A worker turns compost, consisting of leaves from last fall, at the Marion Public Service Facility on Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2013. Turning the compost allows more oxygen to reach all parts of the pile and encourages the activity of microorganisms. A new Environmental Protection Agency rule requiring builders to preserve or restore topsoil at construction sites is increasing demand for compost, which can be mixed with topsoil to meet EPA requirements. (Kaitlyn Bernauer/The Gazette)

A new federal rule to reduce erosion and runoff from urban development could boost demand for compost as the 2013 construction, landscaping and gardening seasons begin.

“This last couple months we were getting approached by entities and contractors, specific in Johnson County, to supply compost,” said Ryan Miller, Marion’s public service director. “We were a bit surprised.”

The new Environmental Protection Agency standard, adopted four years ago to take effect this year, requires builders to preserve or restore topsoil at construction sites. Developers may mix compost with soil to meet the rule, which requires four inches of topsoil at sites where that amount or more was present before construction.

The rule comes at a good time for Marion’s yard waste-to-compost operation, set to grow on part of a 49-acre site just acquired by the city.

“We’re hoping to really expand our operations,” said Miller, who’s asked the city council to change an ordinance barring the city from competing with private suppliers.

Amy Johannsen, engineering inspector for the City of Coralville, contacted Miller about supplying Johnson County builders with compost.

“We’re probably going to have a little bit of compost shortage,” Johannsen said. “We’re just trying to make sure we have enough to get us through our city projects.”

The Iowa Department of Natural Resources will enforce the EPA’s rule in the state. Joe Griffin, DNR stormwater permit coordinator, said most contractors should find compliance fairly straightforward.

It’s an open question whether the new rule will mean a big change for builders, said Allen Witt, principal at Hall & Hall Engineering in Cedar Rapids.

“I think the jury’s out right now,” said Witt. “They’re going to work with the EPA and the DNR to make this happen.”

“Traditionally they strip the site, they stockpile the topsoil” and restore it after construction, Witt said. “Some (builders) say it’s not going to be that big a deal. There is some resistance, (arguing) it’s going to add cost to projects and it’s not gong to improve the situation.”

Tons of material

Marion’s current compost operation generates 2,000 to 3,000 tons a year. Miller said the site typically carries a surplus of about 1,000 tons at the end of the year. The site will continue to provide compost free to Marion residents

The Cedar Rapids/Linn County Solid Waste Agency ran out of compost for the first time last year, distributing 20,955 tons generated from 31,183 tons yard waste collected in the year ending last June 30, agency spokesman Joe Horaney said.

The Cedar Rapids/Linn County agency will continue to offer compost free to county residents – up to two cubic yards per visit. Nonresidents are charged $8 per cubic yard, the same rate Marion charges for screened compost. Marion also offers unscreened compost at $4 per ton for nonresidents.

A cubic yard of compost can weigh 1,100 to 1,900 pounds depending  on its moisture content, Horaney said.

Johnson County’s only publicly-run compost producer, the Iowa City Landfill and Recycling Center, has sold out 4,000 to 6,000 tons of compost each of the past three years, said Jennifer Jordan, the city’s recycling coordinator. The county charges county residents $10 a ton.

“We are doing our best to make as much as we can, but it really comes down to Mother Nature,” said Jordan. She said it takes six to eight months for organic waste to become compost.

To speed the process, Jordan hopes to get more food waste diverted from the general waste stream to composting. She said a recent DNR study found food waste from restaurants and groceries composed 15 percent of the total.

Jordan will meet Tuesday with grocery and restaurant operators to discuss separating food waste. The meeting is set for 4 p.m. at the Bluebird Diner, 330 E. Market St. in Iowa City.

“It’s hard in general to find good local compost,” said Chuck Porto, retail manager at Iowa City Landscaping and Garden Center. “I’s been difficult for awhile. The landfill stream is always in high demand.”

Dale Peterson, owner of Ever-Green Landscape Nursery in Cedar Rapids doesn’t expect supply problems.

“We have enough in stock that I couldn’t even imagine we’d run out,” said Peterson, who buys from a commercial supplier. “We have a mountain of it.”

“Let’s just keep pushing the envelope forward, and keep doing what is right,” Steve Miller told about a half-dozen lawmakers Thursday afternoon.

Miller, of Cedar Rapids, a county, state, and national board member for the National Alliance on Mental Illness, helped the Johnson and Linn Counties Disability Coalition organize the forum in North Liberty for lawmakers who will shortly begin the next steps in redesigning how Iowa provides mental health and developmentally disabled (MHDD) services.

Funding for supported employment services cost Ron Harris, 37, his job at Goodwill in Cedar Rapids, where he’d worked 15 years, said his mother, Shirley Harris. Instead, Ron Harris was shifted to a day-habilitation activities program.

“I appreciate the day hab, but he needs to do more,” said Shirley Harris. “We can’t take away one option without giving them another.”

State Sen. Rob Hogg said he hopes to shift state support for sheltered workshops from MHDD programs to Iowa Workforce Development.

“Do you just want to have a welfare program, or do you want to have a work program that’s productive?” said Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids.

The answers to other residents’ concerns will take longer to sort out. Terry Cunningham of Iowa City said just getting to North Liberty was a challenge for those who need special transportation services.

“If there’s no transportation system, how are they going to get those services?” said Cunningham, 59, who’s used a wheelchair since a traffic accident in high school severed his spinal cord.

Cunningham, who works part-time at the University of Iowa’s  Center for Disabilities and Development, said Medicaid covers his transportation services as well as in-home help with daily tasks such as cooking and dressing himself.

“If I didn’t have that, the next step is an institution” at far more cost to the state, Cunningham said.

“One of the things I’m trying to do is, simplify the legislative issues,” said Hogg. “What we need is some tangible decision points, and that’s my job.”

A casino in Linn County could go before voters on March 5. (The Gazette)

Linn County residents could start voting in as little as two weeks on bringing casino gambling to the county.

County supervisors this afternoon went through the formality of receiving and verifying 15,491 signatures on petitions circulated by Vote Yes Linn County, keeping the local investor group’s casino proposal on track for a March 5 special election. That means the county may begin distributing absentee ballots Jan. 24, said Tim Box, the county’s deputy elections commissioner.

“We’re going to try our hardest to get get absentee ballots available” by that date, Box said.

Casino opponents could delay a vote by successfully challenging individual signatures, or the petition itself, by next Tuesday. If that doesn’t happen, state law requires county supervisors to call an election  by Jan. 18. The election must be held within 46 days of that date.

The petition, with signatures, is posted on the county elections web site for inspection. It may also be viewed at the county auditor’s office at the Jean Oxley Public Service Center, 935 Second St. SW.

“We’ve already had a couple people look at it,” Box said minutes after supervisors received the signed petitions.

Assuming the petition and signatures pass any challenges, other significant dates on the special election timeline, as set by state code:

• Feb. 1: deadline for petitions for satellite voting.
• Feb. 22: last day to pre-register to vote.
• March 1: last day to request a mailed absentee ballot.
• March 4: last day to vote absentee at auditor’s office.
• March 12: canvass of votes.

The final decision on issuing the state’s 15th casino license is up to the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission, but county approval is required for a license. (The state also has three Native American casinos).

A terra cotta detail can be seen next to a boarded up door for the original Peoples Bank and Trust Company that is now part of Wells Fargo Bank at 101 Third Avenue SW. The building was heavily damaged in the June flood. The original building was designed by Chicago architect Louis H. Sullivan in 1910. (Jim Slosiarek/The Gazette)

Linn County is being asked to support renovation of a west-bank downtown landmark.

County supervisors got their first look Monday morning at developer Fred Timko’s request for support for his plan to convert the Louis Sullivan-designed Wells Fargo bank building at 101 Third Ave. SW in Cedar Rapids into an upscale office and residential project.

Darrin Gage, the county’s director of policy and administration, said Timko wants the county to forgo its share of property taxes on the site’s existing value for 10 years. The city has already granted the same request, and the site is in a tax-increment financing (TIF) district  granting Timko an exemption from the property taxes on the improvements’ added value.

Timko’s request will be on Wednesday’s formal session agenda.

“I’m hoping that on the west side of the river, especially with the development we’ve got going on there, we’ll be seeing more,” said Supervisor Linda Langston, D-Cedar Rapids. “This has brought to our attention we’ll need to have a policy in place.”

Because taxes are paid on the previous year’s assessment, Timko’s proposed rebate would take effect in September 2014. Gage said the county receives about 16 percent of revenues generated by the site, which has a $1.8 million assessed value.

Built in 1910 for People’s Bank and Trust, the bank has been vacant since the June 2008 flood. Preservation Iowa named the bank one of 2012′s Most Endangered Properties.

Under plans announced by Timko last fall, a restaurant may move into the architecturally notable bank building. The newer adjoining office building would remain, and new six-story residential condominium would be built on the present parking lot, fronting on Fourth Avenue SW.

Firefighters pay their respects at a memorial for shooting victims near Sandy Hook Elementary School, Saturday, Dec. 15, 2012 in Newtown, Conn. (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)

Prompted by last year’s mass shootings, state lawmakers will consider improving availability of mental health services when the Legislature convenes in two weeks.

“I personally have some interest in looking at it, ” said state Sen. Rob Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids. “It might be something we need to re-visit.”

The state is already reorganizing the delivery of services for the mentally ill and developmentally disabled, and high-profile incidents across the country over the past year may prompt a response by lawmakers, said Hogg.

One idea is to ease involuntary commitment for psychiatric care when family members are concerned someone may be a threat to themselves or to the public.

“The idea that you might strengthen our civil commitments system, there’s no question that’s something I’d like to have my committee address,” said Hogg. He’ll be chairman of the state Senate Judiciary Committee when the Legislature reconvenes Jan. 14.

Hogg has scheduled a public meeting Jan. 11 to discuss restoring mental health services lost to budget-cutting over the past several years. The meeting will be at noon at Westdale Public Library.

“After Sandy Hook I wanted to make sure we’re doing it,” said Hogg. “The clear opportunity for the Legislature in 2013 is to adequately fund mental health, and make sure we have the services.”

Mental illness was a factor in at least two recent shooting deaths in Iowa.

In April 2011,Keokuk County Sheriff’s Deputy Eric Stein was killed by a man whose family had attempted to have him committed for treatment of his mental illness. Stein’s killer was shot and killed by members of a State Patrol tactical unit.

In June 2010, legendary Applington-Parkersburg football coach Ed Thomas was shot to death by a former student with a history of mental illness. The student, Mark Becker, had been released from a Waterloo hospital after a psychiatric evaluation days before the shooting. The coach’s family lobbed lawmakers to pass the Ed Thomas Bill requiring police notification when a psychiatric patient is released with pending criminal charges.

Linn County Board of Supervisors (from left) Linda Langston, Lu Barron, John Harris and Ben Rogers in May 2012. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette-KCRG)

John Harris will chair the Linn County Board of Supervisors this year, board members decided Wednesday.

Harris, a Palo Republican starting his second term, rotated into the position Wednesday morning at the supervisors’ first meeting of the year. Brent Oleson, R-Marion, was last year’s chairman.

Lu Barron, D-Cedar Rapids, is 2013′s vice chair,  running meetings and signing official corresp0ndence in Harris’ absence.

