Iowa's Radio News Network
A northwest Iowa woman died in a head-on collision Monday afternoon. The Sioux County Sheriff’s office identified the woman who died in the accident two miles northwest of Hull as 51-year-old Judy Dieken) of George. Authorities report Dieken was driving north on Highway 75 when a southbound pickup truck crossed the center line and struck her van.
The pickup driver, 42-year-old Patrick Camburn of Rock Rapids, was taken to a Sioux Falls hospital by air ambulance.
By Joanne Glamm, KLEM, LeMars
Iowa farmers have been running their planters through the fields at a record pace. Some farmers had to harvest crops left in the fields from last year before getting planting underway this spring, but that hasn’t slowed the new planting.
The latest report from the U.S. Ag Department says near-perfect field conditions pushed the amount of corn acreage planted up to 68% at the end of last week, that compares to 19% that was planted the week before. The report says this is the most corn that’s been planted by this time in April in state history.
The corn planting is 11 days ahead of last year and 13 days ahead of the five-year average. All nine districts of the state reported over 55% of the corn acreage was planted, with central Iowa leading at 81% planted.
President Obama’s aides say he’ll be in southern Iowa today to visit with business owners, workers and “everyday” Americans who are trying to navigate the challenges of the recession. One of Obama’s stops today is Ottumwa where Trudy Caviness runs a photo-processing shop on Main Street in downtown Ottumwa.
“Because we make pictures for photographers, there’s many Main Street photographers that are our customers…Photography is not a necessity and so it’s something that they are cutting down on or cutting out on,” Caviness says. “And some of the regulations that we have just kind of hurts us in being able to compete with everyone else.”
Drake softball coach Rich Calvert hopes the Bulldogs struggles on offense are a thing of the past. Drake won the second game of a doubleheader at Indiana State on Saturday 8-2. It snapped a four game skid in which Drake failed to score a run.
Calvert says very game is important and they went through a stretch where they had trouble getting runs across the plate, and hopefully, this will break the ice and get them scoring again. Calvert says there were a number of reasons for the dry spell. He says when you get into streaks, it becomes a team mental thing as you face good pitching.
Calvert says you never like to go through that and hope it only lasts a couple of games. It was a costly skid for the Bulldogs who were in the thick of the Missouri Valley chase. They are now 10-8 in the conference. He says they have probably taken themselves out of a one or two seed for the conference tournament with 7 games left.
There is plenty of time to regroup and the good news for the Bulldogs is they will host the Valley post season tournament. He believes they have the best 1-2 pitching combination in the conference, and says when they get on the same page offensively they can score some runs. Calvert says it’s nice to be home, but unfortunately they haven’t played well at home yet this year.
Drake returns to conference play on Tuesday with a visit to Creighton.
Governor Chet Culver said today he’ll sign into law a bill that would set a statewide standard for issuing permits to Iowans who want to carry a concealed weapon. Under current law, Iowa’s 99 county sheriffs get to decide who can and cannot get a concealed weapons permit. The new law will require a permit to be issued, in nearly every case, if the applicant has taken safety courses and hasn’t been convicted of a felony.
During his stop in Mason City today, Culver said he wants to make sure it’s a fair process statewide for those who apply for a permit.
“I’m a strong supporter of the Second Amendment,” Culver said. “I think we have to level the playing field to make all of the rules universal in terms of concealed weapon permits in all 99 counties and I want to make sure that if people want a concealed weapon permit, and they are eligible for one, that they get one.”
Culver indicated he’ll sign the bill into law on Thursday.
By Bob Fisher, KRIB, Mason City
"Green" building that's under construction at Maharishi University.
A new classroom and research building is under construction on a college campus in southeast Iowa that aims to set a new global standard for green buildings.
David Fisher, director of the Sustainable Living program at Maharishi University in Fairfield, says the building promises to be unlike any other structure on the planet.
“It will be off the grid completely with respect to electricity, heating, cooling, water and waste disposal,” Fisher says. “In addition, the building will be day lit throughout the building.”
Banks of solar panels will provide the electricity for the Sustainable Living Center, Fisher says, and solar energy is being used by workers during the construction phase, as well. During the warm months, he says the building will be kept cool using a geothermal system.
“The heating will be done with solar water heaters on the roof,” Fisher says. “We will have insulation provided in part by very local materials, that is compacted earth blocks which came from some earth right across the street that was being cleared out for a parking lot.” That dirt was compacted into 26,000 bricks that will make up the building’s insulation. The building’s skeleton will use whole tree post and beam techniques.
“Water will be all rainwater,” Fisher says. “It will be collected on the roof and stored in a cistern and, of course, for drinking purposes, it’ll all be filtered with (an ultraviolet) filter.” Fisher says the system for handling waste is also accounted for as a green effort. Fisher says, “We have a constructed wetland and we’re planning to use a system that’s similar to what they use in submarines and on space capsules, purifying the water with a system that puts very, very finely-divided bubbles through the water to keep it aerobic and to completely degrade all of the organic matter so as to purify the water.”
Fisher says the building is designed to meet the Living Building Challenge, the highest standard for sustainable design and green building in the world. It will also be the first to combine that standard with the standards of LEED Platinum certification, Building Biology and Maharishi Vedic Architecture.
The building will serve as the base for the university’s Sustainable Living major. It will have classrooms, a workshop, a meeting room, a greenhouse, a kitchen, a research lab, a recycling center and offices. Fisher says it’ll be a building that teaches. The one-point-seven million dollar project is expected to be complete late this year.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack says Iowa soldiers will continue an effort to move Afghan farmers away from growing poppy plants to a more diversified system when they are deployed there later this year. An agriculture development team of about 60 Iowa National Guard soldiers and airmen will arrive in Afghanistan by August to replace a guard team from California.
The poppy plants are used to by drug producers to make opium and Vilsack says the Afghan farmers had few other options. Vilsack says it was a very rational thing for the Afghan farmers, as they got the poppy seed virtually free, and the crop was picked up at the harvest and there were no costs associated with it. He says they had to figure out ways to reduce the perceived risk of growing wheat or other crops.
Vilsack, the former Iowa governor, says they’e been successful in cutting the production of poppies. He says people began to see there was a much easier and better way to grow “legitimate” crops their families could use, their neighbors could use, and that they could ultimately sell outside of Afghanistan to produce wealth. Vilsack says they showed them financial information that indicated they could get more money if could raise crops like pomegranates, saffron, table grapes.
Vilsack says one thing the soldiers will also do is to help rebuild the irrigation system in Afghanistan that was destroyed during the war with Soviet Union. Vilsack says the country has precious resources that have to be used effectively. He says it “isn’t about turning this into an Iowa cornfield, this is really about focusing on what they can do with very limited…natural resources, and very limited technology.”
Vilsack says an ag expert from his department will be embedded with the Iowa National Guard Agriculture Development Team.
O.KayHenderson.com