional in Coralville, says the technology makes perfect sense for a predominantly rural state like Iowa.

“That is exactly the reason that we would be going that route,” Schwartz says.

“More of our population is in rural communities and services haven’t always extended out into those areas, certainly not the free wireless internet you have in the downtown areas, for instance. Just getting Internet was very difficult for many farming and rural communities.”

While there’s a perception on the coasts that people in ag-based fly-over states don’t embrace modern technologies, Schwartz says the opposite is true and he’s never far from his cell — or his business partners and clients.

Schwartz says, “For me personally, I end up working more because I have a cell phone that has email and Internet connectivity, so I am basically on the clock 24 hours a day because it’s a device that’s on my person, or near my person, all of the time.” He admits his household is still “wired,” but only as a matter of convenience.

“We still have a landline at home,” Schwartz says. “It’s kind of a struggle whether or not we should keep it. I guess the main reason we keep our landline is because most people still have our home phone number and you can’t port your home phone number over to a cell phone.”

The study is from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics. It finds 22.2% of Iowa households are wireless, ranking Iowa fifth in the nation.

The top state is Oklahoma at 26.2%, followed by Utah, Nebraska and Arkansas. The least-wired states are: Rhode Island, South Dakota, Delaware, Connecticut and lastly, Vermont — with only 5.1% cell-only. 

Filed Under: Human Interest Tagged With:

Braley says earmarks have their place

March 12, 2009 By

Democrat President Barrack Obama signed the 410-billion dollar spending bill Wednesday that had thousands of earmarks in it — and then along with House leaders announced proposed reforms to the earmark process.

Iowa Congressman Bruce Braley , a Democrat from Waterloo, today defended the "earmarks" that send money to a project in the sponsoring legislator’s state.

Braley says, "I’ve always taken the position that the role of earmarks as long as it’s conducted in a transparent manner and the public has confidence that there is not an abuse of that system, is a vital role for Congress to play in making sure that the interests of the district they represent is being considered as part of federal spending." Braley says he’s taking note of the reforms.

Braley says he hasn’t analyzed the specifics of the president’s comments as he has the looked at the House speaker’s comments on the reforms, including the increased executive review process, and the competitive process for reviewing earmarks of for-profit entities. Braley says he has no major concerns with the proposed earmark reforms.

"I think that these reforms are good and I think that they will continue to allow members like myself to be strong advocates of projects that will put people to work back in their district," Braley says. Braley has been touted as a leader in the U.S. House in bringing money back to the first district. He was asked if the new reforms would hamper his efforts.

Braley says: "It just depends, because there’s a great misunderstanding about the percentage of the overall discretionary budget that goes to earmarks. By imposing the one-percent cap (on earmarks), there will be a finite amount of money available, and my guess is that there will be a strong bipartisan efforts to make sure that there is an equal division of those resources to the 435 districts that exist."

Republicans criticized Obama for signing the legislation after he had spoken out against earmarks during his campaign. Obama says the bill was not perfect but necessary to keep the government running. Braley’s office issued a news release that said he had secured 42-million dollars in the spending bill for "critical eastern Iowa projects." 

Filed Under: Politics & Government Tagged With: ,

Top Democrat has reservations about key chunk of Culver plan

March 12, 2009 By

The top Democrat in the Iowa House says legislators have reservations about a big  chunk of Governor Culver’s proposed $750 million borrowing plan. 

House Speaker Pat Murphy, a Democrat from Dubuque, is not completely ruling out the idea of  borrowing $250 million to finance transportation-related projects. "It’s an uphill climb, but we might be able to do something in that area," Murphy says, "We may look at things that deal with roads and bridges for disaster-affected communities, so there (are) a number of things that are on the table. I just don’t know what we will be able to agree to and what we won’t be able to agree to."

Murphy suggests the current system which uses state gas taxes to finance road and bridge maintenance and construction is preferable to borrowing. "Whenever you (borrow) for roads and bridges (and) other states have done this is you start cycles in the construction industry where you have a two or three year surge in construction and then if you don’t have as much in bonds, you have a huge drop off," Murphy says. "Whereas with the gas tax, you have a constant revenue source that’s rolling in there." 

Governor Culver has voted to veto a gas tax increase and Murphy says while he was "open" to a gas tax increase, Murphy is also "open" to borrowing money to finance some road and bridge construction. "When (Culver) talked to us about it, I told him that I thought it was a bold initiative.  I thought it was a good idea," Murphy says.  "The details are the hard part to work out on this."

Click on the audio link below to listen to this afternoon’s statehouse news conference featuring Murphy and House Democratic Leader Kevin McCarthy of Des Moines.

 

AUDIO: Murphy and McCarthy. 15:00 MP3

Filed Under: Business, Fires/Accidents/Disasters, Politics & Government Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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