Supervisors also approved appointments to agency boards and liaison assignments:

Term appointments

• Cedar Rapids-Linn County Solid Waste Agency: Ben Rogers, Oleson
• Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance: Rogers
• 6th Judicial District Corrections: Barron
• Corridor Metropolitan Planning Organization: Barron, Rogers
• East Central Iowa Council of Governments: Barron, Rogers
• Marion Economic Development Company: Oleson
• Area Ambulance: Harris
• Conservation: Barron (ends 2013)
• E911 Service Board: Rogers
• Public Health: Linda Langston
• Regional Workforce board (appointed by governor): Barron
• Workforce Development CEO Board: Barron, Langston, Harris

Liaison assignments

• Area Substance Abuse Council: Oleson, Harris
• Decat: Barron, Rogers
• Emergency Management Association: Langston, Harris
• Heritage Area Agency on Aging: Barron, Langston
• State legislative: Rogers, Harris
• Local homeless coordinating board: Rogers, Harris

Department liaisons

• Assessor: Langston, Oleson
• Child and youth development services: Rogers, Oleson
• Conservation: Oleson, Harris
• General assistance advisory: Langston, Oleson
• Home Health: Langston, Harris
• Juvenile detention/youth services: Oleson, Harris
• LIFTS: Langston, Rogers
• MHDD advisory: Langston, Rogers
• Options: Rogers
• Planning & development: all supervisors
• Secondary roads/roadside management: Oleson, Harris
• Veterans Affairs: Barron, Harris

Timothy Finley, 33, threatened the volunteer with a pipe and ordered her to go into the basement of Fennelly’s Irish Pub after she tried to buy a six pack of beer Friday, according to Clayton County Chief Deputy Ryan Johnson.

Finley, who was tending bar, checked the youth’s identification, then told her he suspected she was conducting an alcohol compliance “sting,” Johnson said. He told the volunteer to go into the bar’s basement “because he was going to cause her great physical harm.”

When the youth, who wasn’t identified, refused to go into the basement Finley tried to detain her, calling her names and threatening her several times, according to Johnson. The volunteer was eventually able to leave the bar and tell the deputy she’d been working with of Finley’s threats.

Finley was arrested on suspicion of second-degree harassment, false imprisonment, and kidnapping. Harassment and false imprisonment are serious misdemeanors with a maximum sentence of one year, and kidnapping is a Class C felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The state Alcoholic Beverages Division was also informed of the incident.

Finley has been released from the county jail.

A new effort by churches and a synagogue in Cedar Rapids and Marion is offering another shelter option for homeless families in Eastern Iowa.

13 area churches are participating in Family Promise of Linn County, the local affiliate of a national program that organizes churches to shelter and feed homeless families. Family Promise also provides support for parents’ job-hunting and other efforts to get back on their feet.

“In the past six months, I’ve only had two single beds available because I’ve had so many families,” said Larissa Ruffin, manager of the St. John of the Cross Catholic Worker House. “I have a family of six moving on Friday, and I have seven people ready to move in. There’s no end to it in sight.”

Ruffin said she reserves 18 of the 20 beds at Catholic Worker House, 1027 Fifth Ave. SE, for families.

One family’s story

After the violence of Chicago began to threaten the lives of their children, Vincent and Monique Nelson decided they needed a different future for their family. They gave away all of their belongings, and with four kids and seven suitcases, they came to Cedar Rapids, knowing they would be homeless once the bus ride was over.

On Dec. 21, after nearly two months in the Catholic Worker House, the Nelson family found their own home in Cedar Rapids with the help of caseworkers. Before they had fully moved out of the shelter, workers were getting another family and several individuals to fill their room.

The couple said it was painful to hear other families calling for space while their family was staying there.

“When you hear that phone ring as much as you do, it hurts,” Monique said.

“I am out on the streets with my family, with my wife in the streets just like the next person.” Vincent said. “But to hear that phone ring all day, and they always say, “We’re full, please call back at a later time, a later date.” We had to get out there and take care of our business. I´m so grateful to be able to give up that room for another family.”

Ruffin said she has regular contact with families facing a night on the street.

“I’ve had a lot of people call in and say they’re sleeping on the streets, there’s nothing they can do,” she said. “(Family Promise) might eliminate that problem.”

“We keep the families intact,” said Stefanie Munsterman-Robinson, president of the local chapter’s board. “A lot of shelters for safety reasons have to separate the children from the parent.”

Eastern Iowans in need

The most recent survey by the Linn County Continuum of Care Planning and Policy Committee found 87 children homeless the night of July 25. Children were 24 percent of the 362 homeless counted that night, consistent with previous counts conducted every January and July.

“We don’t generally find families in the street because they are many times given priority to get in a shelter,” said Ann Hearn, the county’s deputy director of community planning. “They might get into trouble with DHS (the state Department of Human Services), so they’re going to do everything they can to get them into a shelter.”

“It’s a huge commitment for a congregation, but it’s a blessing,” said the Rev. Jim Langley of Echo Hills Presbyterian Church in Marion. “I think it blesses the congregation as much as the people who stay here.”

Family Promise will shelter families for up to 120 days — long enough for a parent to find a job and save enough for rent, deposit and utilities.

“For some families it may be much shorter than that, but realistically it could start stretching out to that 90- to 100-day window,” said Becky Knudson, the local affiliate’s executive director and case manager.

Host churches prepare a secure, private space for families to spend the night and provide breakfast, a brown-bag lunch and dinner. During the day, families are provided transportation to Family Promise’s day center at First Presbyterian Church. The church, at 310 Fifth St. SE, provides showers, a laundry, and a mailing address and telephone for job hunts.

Family Promise also provides job counseling and help with planning and goal-setting.

“This may be an empty place many days, because we hope they’ll be working” while children attend school or day care, Knudson said. “We’re trying to make this as homelike as we can.”

Shelter duties are rotated among participating churches. Organizers estimate a church would host a family every three to four months.

At Echo Hill, “we basically converted classrooms into hotel rooms,” Langley said. “We want people to feel at home when they come in and we want them to consider the facility as their own.”

Kyle Grillot, The Gazette, contributed to this story

More information

– Family Promise of Linn County: (319) 640-0339 or http://familypromiseoflinncounty.org/

– Donations may be sent to:

Family Promise of Linn County

P.O. Box 1443

Cedar Rapids, IA 52406-1443

“We are extremely busy helping people meet the deadline,” said Dave Burger, general manager of Waterloo-based Radio Communications Company. “We usually take Dec. 31 off at noon, that ain’t happening. Our guys have been working Saturdays and long hours to get this done.”

Two-way radio users have until midnight Monday to “narrowband” their transmissions to double the broadcast frequencies available for mobile devices. Private companies passed the extra cost on to their customers, an option public users lack.

Most Iowa agencies will meet the rule, but 10 to 15 percent, including those in Linn County, have received waivers from the Federal Communications Commission granting them extra time, said Jim Bogner, coordinator of the Iowa Statewide Interoperable Communications Board.

“We’ve been talking about it for two and a half years,” said Tom Berger, Epworth’s fire chief, Dubuque County’s emergency management coordinator, and local fire departments’ representative on the state communications board. “Everybody’s well aware of it. It’s another unfunded mandate that’s tough for some departments to meet.”

Berger said his county’s agencies will meet the deadline thanks to a $200,000 federal grant.

The communications gear at Johnson County’s joint dispatch center, opened in 2010, meets the federal requirement.

Because narrowband range is about 20 percent less than older systems’, the state will have to erect up to 100 new broadcast towers to supplement its current 31, State Patrol Capt. Curt Henderson said.

“We lost signal when we narrowbanded,” Henderson said. “Those areas now have a more profound dead spot — it’s difficult for some of our officers to communicate with our communications centers.”

Henderson said the state patrol has an FCC waiver through November.

Linn County, Cedar Rapids, and Marion, cooperating on a new $18.2 million system, were granted another year by the FCC. Marion Police Chief Harry Daugherty, also chairman of the county E-911 board, hopes to have it operational by summer.

Counties’ emergency communications systems are funded through a surcharge on landline telephones, numbers of which are dropping as people switch to cellphones. The state also assesses a 65-cent monthly fee on cellphone bills, which is distributed to counties.

For Linn County, those two sources meant $389,189 in the last fiscal year. Voters in November approved doubling the county’s fee to 50 cents after rejecting an increase to $1 two years earlier.

Linn County supervisors voted to borrow up to $8 million for the county’s share of the new system, and the county bought $246,000 worth of compatible radios for three rural ambulance services. Cedar Rapids ($8.1 million) and Marion ($23.65 million) also are borrowing for their costs.

Crews from Radio Communications finished installing Tama County’s system last week, said Ryan Currens, the county’s emergency management coordinator. He said the upgrades cost the county about $110,000, and it’s up to the four police departments and local fire and ambulance services to fund their new compatible equipment.

“It just wouldn’t be feasible for the county to buy radios for every fireman and fire truck in the county,” Currens said.

Fortunately, radios purchased since the late 1990s can be reprogrammed for the new narrowband standard.

“Probably 90 percent of the radios we’ve been using in the county have been compatible,” Currens said. “They’ve had time to build them into their budgets.”

The State Patrol has spent $2.5 million for new hand-held radios but will need additional funding for the repeaters mounted in patrol cars’ trunks to link them with dispatchers, Henderson said. He said the patrol also hopes to seek quotes on those new transmitters needed to cover “dead zones” across the state.

“I’d hate to even guess” what that will cost, Henderson said.

Joe Heinrich, 51, a dairy farmer near Maquoketa, is paying close attention to the goings-on in Washington, D.C., these days. If Congress fails to adopt a new farm bill, policies take effect at midnight Monday, Dec. 31, 2012, that would push milk prices to $6 or $8 a gallon. (Iowa Farm Bureau photo)

From his Jackson County farm, Joe Heinrich will keep an eye on Washington, D.C., this weekend.

Heinrich is paying close attention to a corner of the so-called “fiscal cliff” debate in Congress and the White House. Thanks to Congress’ failure to adopt a new farm bill, policies take effect at midnight Monday that would push milk prices to $6 or $8 a gallon.

“It seems a little surreal that they would even let it happen,” Heinrich said after morning chores one day this week.

Higher prices would bring a windfall to farmers like Heinrich, 51, who with his wife Shirley and a nephew milk about 60 cows on their farm near Maquoketa. But it’s one he’d as soon do without.

“It sounds good initially, but when you think about it, it’s not good for the consumer long-term,” he said. “It doesn’t take very long to realize we need a balance” between producer and consumer needs.

“Dairy prices are already astronomical,” said Nick Carfrae, manager of Tomaso’s Pizza, 3234 Center Point Rd. NE. “That’s been an ongoing thing over the past six months. A month ago I was paying the highest price for cheese I’ve ever paid.”

Back to 1949

Barring congressional action, federal dairy policy reverts Tuesday to a 1949 plan under which the Department of Agriculture buys milk at $40 per hundredweight, more than twice the current price. There are about 12 gallons of milk in a hundredweight, depending on its fat content.

Cheese makers and other processors would be forced to outbid the government, doubling the retail price of milk and dairy products.

Farmers, processors and retailers don’t expect an immediate jump in prices, but all want a new farm bill to prevent the 1949 policy taking effect.

“I would not stock up on milk as the New Year’s clock nears midnight, as this will take some time to sort itself out,” Chris Hoeger, vice president of procurement for Swiss Valley Farms in Davenport, wrote in an email.

“Milk prices for January have been already established and sent to the retailers this past week, so milk prices should remain near the current levels for the month of January,” Hoeger wrote.

It would take about a month for the government to establish policies for milk purchases at the higher price, according to Hoeger.

“The bigger question will be, where will the government get the funds to buy the dairy products with all the other fiscal cliff issues?” Hoeger wrote.

Even a temporary uptick in dairy prices would hurt dairy exports, which account for about 14 percent of the nation’s production. Hoeger noted imported dairy products would even undercut domestic products.

“We would lose all that we have gained in the past few years as an exporter of dairy products,” he wrote.

‘Poison pill’ provision

The 1949 provision was left in the current farm bill as a “poison pill” to force Congress to adopt a new farm bill. In June, the Senate passed a farm bill that cuts spending over the previous version by about $24 billion over 10 years. The House Agriculture Committee passed a bill in July with $35 billion in cuts.

Both versions reduce direct payments, the $5 billion subsidy paid by the government every year to farmers. Farm groups supported those cuts only if they included subsidized insurance to cover financial losses when crops are lost to flood or drought.

Negotiations on reconciling the two versions are stalled, and House Speaker John Boehner has resisted U.S. Agriculture Secretary (and former Iowa governor) Tom Vilsack’s calls to include a new farm bill in budget legislation to avoid the fiscal cliff.

