About 300 people packed Monday night’s city council meeting in Council Bluffs to voice opposition to the possibility a parcel of land might be sold to a man looking to build a clinic where abortions would be performed. Dr. LeRoy Carhart, of Bellevue, Nebraska, who once performed late-term abortions in Nebraska, recently said he plans to open an abortion clinic in Council Bluffs.
The large citizens’ turnout at the meeting last night was apparently prompted by a rumor that land near Avenue G and North 15th would be sold for that purpose, but Mayor Tom Hanafan said no one had come forward to seek city approval for such a facility.
The Bluffs City Council unanimously agreed to dispose of the more 24,000 square feet of ground only with the stipulation, that an abortion clinic could not be built there.
The value of the property, which is zoned commercial, will be assessed and eventually put up for sale.
By Ric Hanson, KJAN, Atlantic