“There’s no reason why we can’t get it done,” Vilsack told the U.S. Chamber of Commerce last week. “I think right now the Speaker’s reluctance needs to be addressed. Then we need to tell the Speaker it’s not a thousand-page bill, it’s a bill that can be easily linked to and provide savings for any fiscal cliff resolution and would encourage the Speaker to rethink the notion that this can’t be done. It can be done.”

Congressional response

“The looming spike in milk prices is a direct result of congressional leaders refusing to do their job to pass a farm bill,” said 1st District Rep. Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, who sponsored a failed resolution in August to force the House bill out of committee. “It’s beyond frustrating to watch Congressional leaders feud over the so-called fiscal cliff and refuse to work on anything at all while there are so many big issues like the Farm Bill that need to be dealt with.”

Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley expressed similar concerns.

“Many of us have been warning the House leadership about the consequences of not passing a farm bill,” Grassley said. “High milk prices are just one of the first problems we may see. Modern agriculture simply doesn’t fit in a 1949 law.”

Lumir Dostal and his wife Sara Dostal at their Marion home in 2004. (Gazette photo)

Lumir Dostal “was just always a public servant,” according to Linn County Supervisor Brent Oleson.

Dostal, 76, a county supervisor from 1995 through 2002, died Wednesday at Mercy Medical Center. Funeral services will be 11 a.m. Saturday at First Presbyterian Church, Marion.

“I have a lot of fond memories of working with Lumir,” said former supervisor Jim Houser. “He treated me with respect. We had a lot of differences, but he always respected me and I respected him.”

“I think my leadership qualities speak for themselves,” Dostal told The Gazette in 2002 after losing his bid for a third term. “I don’t like to toot my own horn. I think I have the ability to get the best out of people I work with and, to me, that’s leadership.”

Dostal was the first Republican voted to the county board in 22 years when he won election in November 1994. Supervisors then ran at-large, but Dostal was considered the board’s rural representative, although he moved into Marion the following year from the farm northeast of town he’d worked for 35 years.

“He had a lot of ties to the rural community,” said Houser, a Democrat whose terms on the board overlapped Dostal’s. “Lumir had a lot of insight and a lot of knowledge about the land, and the feeling people had attached to their farms and land.”

That knowledge was useful as supervisors wrote a new county land-use plan, Houser said, and Dostal looked after the county’s rural roads and parks.

“We’ve probably got one of the best park systems in the state,” Dostal said in 2002.

Before his two supervisor terms Dostal served 15 years on the Linn-Mar school board and was board chairman of Bluestem, predecessor to today’s Cedar Rapids/Linn County Solid Waste Agency. He graduated from Iowa State University in 1960 with an agricultural business degree and served 24 years in the Iowa National Guard.

“He was a good guy,” said Oleson, R-Marion. “He helped me in my first campaign.”

Oleson was elected six years after Dostal’s last term, but he said the fellow Marion Republican was glad to help with his first campaign.

“I’d meet with him at Burger King a couple times a week,” Oleson said. “He was a Republican, but he was never political.”

Paul Robert Saldivar

The death of a Cedar Rapids man in police custody in May was accidental, with intoxication a contributing factor, according to the state medical examiner.

Charges won’t be filed in Paul Robert Saldivar’s death, Linn County Attorney Jerry Vander Sanden said in a statement issued by the county late this afternoon.

Saldivar, 33, died May 17, a week after he lost consciousness in police custody after being arrested for public intoxication and on an outstanding warrant.

“I concur with the conclusion of the Iowa State Medical Examiner that the death of Paul Robert Saldivar was accidental in nature and that there is no evidence to suggest that criminal charges would be appropriate,” Vander Sanden said in a prepared statement.

“We appreciate the work done and the thorough and exhaustive efforts by all agencies involved in this investigation,” Police Chief Wayne Jerman said in a statement issued by his department.

Patrons at Hazzard County Saloon, 315 Second Ave. SE, pointed Saldivar out to officers making a business check shortly after 11 p.m. May 10, telling police he’d been “causing problems,” according to police reports.

Saldivar ran from officers but was apprehended in the alley nearby. He became combative and resisted as officers tried to place him in the patrol car after they discovered he had an outstanding warrant from Illinois, according to the county attorney’s report.

Saldivar “continued to thrash about” in the back seat, striking his head against the armrest. He grew quiet as Officer Shannon Aguero drove to the county jail, where there was about a five-minute delay before the patrol car was admitted to the jail’s sally port.

Deputies found Saldivar unresponsive, lying on his stomach with his head against the car’s door. After failing to find a pulse, they began resuscitation efforts and called an ambulance.

Saldivar was admitted to Mercy Medical Center in critical condition and never regained consciousness. After learning there was no sign of brain activity, his family decided to remove him from life-support systems May 17.

Tests showed no illegal drugs in Saldivar’s blood, but he had a blood-alcohol concentration of 0.299 percent, more than three times the legal drunk-driving limit.

Associate State Medical Examiner Dr. Jonathan Thompson concluded Saldivar died as a result of positional asphyxia, which occurs when a person’s posture hinders their ability to breathe.

The state medical examiner’s office ruled that the manner of  Saldivar’s death as accidental, with acute alcohol intoxication a significant contributing factor.

Two electric car charging stations are available for customers at the NewBo City Market in Cedar Rapids. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

When it was time for a new car, Paul Webster went in a different direction.

“I’d been thinking about it for a while, but it wasn’t a long drawn-out, thought-out thing,” Webster said.

A salesman for Dave Wright Nissan in northeast Cedar Rapids, Webster settled on leasing a new Leaf, joining something of an exclusive club in Iowa. There were just 41 “pure” electrics — 39 Leafs and two Tesla Roadsters — registered in the state Dec. 4, compared to 15,726 hybrids, according to the Iowa Department of Transportation.

Polk County has the most electric vehicles, 10. There are eight in Linn County, four in Johnson.

With a daily commute of only about 13 miles round-trip and “with the leases they were offering on a Leaf it was a no-brainer,” said Webster.

But for those with longer drives, electric vehicless can be a challenge.

“We don’t have enough infrastructure,” said Jing Dong,  an assistant professor in Iowa State University’s engineering department who’s done extensive research and development work on electric vehicle infrastructure. “People don’t trust the cars’ range.”

Nissan says the Leaf gets 73 miles from a full charge of its batteries, easily covering the 29 miles the average American drives in a day. For longer trips electric vehicles drivers can supplement that range with quick charges, but there are only 33 public charging stations in Iowa, according to the Department of Energy’s online directory.

There are three charging stations in Iowa City and at least five in Cedar Rapids, including ones at both cities’ Nissan dealers and the NewBo City Market. The Hotel at Kirkwood Center installed one last March.

When it comes to electric vehicles support, “a lot of people talk about the chicken or the egg, who’s first?” said Dong. “They have to invest some money to put in the charging station.”

The Kirkwood hotel’s station cost $14,500, and all but $2,500 was covered through a federal block grant managed by the city.

Change is coming. The Kum & Go convenience store chain has charging stations at six locations in the Des Moines area, Fairfield, and Bentonville, Ark. Company spokeswoman Linda Pixley said new Kum & Go stores, including those built in Cedar Rapids over the past year, are pre-wired for installation of Level 2 chargers, which can deliver 10 to 20 miles’ charge in an hour.

“A shift in both demand and charging technology would likely have to occur for this to happen,” Pixley wrote in an email. “More electric cars would have to be on the road, and those cars would have to be able to charge in a reasonable time.”

There’s no charge for Kum & Go’s chargers, Pixley said. Home Depot, Walgreen’s, Kohl’s, and Best Buy are among the companies installing chargers at locations elsewhere across the country.

Paul Webster,a salesman at Dave Wright Nissan Subaru in Cedar Rapids, plugs in his Nissan Leaf outside the service department at the dealership. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

CHARGER OPTIONS

Webster said he plugs his car in only about once a week. At home, he uses a Level 1 charger that simply plugs into a standard household outlet to deliver a full charge in about 12 hours. Webster estimates the full charge costs about $3.

“It depends how much driving I do,” he said. “If I have to go to Iowa City, highway driving really saps my charge. “If I’m driving a little extra and need an extra big charge I plug it in here at work.”

Drivers with longer commutes may install a Level 2 charger in their garage, capable of delivering 10 to 20 miles’ worth of charge in an hour, for $750 to $1,000. A federal tax credit rebates half the cost up to $2,000.

DC fast chargers can supply 60 to 80 miles’ range in 20 minutes but require a 480-volt DC power supply, limiting their use to public charging stations.

Pixley said Kum & Go would place chargers at stores near shopping districts where drivers might park for the hour or two. The chain is participating in Department of Energy programs to develop electric vehicles infrastructure.

DEVELOPING AREAS

Cost, range, and charging time are development targets.

“Companies like Chevron are now pouring tons of money into battery development, and companies like Kum & Go have invested in infrastructure,” said Brian Brownfield, automotive technology instructor at Kirkwood.

Brownfield, who’s developing a curriculum for next-generation automotive technicians, expects both hybrids and pure electrics to fill their niches in the market as battery range and charge time improve.

“There’s a combination of technologies that’s going to be employed,” he said. “The Leaf is great for a commuter car, where the Volt really solves the situation when you want a family car that’s going to be more efficient and you want to take a road trip.”

Chevrolet’s Volt can be plugged in to deliver up to 40 miles on a full charge before its small gas engine fires up to recharge the batteries. The hybrid powertrain gives the car an EPA rating equivalent to 94 mpg while its drivers are secure knowing they’ll never run out of charge.

“Many current users use (the Leaf) as a second car, so you can use the gasoline car when you want to go farther,” said Dong. “Battery cost is the major cost of the car — that’s why the car is expensive.”

Costs should improve with battery technology. The Leaf lists for $36,050, the Volt $37,579. Both cars are eligible for a $7,500 federal tax break due to expire at the end of the year.

NICHE PRODUCTS

Electric vehicles will remain a niche product until manufacturers can lower their cost and demonstrate economic benefits to would-be customers, according to a J.D. Powers and Associates study released this fall. It’s the first of what the consumer research firm plans to be an annual survey of electric vehicles owners.

Electric vehicle owners told J.D. Powers recharging their cars’ batteries raised their monthly utility bills by $18 — significantly less than the $147 they would have paid for gas over the same period.

Based on that savings, it will take an electric vehicle owner 6 1/2 years to recoup the $10,000 premium their cars cost over a comparable gas vehicle, the report said.

Aside from the sticker price and their range issues, Webster said he’s found the Leaf to be a typical compact car with room enough for the entire family – he and his wife Niki Webster have three children ages 2 through 10.

“One of the things that won me over once I drove it was the ride quality,” he said. “We can get all three (children) in there.”

Angel Ross of Coralville (left) picks out soup with help from volunteer Paul Miller of Ainsworth during the annual Project Holiday food distribution event at the Coralville Rec Center on Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2012, in Coralville. Ross will be cooking Christmas dinner for six people, including her roommates and counselors at her group home. More than 1,600 families are signed up for the annual food distribution, which provides most of the food needed to cook a holiday meal. (Liz Martin/The Gazette)

Hours before Wednesday’s blizzard rolled in, Angel Ross set out to get the fixings for Christmas dinner.

Besides a turkey, Ross picked up sweet potatoes, brownie mix and a few staples such as flour and sugar. The bill came to zero.

“I believe in helping the poor people,” said Ross, 42. “And helping the rich to help the poor, too.”

Ross, who works at a Coralville pet-supply store, is one of nearly 5,000 people putting holiday dinner on the table the help from the Crisis Center of Johnson County’s Project Holiday. The neighborhood group home where Ross lives with other people with disabilities is one of 1,643 households receiving food.

Both numbers are records for the project, marking its 25th year. But more families in need and higher costs keep the pressure on donors who buy the groceries.

“The turkeys are 10 cents more expensive per pound,” Sarah Benson Witry, food bank and emergency director at the Crisis Center, wrote in an email. “Each turkey weighs 10 to 14 pounds, and we are ordering 1,000, which means we will spend roughly $1,300 more, just on turkeys.”

“We used to order $20,000 or $25,000 worth of food, and we just hope we’re going to get enough donations to cover that,” said Judy Atkins, a volunteer organizer for the project. “We are on the hook for the food and just have to keep our fingers crossed.”

Atkins said 600 to 700 people signed up for Project Holiday when she started volunteering in 1996.

“The last couple years they’ve had upward of 1,000 people sign up,” she said. “That’s monumental.”

With no formal eligibility rules, the project is open to “anyone who identified as in need,” Benson Witry said. “We don’t have any income guidelines, because we know that people may not meet the guidelines but are still in need.”

Many in need

The Iowa Policy Project calculates more than a quarter of Iowa residents don’t earn enough to cover basic living costs, with 74 percent of that number being single parents.

Last year, volunteers handed out 800 whole turkeys, 340 whole chickens, 300 turkey roasts and 60 “tofurkey” vegetarian turkey roast substitutes, feeding 3,512 people in 1,223 households, Benson Witry said.

Teams of volunteers helped hand out food over three days last week in Coralville and Iowa City — a North Liberty distribution was canceled because of weather.

“It’s an undertaking,” said Atkins, of Iowa City.

“I think there’s a lot of need out there,” said Norbert Sarsfield, who volunteered to help with the first day’s distribution. “It seemed like a good thing to do, and I’m glad I did it.”

Ross said she was looking forward to turning the groceries in her basket into a traditional meal for about a half-dozen “counselors and roommates and friends.”

“I stay busy,” she said. “They keep me busy. I used to be in trouble years ago — I got into trouble. I got straightened out, though.”

Atkins said volunteers will start planning next year’s Project Holiday in a few months.

“In the fall it really has to get ratcheted up, you have to decide if there’s any changes you want to make” to meet higher prices, Atkins said.

Linn County supervisors on Wednesday approved issuing $17.5 million worth of Midwestern Disaster Area Revenue Bonds for CRST International’s planned new headquarters in southwest Cedar Rapids.

The supervisors’ action means CRST will be able to finance its project at a lower interest rate because the 2008 federal law allows the bonds ‘ buyers a tax exemption on interest earned from them. The bonds ‘ purchasers pass along their tax-break savings as the lower interest rate.

Tax-exempt bonds are usually reserved for public projects, but the federal legislation allowed state and local governments to issue them for a wide range of private borrowing in counties declared presidential disaster areas in 2008.

CRST’s project is among the last to draw on Iowa’s $2.6 billion in bonding authority granted by Congress. Nearly half the state’s allocation, $1.1 billion worth, went to an Egyptian conglomerate’s fertilizer plant planned for Wever in Lee County.

Two projects in Waterloo and Eddyville also planning funding through the program, according to Iowa Finance Authority spokeswoman Ashley Jared. The finance authority administers the program in Iowa.

Among the area projects funded through the program are PCI’s medical mall in Cedar Rapids ($21.5 million), True North’s renovation of the former public library for its new offices ($5 million), and Backpocket Brewing’s Coralville facility ($5.4 million).

CRST announced plans last March for a 65,000-square-foot headquarters expansion on 18 acres at 16th Avenue and Wiley Boulevard SW. Company officials haven’t returned calls seeking an update on the project.

City plows clear off Bever Ave SE on Thursday, December 20, 2012. (Kyle Grillot/The Gazette-KCRG)

Darkness will force Linn County plows off the roads at 4 p.m., to return 12 hours later, County Engineer Steve Gannon said Thursday.

“Once it gets dark it’s hard for them to stay out on our system,” Gannon said.

It should take three to four hours to clear major paved roads once plows head back out, but “it depends on what the wind’s going to do,” Gannon said.

In Iowa City, “it’s been difficult to stay ahead of the snow and blowing snow,” said John Sobaski, the city’s assistant street superintendent. “We’ll go down a street and a little later it’s all snowed in again.”

Sobaski said the city’s 12 plow trucks will work until midnight.

“We’ll drop back to a smaller crew, then go full force again at 5 a.m.,” he said.

Iowa City’s snowfall wasn’t enough to trigger the city’s snow emergency rules, Sobaski said.

Gannon said Linn County crews were making headway until winds picked up around mid-morning.

“Essentially everything you do is going to get undone by weather,” he said.

In Cedar Rapids, residents saw a much heavier snowfall.

Late Thursday afternoon, Craig Hanson, the city’s public works maintenance manager, reported that the city took on between 6 and 9 inches of snow, with the north side of the city getting more than the south side, though some of the worst drifting was on the south side, particularly on 76th Avenue SW and Wright Brothers Boulevard SW.

In fact, the city had to close down 76th Avenue SW on Thursday when winds of 35 to 40 miles created a white-out condition.

City crews, Hanson said, had to withdraw plows from Wright Brothers Boulevard SW for a time for the same white-out conditions after a truck driving on the wrong side of the boulevard came at a city plow.

Hanson said the intense Thursday wind complicated work for city crews, and he said dropping temperatures into the evening Thursday were making crews hustle to finish the cleanup of residential streets before the snow on them froze.

Warm temperatures in the downtown at the start of the storm on Wednesday evening allowed the first couple of inches of snow there to melt, making six to eight inches of snow seem more like three to five inches, he said.

Among the assignments for city crews on Friday, he added, is the cleanup 23 miles of city sidewalk.

Iowa snowfall totals:

MARSHALLTOWN — 13.0

MOUNT AUBURN — 12.5

DUBUQUE — 12.1

OELWEIN —  11.7

HAZLETON — 11.2

BELLEVUE — 11.0

TOLEDO — 11.0

VINTON — 11.0

GUTTENBERG — 11.0

EDGEWOOD — 10.8

ELDORA — 10.0

WATERLOO AIRPORT — 10.0

GRUNDY CENTER — 10.0

CLAYTON CENTER — 10.0

MCGREGOR — 10.0

LITTLETON — 9.8

CLUTIER — 8.0

LOWDEN — 8.0

MONONA — 8.0

VICTOR — 7.0

WATERVILLE — 7.0

CEDAR RAPIDS — 6.5

SPRINGVILLE — 6.5

PEOSTA — 6.5

BELLE PLAINE — 6.5

TIPTON — 6.5

ATKINS — 6.2

CALMAR — 6.0

DECORAH — 6.0

ANAMOSA — 5.0

NORTH LIBERTY — 4.9

MONTEZUMA — 4.5

OSKALOOSA — 4.0

IOWA FALLS — 4.0

SWISHER — 3.4

OTTUMWA — 2.0

IOWA CITY — 1.8

UPDATE: High winds are causing more power outages, and wind and drifting snow are hampering crews’ efforts to restore service. Alliant Energy says it may be Friday before all are restored.

More than 11,000 Linn County customers, most in Cedar Rapids, are now without power as high winds bring down lines in the Marion area, according to Alliant spokesman Ryand Stensland.

“We lost part of Marion due to a downed line on Highway 13,” Stensland emailed. “We have had galloping lines in that area, impacting both Cedar Rapids and Marion.”

About 23,000 Alliant customers are without power across the system.

“Looks like 24 hours before we get most back on as our crews are having a bugger of a time getting anywhere right now with travel,” Stensland wrote in an email.

“Weather is playing a factor in getting the folks back on in Urbana and looks like it may be this evening before we can get them back on,” Stensland emailed.

About 400 Urbana customers lost power when a transmission line went down at 4:42 a.m. Crews initially hoped to restore service by 1 p.m.

About 13,000 Alliant Energy customers, most of them in Tama, Marshall, and Jasper counties, are without power.

Outages continue for about 1,400 Cedar Rapids area customers and 600 in Walford.

“The wind is the primary culprit in causing the outage,” he said. “Getting the power restored, that’s where the snow comes in. It’s making some areas almost impassable. It’s a heavy snow, and especially in the rural areas it’s a challenge.”

All Alliant crews are on alert today.

“We haven’t moved crews from one part of the state to another, just because we’re still in the middle of a storm,” Stensland said.

More than 32,000 MidAmerican Energy customers are without power in the Des Moines area. Fourteen MidAmerican customers are without power in Iowa City, about 60 in and near the Quad Cities.

A resident on Cedar Rapids’ east side reported alternating blue and green lights lighting “the entire horizon” early Thursday, according to Peter Davenport, director of the National UFO Reporting Center in Harrington, Wash.

Davenport said the witness filed a report on his group’s Web site after the incident about 3:15 a.m. He said he hoped to reach the witness, who didn’t identify himself but left his contact information, for a follow-up interview.

“He describes it at  great length,” Davenport said. “He sounds like a credible witness. It was intriguing enough to me, I thought it worth following up on.”

Davenport said the witness’ description of viewing bright lights for 20 minutes leads him to believe he wasn’t describing lightning or an exploding power line transformer.

Cedar Rapids police logs don’t list any calls reporting a UFO sighting Thursday morning.

Davenport invited anyone who may have seen the incident to call his group’s hotline: 206-722-3000.

The witness’ initial report:

Date: 12/20/12

Time: 3:15

Duration: 20 minutes

Sighting City: Cedar Rapids

Sighting State: ia

Sighting Zip: 52403

Sighting County: Linn

Witnesses: 2

Shape: Light

Description: Astonishing Sound and Changing Lights Seen North Of Cedar rapids, Iowa on December 20th 3:15 A.M.

Description: Awakened by loud hum. Hum lasted about 5 seconds. Hum immediately followed by a blue light which lit the entire horizon this light then immediately followed by a green light which also lit the entire horizon. Lights were NOT a flash radiating outward but were almost like enormous bars of light (horizon to horizon) radiating upward toward the heavens. This process was repeated at least 5 times and, we believe more as we heard it and could see our room lit from without before rising to look out the window – we personally witnessed at least 5 cycles.

Iowa was the 35th in growth in the Census’ annual state estimate, although its growth outpaced the Midwest’s 0.6 percent.

Iowa’s official population is 3,074,186. The nation gained 5.1 million, to 313,914,040.

North Dakota was the fastest-growing state, gaining 2.17 percent for the year, 4 percent over two years. The fastest growers:

Percent Change

1.         North Dakota                              2.17

2.         District of Columbia                 2.15

3.         Texas                                           1.67

4.         Wyoming                                    1.60

5.         Utah                                           1.45

6.         Nevada                                        1.43

7.         Colorado                                     1.39

8.         Arizona                                       1.33

9.         Florida                                          1.23

10.       South Dakota                              1.19

Texas gained the most people:

Numeric Change

1.         Texas                                       427,400

2.         California                                357,500

3.         Florida                                     235,300

4.         Georgia                                   107,500

5.         North Carolina                        101,000

6.         Arizona                                   86,000

7.         Virginia                                   81,500

8.         Washington                             73,700

9.         Colorado                                 71,300

10.         New York                               68,600

“We set the bar so low last year that any normal type of winter will look higher,” said Alliant Energy spokesman Ryan Stensland.

With prices locked in on about 70 percent of Alliant’s expected natural gas needs, Stensland doesn’t expect customers to see a rate increase. But heating bills would be higher with anything like a normal winter.

“We don’t anticipate pricing to change much over the winter for customers,” he said. “What would change is their usage.”

Continued warm weather may have contributed to a decrease in the number of Iowans signing up for help with their heating bills, said Jerry McKim, director Iowa Bureau of Energy Assistance.

“Our participation rate is quite a bit lower than last year,” McKim said. “I attribute that to a mild winter so far.”

Through Thursday, 50,729 Iowa households had signed up for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program), down about 6 percent from 53,776 at this point last year.

The Hawkeye Area Community Action Program has taken 4,740 enrollments, down from 4,997 at this point last year, said Lorna Golson, program manager for the Hiawatha-based non-profit. The agency administers the assistance program in Benton, Iowa, Johnson, Jones, Linn and Washington counties.

Households with incomes up to 150 percent of the federal poverty level — $34,575 for a family of four — may apply for heating assistance through April 30. That’s down from a record 101,401 Iowa homes in 2010 to 88,493 last year.

The assistance program’s federal funding is set every year, and McKim expects Iowa’s share this year to be the same as last winter’s $54.8 million. But $5 million has been held pending an outcome to the slow-moving fiscal negotiations in Washington.

“We’re waiting to see if we’ll fall into the sequester,” said McKim. “Best-case scenario, we’re going to get the same amount as last year. Worst scenario is we’d get about $4.5 million less.”

That would mean an average benefit of $460 per household if enrollment hits last year’s level.

“Is $460 an adequate benefit? Even on a mild winter, no it’s not,” said McKim. “For a significant segment of our population, energy continues to remain unaffordable, plain and simple.”

New residents moved to Iowa in 2011 from every state except Delaware, New Hampshire, or the District of Columbia, according to the U.S. Census Bureau . People leaving Iowa went to every state except Delaware, New Mexico, Vermont, or West Virginia.

According to the Census’ American Community Survey, 74,516 people moved from Iowa over the past year, while 70,405 were moving here from somewhere else.

Nationwide, 36.5 million people, or 12 percent of the population, moved over the past year, raising the national “mover rate” from 2011’s record low of 11.6 percent, according to the Census Current Population Survey. Most movers stayed within the same county, and even those who didn’t stayed within 50 miles of their old home, according to the Census.

Illinois sent the most new residents to Iowa – 13,725, edging out the 13,345 who came from foreign counties and more than double the next-most-popular origin state, Nebraska.

Nebraska was the most popular state for Iowans to move to, with 9,575 crossing the Missouri River. The Mississippi River was the second-favorite border to cross, with 8,490 moving to Illinois.

Iowa’s incoming and outgoing numbers were dwarfed by the year’s most popular state-to-state move, the 59,288 who moved from New York to Florida.

“It’s a big loss for us, in terms of our staff that’s there and in terms of the community,” said William Bonnes, president and CEO of Community Care Inc., the DeWitt-based non-profit that owns Fairview Care Center in Anamosa.

Bonnes said Community Care is closing Fairview, opened just three years ago, due to fewer referrals and declining state payments for residential services. He said about 10 of the facility’s 21 residents have already found new homes in smaller neighborhood group homes, closely supervised apartments, or other settings.

Community Care moved into the former Jones Regional Medical Center in October 2009 after the hospital moved to a new building on Anamosa’s eastern edge. Community Care spent about $1 million to convert the hospital to a long-term care facility that could house up to 36 residents, Bonnes said.

Before Fairview, Community Care provided the services at Edinburgh Manor about 11 miles northwest of Anamosa. That deteriorating building, the former “county home” built about 1900, was closed and sold.

“We invested $1 million in the (Fairview) facility and now we’re still paying the mortgage,” Bonnes said.

Like the Abbe Center for Community Care in Linn County, Fairview provides 24-hour supervision for its residents. Medicaid covers much of the cost of those patients’ care, and the federal government’s preference for small-group homes leaves counties and states to fund most of the costs of residential facilities.

“That’s the direction of the state,” Bonnes said. “Unfortunately, some of these folks need 24-hour, seven-day-a-week care.”

Bonnes said Community Care found it difficult to staff Fairview, where most jobs pay $8 to $9 an hour.

Community Care continues to provide residential mental health services in six Eastern Iowa counties.

Three men placed at Fairview under court order were charged with sexually assaulting another resident there in 2011. Two of the men  received jail time, the third probation.

Linn County has approved the sale of a portion of land near the Mott Building, 42 Seventh Ave. SW, to the city of Cedar Rapids. The land will be used for flood control in order to protect the building. (Gazette file photo)

Cedar Rapids is about to buy property from Linn County as part of its flood control plans.

The proposal to sell the county’s lot at 42 Seventh Ave. SW to the city sailed through the required public hearing Wednesday morning without comment. County supervisors will vote on the sale, which carries a $212,820 price tag, next week.

The parcel is just east of the county-owned Mott Building, 42 Seventh Ave. SW. A flood-control structure incorporated into the adjacent amphitheater project will go onto the empty lot, keeping the building on its “dry” side. The county hopes to find a buyer who will renovate the 1900 three-story brick building for residential or commercial use.

The county gave another lot to the city last year as its support for the amphitheater, now under construction. It retains a steel building at 60th Seventh Ave. SW, rented to Linn Star Truck Repair on month-to-month lease, and three lots to the north, also rented to Linn Star.

“It’s still got power to it as far as I know, which to me is more of a hazard than some of the others,” Peyton said one day last week, nodding toward the house.

One of dozens of buildings still vacant in Cedar Rapids after the June 2008 flood, 1422 Sixth St. NW sits on a small lot within about 10 feet of Peyton’s home and its neighbor on the other side. Peyton was relieved when a demolition notice was posted on its front door Nov. 21.

Larry Peyton, seen Monday, Dec. 10, 2012, lives next door to a vacant house in the northwest Cedar Rapids flood zone, where neighbors and business owners are keeping an eye on vacant properties. Forty flood-damaged structures in Cedar Rapids have caught fire since the Floods of 2008, and Peyton is worried for his home if the neighboring house would catch fire. (Liz Martin/The Gazette)

“If it would catch fire, there’s no doubt it would take out a house on each side,” he said.

Forty flood-damaged structures have caught fire over the past four years, the most recent Dec. 3.

“I can’t go through a fire after the flood, that’s for sure,” said Mike Papich, owner of Papich-Kuba Funeral Home, 1228 Second St. SE. “If something went up in flames closer than that grocery I’d be a little concerned, but I don’t know what a person could do.”

Papich was referring to the Nov. 30 fire that leveled the old Globe Grocery at 131 14th Ave. SW, just days after historic preservation advocates convinced the city to save it. The grocery store stood about two blocks from the funeral home.

Criminal acts?

Suspects were charged in two of the fires involving flood-damaged buildings. Investigators said the Globe fire was the result of some “human element,” but the building’s destruction left no clues whether accidental — vagrants trying to keep warm, or discarded cigarette butts — or intentional.

“There are a multitude of possible causes, so in the absence of electrical and gas utilities, as well as severe weather (like a lightning strike), it appears that there is a human element involved,” Fire Department spokesman Greg Buelow wrote in an email.

Buelow said a fire can’t declared an arson unless its cause is determined.

“It is possible that someone was inside and built a fire to stay warm,” Buelow wrote. “It is also possible that someone was inside cooking food, and the fire got out of hand or wasn’t extinguished properly. It could be a careless discarded cigarette or other smoking material. It could be someone doing illegal activity inside.  And, it could be someone with ill intent that wants to set something on fire.”

New Bo preservation

A few blocks north and east of Globe Grocery, the New Bohemia entertainment district appears to be gaining momentum, with new businesses moving into buildings that had been vacant before the flood. But the blocks between the Third Avenue-12th Street SE intersection and the Bridge of the Lions gateway to Czech Village are dotted with a few occupied homes, some longtime businesses and several vacant structures scattered among the empty lots.

“We’ve been in touch with the city,” said Jennifer Pruden, executive director of the Czech Village/New Bohemia Main Street District. “Whenever we notice anything, we let them know there is an issue. They have been sending people out to check on them and secure them.”

Preservation advocates are keeping an eye on 10 buildings in New Bohemia and in the Kingston commercial district on the west side of the river, said Beth DeBoom, president of Save CR Heritage. The group had convinced the city to shift the Globe building from its demolition list to be preserved.

“We have a lot of people interested in saving these and making them economically viable again,” said DeBoom. “I’m just worried that one of those buildings is not going to make it through the process, and those (in Kingston) are so close together. The city-owned properties are the most vulnerable right now, so that’s where we’ve focused our attention.”

City property

Many of the buildings still standing, in New Bo and other flooded neighborhoods, became city property through buyouts in the recovery process.

Monica Vernon, chair of city council’s development committee, said many of the remaining vacant buildings have legally clouded titles and other issues delaying demolition.

“Some of these people (owners) have left town and we don’t know where they are right now,” Vernon said. “The easy ones, the low-hanging fruit, we’re done with. Now we’re down to the tough cookies.”

Vernon said the city hopes to have all flood-damaged homes disposed of by the end of the year, leaving the business properties to deal with. She said the city will start charging property owners who leave their buildings unsecured.

“If it sits empty for a certain amount of time we’re going to start charging for services because we’re baby-sitting these properties,” Vernon said. “Our taxpayers shouldn’t have to pay because someone’s decided no one’s going to live in that house.”

The planned Lowe Park amphitheater in Marion will have lawn seating and a 50-foot-wide stage with an oak-leaf-themed canopy.

Supporters of Marion’s Lowe Park improvements will make their pitch Wednesday for state funds.

The city is asking $312,000 from Vision Iowa’s Community Attraction and Tourism (CAT) Committee for construction of an amphitheater at the park, said Mike Carolan, the city’s interim parks and recreation director.

Marion has already landed $235,000 from the Iowa Great Places program for the $1.7 million project. Other funding includes $75,000 over four years from the county and$750,000 from Marion’s local-option sales tax revenue, and $150,000 from the Hall-Perrine Foundation.

Project supporters are seeking private donations to match the Hall-Perrine grant.

Carolan said he expects a decision on the CAT grant around February.

Linn County will ask for an extension of the state’s deadline for an $850,000 grant for improvements at the county’s Wickiup Hill Outdoor Learning Center near Toddville.

Linn County Conservation Dan Biechler said he’ll appear before the Vision Iowa board Wednesday in Des Moines to update them on the $2.1 million improvement project and ask for a three-month extension on the grant’s Feb. 28 deadline.

Biechler said the project is substantially complete except for the extension of fiber-optic cable to the center and a few minor building details.

“We’re very close to being completed, but there’s a few things that are lingering,” Biechler said. “Technically I think we could it without the extension, but we’re just making sure.”

The fiber optic cable will allow a high-speed Internet connection so educators at the center can participate in classroom lessons with county schools. The projects also include a storm shelter, expanded exhibits, and office space so the conservation department can move from its present building on County Home Road in Marion.

County supervisors approved $1.2 million in bonding for the project. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Iowa Department of Homeland Security have granted $615,000 for the storm shelter.

Linn County Auditor Joel Miller gives copies of a report to the Linn County Board of Supervisors (from left) Linda Langston, Lu Barron, John Harris and Ben Rogers on May 23 in Cedar Rapids. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

Linn County Auditor Joel Miller said his request for a judge to clarify his ruling against Miller’s challenge to county supervisors’ authority doesn’t mean he’ll appeal, but it preserves his options.

“It’s a step that has to occur, otherwise you cannot appeal,” Miller said. “We’re just asking him to look at some things we maybe feel he didn’t comment upon.”

Miller’s attorney Peter Riley filed a motion last week requesting District Court Judge Paul Miller to clarify his Nov. 20 ruling that only the supervisors may order an audit of county departments’ books.

“It’s not an appeal, it’s a request of the trial judge to address some things we don’t think the trial judge fully considered,” Riley said. “Joel has not made any decision whether that’s something he wants to pursue.”

The auditor filed suit in February 2010 after supervisors blocked his appointment of a deputy auditor whose duties would have included audits of accounts maintained by other county departments. Supervisors argued the annual audit conducted by an accounting firm is sufficient oversight of the county’s accounts.

Paul Miller ruled the county auditor “does not have explicit authority or implicit authority to conduct audits of other county departments, absent a request by the board of supervisors.”

Riley said Paul Miller’s ruling failed to address some points about county governance under Iowa’s home-rule law, adopted for counties in 1978 with an amendment to the state Constitution.

“Home rule is a fairly new concept,” Riley said. “Most of the cases on county home-rule issues are prior to home rule” taking effect.

Riley’s motion also raises specific questions in the supervisors’ rejection of Joel Miller’s move to name a deputy auditor.

LED lampposts and brickwork line Sixth Avenue in Marion as part of the completion of the first phase of the Marion Central Corridor project at City Square Park on Friday, December 7, 2012. (Justin Torner/Freelance)

After years of debate and planning, the first steps toward Marion’s transportation future are officially complete.

“This was the first issue that came up since I was on the council,” City Councilmember Joe Spinks said.

With the mayor out of town, Spinks, the city’s mayor pro tem, wielded the giant-sized scissors Friday afternoon to cut a length of ribbon on the new steps leading to City Square Park from Sixth Avenue. Improvements to a five-block stretch of the street are the first in the city’s Central Corridor plan to speed traffic across town while making the central business district more bicycle and pedestrian-friendly.

It’s also all that’s planned for now. The overall plan for both Sixth and Seventh avenues to be reworked between roughly Seventh and 31st streets is expected to take about a decade, but no money has been budgeted for further work. The project’s $2.6 million first phase was funded with the city’s share of local-option sales tax revenue.

City Manager Lon Pluckhahn said the project’s next segment will likely be determined by private development on the corridor’s east end.

“We know there’s interest, but nothing’s solidified yet,” he said.

Pedestrians walk down Sixth Ave where LED lampposts and brickwork were erected as part of the completion of the first phase of the Marion Central Corridor project. (Justin Torner/Freelance)

But the completed section offers residents and motorists a look at the neighborhood’s future, with wide sidewalks, LED streetlights, plantings, and “street furniture” such as benches and waste bins.

“It gets all the parties better suited to what the plan is,” said Spinks. “It looks like there’s plenty of parking. That was one of the issues.”

“I love it,” Cathy Petersen, owner of Witte’s End Coffeehouse, said as she prepared pastries for tonight’s Christmas in the Park. “It’s kind of a long process, but I think the end result is just exciting. This spring it should be so much fun to see everything come up green.”

The new street’s brick paving will be limited to the blocks around the central park – the area Spinks said some residents are calling the “hashtag,” because that’s what it looks like from above. He said he’s glad the project retained the original limestone retaining wall around the park’s south edge.

“This was a learning experience, but it was doable,” said City Engineer Dan Whitlow.

This combo made from undated photos provided by the FBI shows cousins Lyric Cook, 11, right, and Elizabeth Collins, 9, who have been missing since Friday, July 13, 2012. (AP Photo/FBI)

EVANSDALE, Iowa — Hours after authorities announced a devastating find potentially linked to the missing cousins case, community members gathered in somber remembrance.

Sarah Curl speaks out during a vigil held at Meyers lake Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2012, in Evansdale, Iowa. (AP Photo/Waterloo Courier, Matthew Putney)

About 80 friends, neighbors and strangers huddle on the banks of Meyers Lake earlier tonight — a place synonymous with the girls’ disappearance since they vanished while riding bikes in town. The girls’ bicycles were found at the lake July 13, the day they went missing.

Many at Wednesday’s vigil gazed silently across the dark body of water. Several women tried to light candles inside plastic cups and protected the flame from chilling winds by covering the opening with cold hands.

“We shouldn’t be here. These were just innocent children,” said Barb Collins of Waterloo. “These girls should have been left alone to start with. They should be home safe in their beds.”

UPDATE: Two bodies found by hunters Wednesday afternoon may be those of missing cousins Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins, police said.

Black Hawk County Chief Deputy Rick Abben didn’t say the bodies found in an undisclosed “wooded area” are the two girls, but hinted the discovery may be the ending feared by thousands in Iowa and beyond.

“It’s definitely not the outcome that we wanted, obviously,” Abben said, appearing to fight back tears during a news conference in Evansdale. “This is a difficult thing for us to go through. It’s a difficult thing for the community.”

Black Hawk County sheriff's Capt. Rick Abben addresses the media Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2012, about the two bodies found in a wooded area earlier in the day. (TIFFANY RUSHING / Courier Staff Writer)

Abben said the remains have been taken to the state Medical Examiner’s office in Ankeny for positive identification. He said a press conference will be held Thursday afternoon to announce the results of that effort.

Abben declined to say where the bodies were found, noting “preserving the scene is paramount.”

Jennifer Lancaster, Department of Natural Resources law enforcement supervisor for northeast Iowa, said DNR conservation officers have been involved with the recovery, but they, like all involved officers from all agencies, have been instructed not to comment on the specific location, which is being investigated as a crime scene.

Lancaster said the odds of finding missing persons’ remains – or evidence of other crimes —  increase during the shotgun deer season, when more than 70,000 hunters comb through remote woods and fields.

More Iowans are afield during the two shotgun deer seasons (Dec. 1-5 and Dec.8-16) than at any other time of the year, she said.

Dan Morrissey leans on a tree near Meyers Lake where his daughter Lyric Cook-Morrissey, 10, and Elizabeth Collins, 8, disappeared last Friday, Tuesday, July 17, 2012, in Evansdale, Iowa. The girls' bikes were found Friday afternoon near a bike trail at the edge of the lake. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

The images of the two girls’ smiling faces became a familiar, unsettling sight across Iowa on billboards, posters, bumper stickers, and even Halloween candy in the months after they went missing the afternoon of July 13, a Friday.

The girls were last seen around noon near downtown Evansdale. Their bicycles and Elizabeth’s cellphone were found along a trail on the southeast corner of Meyers Lake, in a city park just north of Interstate 380.

Evansdale Police and Fire Chief Kent Smock said investigators viewed the girls’ disappearance as a missing-person case but didn’t rule out the possibility of an abduction.

Hundreds of volunteers helped police search parks, ponds, and wooded areas near town over the first weekend the girls were missing.

On July 16, the Monday after the girls went missing, authorities began draining 5-acre Meyers Lake, while Black Hawk County Chief Deputy Rick Abben admitted investigators “grasping for straws.”

No bodies or other evidence were found in the lake.

Two people embrace after a vigil held at Meyers lake Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2012, in Evansdale, Iowa. (MATTHEW PUTNEY / Courier Photo Editor)

“It wouldn’t be proper for me to stand here and tell you we have a theory because we don’t,” Abben told reporters. “We have two missing girls, and we have no idea why.”

By July 19, Lyric’s parents had consulted an attorney because they felt they were being treated as suspects, according to another family member.

Dan Morrissey has three drug convictions, including possession of marijuana and ingredients to make methamphetamine. He  was also charged with domestic abuse causing bodily injury in August 2011, with trials on the charges set as early as August.

Those trials were postponed in late July.

Misty Morrissey, 34, pleaded guilty in 2003 in federal court to conspiracy to manufacture and distribute methamphetamine. She also has theft and alcohol violations in state court. In September 2011, her probation was revoked for violating its terms — including use of illegal drugs, excessive use of alcohol and failure to comply with drug tests — and is now on supervised release.

A poster with photos of Lyric Cook-Morrissey, 10, and Elizabeth Collins, 8, who disappeared in Evansdale last Friday, adorn a utility pole across from the entrance to Meyers Lake in Evansdale, Iowa, Monday, July 16, 2012. (AP Photo/Waterloo Courier, Brandon Pollock)

The case was officially reclassified from missing persons to an abduction July 20, the same day a judge granted prosecutors’ request to place Daniel Morrissey under pretrial supervision while he awaits trial on drug charges. Morrissey, who had been free on bond, will be supervised by parole officers.

Daniel Morrissey’s mother-in-law Wylma Cook said he had been giving investigators information on other methamphetamine makers in recent months to shave time off his own possible sentence. She said Morrissey had been expected to accept a plea agreement July 12, the day before the girls vanished, but decided not to do so because he was not ready to go jail.

“We’ve got two choices,” Ken Selzer said of the planned changes.  “Accept them, or accept them.”

But residents can still weigh in on how the reduced hours taking effect in early 2013 should be scheduled, said Rich Watkins, postal service regional spokesman in Kansas City, Mo.

“We’ve made the decision and it’s been blessed by the postal commission,” said Watkins. “We will discuss what hours to change, and we’ll consult the community for when best to be open.”

The reductions are part of the Postal Service’s Post Plan announced in May. An alternative to closing thousands of small-town post offices nationwide, the Post Plan reduces hours and makes other operating changes to save $500 million a year.

“There’s no one single solution,” said Watkins. “We’re looking at everything. That’s why we’re having these public meetings – we want to be as transparent as possible.”

The Post Plan calls for reduced hours at 31 Iowa post offices, including several in Eastern Iowa. Meetings are also set today in New Albin, and Oxford, with meetings Thursday in Chelsea and Raymond and Friday in Olin.

The plan was devised to head off deficits projected to hit $18 billion a year by 2015.

“We think it’s a healthy balance between being able to continue to serve those communities and being able to move forward,” Watkins said.

Watkins said this week’s meetings will be the last until after the holidays. Residents may also comment through a survey mailed to households in affected communities.

“We hate to inconvenience our customers, but safety is an issue,” said Rich Watkins, U.S. Postal Service regional spokesman in Kansas City, Mo. “It appears as though the ceiling is crumbling.”

Watkins said a sign directing Van Horne’s 179 customers to Newhall was posted when the building was closed Nov. 28. He said letters will be mailed to Van Horne residents explaining the Postal Service’s repair plans and schedule, as soon as those plans are finalized with the building’s owner.

“We’re working with the building’s owner right now,” he said. “We need to iron those details out before we can get back to our customers. It’s going to take at least a few weeks just to get it back up to safety standards.”

Watkins said about 75 percent of the nation’s post offices are housed in leased buildings.

Linn County Auditor Joel Miller gives copies of a report to the Linn County Board of Supervisors (from left) Linda Langston, Lu Barron, John Harris and Ben Rogers on May 23 in Cedar Rapids. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

CEDAR RAPIDS — Linn County supervisors appear ready to consider shifting management of county buildings from County Auditor Joel Miller’s office to the recent unsuccessful challenger for his job.

“I think it is retribution against me and also against the employees who supported me,” Miller said Wednesday. “If they follow through on this, I think the attorney general ought to look into it.”

Miller said he expects the supervisors to consider a move next week to transfer facilities management from his office to a separate one managed by Garth Fagerbakke. Miller, a Democrat, won re-election with 62.5 percent of the vote over Republican Fagerbakke, the facilities manager from 1999 until 2008.

Supervisor Ben Rogers, D-Cedar Rapids, said supervisors have discussed changes informally.

“It looks like it’s something we’re going to talk about” officially, said Rogers, although maybe not as soon as Miller expects. He said supervisors have managed maintenance of county buildings other than the courthouse in the past.

“It’s very, very poor timing at the very least by the Board of Supervisors,” said Supervisor Brent Oleson, R-Marion. “It kind of smacks to me of overreaching. I think the time right now should be to try to work together and bury the hatchet.”

Fagerbakke said he’d take the job if it’s offered.

“I have managed the construction and rebuilding of our new county buildings,” he said, noting supervisors manage maintenance in larger Iowa counties.

“From a long-term stability standpoint it’s probably better,” he said. “If you looked at past history I think I’ve demonstrated I would manage the county facilities efficiently.”

Two county workers asked supervisors Wednesday not to make the change.

“We don’t see the economic (or) logical approach of doing that,” Joyce Sramek told supervisors during their meeting’s comment period. “You’re going to be spending money to create a management position that’s not needed.”

Sramek, of Cedar Rapids, is chief steward of the maintenance workers’ union local.

“If the board were to take over facilities as we used to have it, we would make a business case for it,” Rogers said.

Rogers said supervisors may debate changes as they write a budget for the next fiscal year, a process that’s just starting. But Miller said he’d want to know before writing his next budget whether to include maintenance costs.

The county’s building maintenance budget runs about $2.7 million a year and employs about 30, according to Miller.

Supervisor John Harris, R-Palo, said he doesn’t want supervisors to rush a decision. He said he’s researching how other counties manage their maintenance.

“I’d have to make sure it doesn’t cost the taxpayers a whole lot of extra money,” Harris said. “I’d have to make sure that if it were to happen it wouldn’t negatively affect the employees.”

“I’d be willing to look at things in a more orderly way, absolutely,” said Oleson. But “for all of our problems with Auditor Miller it hasn’t been in the facilities area. This just looks like trying to punish him.”

Fagerbakke was hired as facilities manager in 1999 by Miller’s predecessor Linda Langenberg. Supervisors named him construction manager after the June 2008 flood.

Miller said he’s managed building maintenance himself since Fagerbakke left.

“As near as I can tell everything’s been running pretty well,” Miller said.

Miller sued supervisors in February 2010 after they blocked his appointment of a deputy auditor whose duties would have included closer oversight, including audits, of accounts maintained by other county departments. Supervisors argued the annual audit conducted by an accounting firm is sufficient oversight of the county’s accounts.

Judge Paul Miller ruled last week the county auditor “does not have explicit authority or implicit authority to conduct audits of other county departments, absent a request by the board of supervisors.”

A train pulling executive coaches from the Iowa Interstate Railroad pulls up to the old Rock Island line train depot Tuesday, May 5, 2009 in Iowa City. (Brian Ray/The Gazette)

The Iowa Department of Transportation has announced three public hearings and an online “hearing” on its study to revive rail passenger service across the state from Chicago to Omaha.

The Chicago to Omaha Regional Passenger Rail System Planning Study designated the Iowa Interstate Railroad’s route as the most promising option for a new service. The route serves the Quad Cities, Iowa City, and Des Moines.

The Iowa Interstate will host new trains between Chicago and Moline starting in 2015, but there are no current plans to extend that service to Iowa City and beyond. IDOT, the Illinois Department of Transportation, and the Federal Railroad Administration are taking public comment on the project’s draft environmental impact statement.

The traditional public hearings will be held at 5:30 p.m., with comments taken starting at 7:00:

Chicago

Dec. 11

Chicago Union Station, 500 W. Jackson St., Great Hall Gallery

Des Moines

Dec. 12

Des Moines Botanical Center, 909 Robert D. Ray Dr., Oak/Willow Room

Council Bluffs

Dec. 13,

Council Bluffs Public Library, 400 Willow Ave., Conference Room A/B

The online, self-directed open house public hearing will be available through Dec. 26, on the study’s website at www.iowadot.gov/chicagotoomaha/. Information included on this website will be identical to the presentation made at the in-person meetings.

The Abbe Center for Community Care located on County Home Road in Marion. (The Gazette,file)

The Abbe Center for Community Care, for 40 years the provider of Linn County’s most intensive care for people with mental illness or developmental disability, may be nearing the end of its useful life – at least in its present form.

“We’ve got a large building that is probably too large,” said Dan Strellner, president of Abbe Services, the non-profit that operates the center under contract to the county. “We’re trying to right-size.”

Earlier this month, county supervisors voted to commission a study of the center’s future under the state’s reorganization of services for Iowans with mental health and developmental disability (MHDD) issues. That’s complicated by the fact that no one knows just what the new MHDD system will look like or how it will function.

“We want to get an architect to assess the building’s viability,” said Supervisor Linda Langston, D-Cedar Rapids. “Is it worth it to invest anything in this building?”

Langston said all options are open, including demolition all or part of the 128,000-square-foot facility, opened in the early 1970s. Total demolition would be accompanied by plans for a smaller replacement, Langston said.

Supervisors also reduced the rent Abbe pays for the center at 1860 County Home Rd., Marion, from $284,000 to $1 for the year ending next June 30, with a corresponding cut in maintenance.

The changes began last year as the county scrambled to cut costs in response to an unexpected $5.3 million MHDD deficit. Two weeks ago Abbe had 88 residents where 125 lived a year ago.

Licensed for up to 280, the center reached its maximum population of 218 in 1999, Strellner said.

The decline since then reflects long-term national changes, and some factors unique to Iowa.

“We’ve been decreasing the facility naturally for some time,” Strellner said. “Mostly because there are more opportunities in the community for people to live, and because we’ve adopted some treatment-oriented methods that enable people to live in the community.”

Moving MHDD patients from large residential facilities into smaller neighborhood group homes has occurred across the country over the past few decades. The smaller homes’ advantages, including a less institutional atmosphere often closer to family members, make them the preferred setting for Medicaid, which pays a higher share of their residents’ costs.

Abbe’s changes include a corresponding reduction in staff, down 24 full-time workers from last year’s 87. Strellner said some of the workers have followed residents, providing care and supervision in group homes.

Abbe has opened three group homes in Manchester and two in Marion, each with four or five residents. There’s also a 14-unit complex in Cedar Rapids, where Abbe will open two smaller homes next month, Strellner said.

Medicaid’s preference for small-group homes leaves counties and states to fund most of the costs of residential facilities. Strellner wants to make sure the pressure to control costs doesn’t force patients into more independent settings before they’re ready.

“Previously, the reason people moved was purely clinical,” he said. “Now, it can be for financial needs.”

Iowa counties and their non-profit contractors are also trying to keep up with the state’s reorganization of MHDD services. In response to legislation passed earlier this year, counties are planning new regional service-delivery agencies to provide uniform services while controlling administrative costs.

County supervisors and MHDD administrators from seven northeast Iowa counties – Linn, Benton, Delaware, Dubuque, Iowa,  Jones,  and Johnson – have begun meeting to decide whether to form such a region. Part of that includes figuring out how their own residential facilities would fit into such an arrangement.

“That will be something we have to talk about within the region,” said Benton County Social Services Director Mary Williams. “We’re waiting for rules from the state.”

It’s common for residential facilities to serve patients from other counties – Strellner said 45 of Abbe Center’s 88 residents are from Linn County – as families seek care in counties offering specialized services or higher levels of care. With uniform services a state priority, that may change.

“They recognize the service system delivery model is going to be different,” said Kristen Artley, Johnson County’s director of mental health and disability services. The county contracts with Chatham Oaks in Iowa City for residential services, and “their board of directors is reviewing options,” said Artley.

Artley said the University of Iowa contributes to Chatham Oaks’ patient census. Many patients transition through Chatham Oaks after more intensive treatment at the university’s hospital and clinics.

On Oct. 25, Hillcrest Family Services took title of its namesake facility from Dubuque County. Hillcrest, on the west end of Dubuque, held 48 patients last week, said chief operating officer Julie Heiderscheit.

“We’re focusing on providing the best level of care for the clients, maximizing their skills so they can get back into the community,” Heiderscheit said. “Our feeling is there’s always going to be a need for some type of residential facility.”

Strellner agrees.

“Where do residential treatment facilities like ours fit?” he said. “That’s the question we’re trying to find the answer to.”

Sculptor James Bearden of Des Moines checks the installation of his piece "Liberation prior to a dedication of the artwork at Lowe Park in Marion on Monday, November 19, 2012. Eventually ten sculptures will be installed all the art trail at Lowe Park. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette-KCRG TV9)

“It looks good from far away,” James Bearden said. “It’s meant to be seen from far away. The idea that it breaks up the landscape is so graphic.”

Bearden stood among a small group Monday afternoon at Marion’s Lowe Park, looking at an arrangement of folded steel planes about eight feet tall, painted bright yellow and mounted on a low concrete pedestal along what’s now the park’s north border.

The piece, “Liberation,” is the fourth addition to Lowe Park’s sculpture walk. Artist Bearden joined city officials and members of the Marion Arts Council to inspect the installation and hold a brief dedication ceremony for the work.

Some heavy landscaping continues along a fenced-off section of the trail. But the Children’s Discovery Garden is accessible. The park’s Arts and Environment Center gallery, 4500 N. 10th St., now hosting works by Mount Vernon artists Sue Coleman and Marty Mitchell, will be open 1 to 3 p.m. today.

Plans call for 10 installations over the next year as the walk reaches its full length of about a mile, said Bob North, a member of the Marion Arts Commission. The commission selects and commissions works for the trail, funded by $65,000 in local-option sales tax revenue.

“We have plans for the next couple of years,” North said. “As the community grows north, Lowe Park will be the central park of Marion. It’s going to be family friendly, arts friendly.”

The trail will wind behind the park’s amphitheater when it’s built next year. Supporters are raising the last $200,000 of the amphitheater’s $1.7 million estimated cost.

Arts council chairman Dennis Frevert said the council will probably launch its own fundraising campaign to fund future installations.

“There’s probably going to have to be some more expensive ones near the amphitheater,” Frevert said.

The trail’s landscaping will include more than one pond and plantings of native prairie grass and wildflowers. The sculptures also will get identification plaques.

“Liberation” swayed gently in the breeze, something Bearden expected.

“I have an extra weld in there, so it should be good,” he said, pointing to the base. “If it gets really windy, it’s really going to get going. It looks like it’s balancing on one point, doesn’t it?”

“I like it,” said Mayor Allen “Snooks” Bouska. “It’s bent. I like that. It’s got an airfoil effect. That’s enough for me.”

Bouska said the park is a fitting monument to George and Alyce Lowe, who donated 180 acres of their farm to the city in 2000. George Lowe died in 2002.

“You have the full support of the city council on everything you do out here,” Bouska told members of the arts council.

“It’s going to be perfect,” said Marcie Wright, the former arts council chairwoman. Frevert credited her with the idea for the arts trail.

“We always visit the museums and the sculpture parks” when traveling, Wright said. “We had all this land, and we thought, what could be better?”

Bearden, 48, a Des Moines native, was on his way home after five days installing his work in a Madison, Wis., museum. A working artist for eight years, he said he’s placed outdoor works in Urbandale, Clive, and Minneapolis over the past two years.

“I’ve finally got a portfolio that I can send out for bigger pieces,” he said.

“And when James Bearden is a famous artist we’ll have one of his pieces here,” Frevert said.

“That’s my plan, anyway,” Bearden said, happily.

Linn County Auditor Joel Miller delivers a report under oath regarding iMaint and former contract employee J. Clarahan to the Linn County Board of Supervisors during a meeting at Linn County West in Cedar Rapids on Tuesday, May 23, 2012. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

Linn County Auditor Joel Miller isn’t ruling out an appeal of a judge’s ruling today that county supervisors have sole authority to audit county finances.

“The voters re-elected me by the biggest popular vote of anyone on the ballot in a contested race,” Miller said this afternoon. “The voters want the county auditor to be vigilant with the tax dollars.”

But there’s a catch, Miller said: the supervisors would have to approve any appeal and the funding for an attorney to argue it.

“I would guess they would want no part of continuing it,” he said. Miller said he hasn’t decided whether he’ll request an appeal himself.

“If the taxpayers want me to pursue this, I would ask they contact the county supervisors.”

Judge Paul Miller ruled the county auditor “does not have explicit authority or implicit authority to conduct audits of other county departments, absent a request by the board of supervisors.”

“It was a complete and utter rejection of every point that was raised by Auditor Miller,” said Supervisor Brent Oleson, R-Marion. “We are very happy, and we hope that now after years of litigation and hundreds of thousands of dollars diverted to this issue  Auditor Miller will be able to work with us.”

Joel Miller, who was sworn in for a second full term this morning, said the judge “missed some key arguments that were made” but declined to specify them.

“I’ll save those for later,” he said. “I don’t want to re-hash the ruling.”

Joel Miller, who said during his re-election campaign that “I would probably rethink continuing in this job” if the ruling was against his case, said he plans to finish out his new term.

“I don’t see myself stepping away after the resounding victory I was just handed by the electorate,” he said.

Joel Miller filed suit in February 2010 after supervisors blocked his appointment of a deputy auditor whose duties would have included closer oversight, including audits, of accounts maintained by other county departments. Supervisors argued the annual audit conducted by an accounting firm is sufficient oversight of the county’s accounts.

Paul Miller heard the case over two days in late May. The county paid Cedar Rapids attorney Peter Riley $6,482 to represent Joel Miller in the case, and another $10,325 to Robert O’Shea to advise him on other legal issues while the case awaited trial.

“It’s nice to finally have a ruling and a conclusion on an issue that’s been going on for two years,” said Supervisor Ben Rogers, D-Cedar Rapids. “As far as the board is concerned we’re moving on, and we consider this issue settled by a judge.”

“I certainly hope we can put this behind us and quit wasting the taxpayers’ money with frivolous lawsuits,” said Supervisor Lu Barron, D-Cedar Rapids. “I hope that this clarifies things so that we can move forward.”

“The judge made abundantly clear in his ruling it really is the supervisors who have the ability to take care of the finances,” said Supervisor Linda Langston, D-Cedar Rapids. “(Joel Miller) has a job. It’s very clearly spelled out in the code and it’s not an insignificant job.”

The ruling ends a nearly three-year power struggle between Joel Miller and supervisors. In December 2009, Joel Miller fired Sue Wold, a longtime deputy auditor, to name Karen Heiderscheit to her post. Joel Miller wanted Heiderscheit, then a payroll technician, to conduct independent audits maintained by other departments.

Supervisors, who weren’t consulted in either Wold’s firing or Heiderscheit’s appointment, reduced the deputy auditor’s positions from four to three. They also refused to authorize Joel Miller’s subsequent attempt to hire Heiderscheit as a temporary assistant, which could jeopardize her pay and benefits as a full-time county employee.

The supervisors’ vote to reduce the number of deputy auditors “was clearly a legislative decision vested in the Board by the legislature” and was neither arbitrary nor illegal, Paul Miller wrote in his decision.

The judge cited a 1990 decision by the state attorney general in a Jasper County case that “the county auditor is but a ministerial officer” in managing the county treasury.

The site plan for the Prospect Meadows complex.

Backers of a baseball/softball complex near Marion are asking Linn County supervisors for more time to plan the project.

“We’re putting a lot of pieces of the puzzle together,” Jack Roeder, president of the non-profit Prospect Meadows Inc., said Wednesday morning.

Prospect Meadows is requesting the supervisors approve an amendment to its lease on 121 acres of county property near the junction of Highway 13 and County Home Road. The proposed amendment would set an April 1 deadline for the group to file official notice of intent to proceed with the project.

The deadline was set at July 1 when the lease was approved in February, then pushed back to Nov. 1. Prospect Meadows pays $1 a year for 20 years, with three 25-year options.

Roeder said planning issues, not problems raising capital for the $9.4 million project, led to the request.

Roeder said Prospect Meadows is still waiting for comments from the Iowa Department of Transportation and county planning and zoning on the project, which could affect traffic flow at the Highway 13-County Home Road intersection.

Prospect Meadows plans a complex of 17 baseball and softball diamonds, some with lighting and stadium seating; parking; and a building housing management offices, concessions and other services.  The complex would host local league play and weekend tournaments drawing teams from across the Midwest.

Roeder couldn’t say whether the delay will affect initial plans calling for construction next summer and a first pitch in 2014.

“That’s premature to say right now,” he said.

Roeder saidthe group’s capital campaign is “going very well. We’re in the quiet phase, so I can’t discuss it much.”

Roeder said another group’s plans for a baseball complex near Dyersville shouldn’t have much impact on Prospect Meadows. He said the plans for the Field of Dreams movie site focus on a baseball academy, not tournament play, for players under age 14.

“Hopefully, we can coexist,” he said. “We’re looking for local, neighborhood play, expanding that into weekend tournaments.”

Supervisors will vote on the request at Monday’s work session.

Confined animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, mean different things to different Iowans.

Farm groups see relentlessly efficient, high-density livestock operations as agriculture’s future, but to critics they’re symbolic of corporate-driven industrial agriculture hollowing out rural communities.

To would-be neighbors, they can be at best a nuisance, at worst a threat to their way of life. That’s how a group of rural Center Point residents undertook a crash course in CAFOs and the laws regulating them.

“You just learn really fast what the steps are,” said Regina Behmlander.

Behmlander, her husband Chris, and their three sons moved from Marion to a rural acreage about two years ago. The Behmlanders and neighbors launched a campaign this fall against an application by Matt Ditch of Center Point for a 5,661-hog CAFO two miles northwest of their home.

On Nov. 14, Ditch withdrew his application after neighbors convinced county supervisors to challenge several points on his master matrix, a score card of environmental and safety requirements the Iowa Department of Natural Resources uses to determine a proposed operation’s fitness.

It was the first successful challenge in Linn County since the state adopted the matrix process in 2003, said Les Beck, the county’s planning and development director. Livestock operations established before 2003 were “grandfathered” into the law.

The master matrix was adopted after legislative action in which lawmakers, stakeholders and the DNR tried to balance the interests of local government, rural residents and agriculture.

“A lot of different organizations, a lot of different individuals had input designing that matrix to be fair and to keep our environment safe,” said Brian Waddingham, executive director of the Coalition to Support Iowa Farmers, a consortium of commodity and livestock groups. “I personally think it’s worked very well.”

Matrix opposition

But not all groups agree the master matrix does enough.

“We did not feel that it went far enough and restored enough local power to counties,” said Dave Goodner, rural community organizer for Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement. “We’ve been very successful using it as tool to stop proposed factory farms, but our number-one priority is to increase oversight” of big feeding operations.

“I would say the (matrix) process doesn’t work at all,” said Behmlander. “It’s very much slanted in corporate farms’ favor, and the smaller farmer is left with very little recourse.”

The matrix process and DNR’s rules apply to all livestock operations of more than 1,000 cattle or 2,500 hogs. They also apply to large dairy and poultry farms.

Ditch, who didn’t return calls for comment, could resubmit his application after changes to address the matrix issues cited by county supervisors. Or he could establish a smaller feeding operation below the 2,500-hog standard.

Before the master matrix process, the state had issued 923 CAFO permits through the end of 2002, 49 of them to open feedlots, said Gene Tinker, the DNR’s animal feeding operations coordinator in the agency’s Manchester office. There are now 2,553 active permits, 243 of them held by open feedlots.

Economy woes cut new CAFO permits to just more than 100 in both 2009 and 2010, including new storage facilities required under new manure-disposal rules. But activity picked up last year when the state issued permits to 324 new operations. More than 800 permits were issued in 2006.

The matrix process could be changed as the state responds to a finding by the federal Environmental Protection Agency that its rules, specifically the CAFO permitting process, don’t adequately protect water quality. In 2003, 42 manure spills were reported to the DNR. There were 59 reported spills last year, but just 13 through July 31 this year.

Any changes will be the subject of public hearings across the state, “and we’ll be able to weigh in on that,” said Goodner. He said his group also plans to lobby in support of boosting the DNR’s budget $1.2 million to hire more CAFO inspectors.

Master matrix at a glance

Adopted by the Department of Natural Resources in 2003, the master matrix is an appendix, often 80 pages or more, submitted with an application to construct and operate a confined animal feeding operation. An application receives points for meeting standards of construction, waste storage, distance from occupied buildings and public spaces, manure management and safety plans, and other factors. An application must score at least 440 points to qualify for a permit. County supervisors may challenge an applicant’s matrix before it’s forwarded to the DNR.

The comments came during a budget forum supervisors have scheduled the past several years to hear residents’ budget concerns early in the budget-writing process. The state-mandated budget hearing will be March 13, just two days before the county is required by law to adopt a budget for the fiscal year that starts next July 1.

“If you’re aware of a county program you think is a waste of money, you can say so,” Budget Director Dawn Jindrich told the dozen or so residents who attended Monday’s 40-minute meeting.

Instead, the three supervisors – Supervisors Brent Oleson, R-Marion, and John Harris, R-Palo, were absent – were thanked for county money, now $35,000 a year, funding Iowa Legal Aid’s Cedar Rapids office. Gary Hinzman, director of the 6th Judicial District Department of Correctional Services, asked them to continue the $15,000 annual funding for the AmeriCorps Each One Reach One program for another three years.

Three mothers asked supervisors, already coping with a state reorganization of programs and funding, to boost support for mental health and developmental disability (MHDD) programs their children use, especially sheltered workshops and vocational assistance.

“We’re hoping there will be a higher priority in the county to take care of those who can’t take care of themselves,” said Karen Kroeger of Marion.

“We are going backwards,” said JoEllen Marconi of Palo. “I’m just hoping to feel better about their future, because I’m really scared.”

“Building the budget for MHDD will be interesting,” said Supervisor Linda Langston, D-Cedar Rapids. “We are heading into a (service management) region, which is something entirely new.”

Myrt Bowers, director of the Witwer Senior Center, said she’s optimistic about efforts to find a new, larger senior center. She said she’ll tour some flood-damaged buildings, potential rebuilding candidates, Tuesday with Cedar Rapids officials.

“Those conversations (with the city) are leading us into, hopefully, a wonderful direction,” said Bowers. If a new center is developed, she said she’d ask supervisors to considering funding “whatever operating costs may be needed.”

The county’s current $119.2 million budget is down $10.5 million from the previous year as flood-recovery rebuilding projects have been completed.

(AP Photo/Mike Groll)

The Iowa Interstate Railroad remains willing to host new passenger rail service across Iowa if the state and Amtrak can reach an agreement to develop and fund it, a top executive of the Cedar Rapids-based railroad said today.

“The railroad is more than willing to work with Amtrak, the states, or anybody else that’s involved in passenger service,” said Henry Posner III, chairman of the Iowa Interstate’s board and of its parent company Railroad Development Corp. “Our main business is freight, but one of the benefits of being a railroad is you can do more than one thing at once.”

A feasibility study on new rail service between Chicago and Omaha picked the Iowa Interstate’s route across the state from Davenport through Iowa City and Des Moines. Public meetings on the study will be held next month in cities along the line.

Iowa Interstate is already working with Amtrak and Illinois to restore passenger service between Chicago and Moline by 2015. Former Gov. Chet Culver was an enthusiastic supporter of extending that service to Iowa City, but current Gov. Terry Branstad and state House Republicans oppose the $3 million annual subsidy that would require.

“We’re back to, does Iowa want to be a part of it?” said Posner. “If Iowa’s interested, we can work it out.”

Posner, who’s based in Pittsburgh, was in Iowa to dedicate the railroad ‘s new Dennis H. Miller Locomotive Works near Homestead in Iowa County. The railroad held an open house at the $24 million facility for employees and shippers.

“It’s quite a testament to you that we’re in a position to be able to do this,” Posner told Miller.

Miller, 60, of Cedar Rapids, joined Iowa Interstate in 1985, the year after it took over about 600 miles of track from the bankrupt Rock Island Railroad. He was Iowa Interstate’s president and CEO from 2002 until March, when he stepped down.

“This is  a long time coming, and hopefully it isn’t the end of things happening at the Iowa Interstate,” said Miller, who remains vice chairman of the railroad’s board.

Miller said he picked Homestead for the new facility because it’s about halfway along the railroad’s Chicago-Omaha main line. The 30,000-square-foot shop building was designed around the railroad’s 14 General Electric GEVO 4,400-horsepower locomtives purchased in 2009 and 2010.

“They wouldn’t fit in the shop in Iowa City,” forcing crews to work outdoors, Miller said. Work formerly done in Iowa City and Council Bluffs will be shifted to the new facility.

The new shop has a wash bay – Iowa Interstate washes its locomotives monthly – overhead cranes to allow workers to remove heavy engine components, and pits for working underneath locomotives. The fueling facility can pump 440 gallons a minute into the GEVOs’ 5,000-gallon tanks.

“The Iowa Interstate wouldn’t be the company it is without Denny,” Posner said. “He’s all business, but he’s a railroader at heart. You really have to be both to succeed in this business.”

Jerome Lipka, Iowa Interstate’s president and CEO, said about 40 people will work out of the Homestead facility, about half of them operating crews.

“Collections are really moving on track or a little ahead for this time of year,” said Johnson County Treasurer Tom Kriz.

Johnson County mailed 2,246 property tax delinquency notices Nov. 1, down from 2,411 last year, Kriz said.

Linn County mailed 6,442 notices Nov. 1, up about 7 percent over last year’s 6,004 and 60 percent more than the 4,013 notices mailed in 2007, County Treasurer Sharon Gonzalez said.

The notices were mailed in February until the law was changed last year in an effort to help property owners reduce their interest costs, Gonzalez said.

A 1.5-percent interest charge is assessed monthly against unpaid property taxes through May. Properties whose owners remain delinquent are auctioned by the county on the third Monday of June.

Kriz said low interest rates are contributing to the decrease in tax sales in his county.

“Each year that seems to drop a little bit,” he said. “If you need to borrow it to pay your taxes, you’re better off paying that (loan payment) than the interest that accrues.”

Linn County sold 1,431 properties in June for a total of $2,498,000, Gonzalez said. Johnson County sold 757 for $751,589.

Linn County’s numbers lingering effects of the June 2008 flood and the recession that began in December 2007. This year’s delinquencies include 5,165 real estate parcels (residential, commercial, and agricultural), 1,260 mobile homes, and 17 utilities.

Kriz wasn’t able to provide detailed information today for Johnson County’s delinquent parcels.