News Center newsletter

by Joe Moses

The Waukon City Council met in special session Monday, July 22 to address several matters including the hiring of a police officer and a revised Anticipatory Warrant relating to Veterans Memorial Hospital’s General Fund.

Mayor Pat Stone called the meeting to order. The council approved the meeting agenda and moved into discussion of the Resolution issuing a revised Fiscal-Year 2019-2020 Anticipatory Warrant relating to the Veterans Memorial Hospital (VMH) General Fund. This matter relates to the approved renewal of the $750,000 loan for the hospital with a one-year extension that took place at the July 1 council meeting following a presentation from VMH CEO Mike Myers. At that meeting, Myers provided an overview of steps being taken to improve VMH’s profitability, including the hiring of a CFO with experience in making a distressed critical access hospital profitable again.

Children of all ages are invited to read to Sunny, a Chesapeake Bay Retriever owned by PJ Mullen, at K9 Story Time at Robey Memorial Library in Waukon. Sunny received her therapy training through the Love on a Leash Organization.

K9 Story Time will be held Thursdays through August 15, from 10:30-11:30 a.m. Each reading session will be 10 minutes long allowing space for four different readers. Registration is required and can be made by contacting the library at 563-568-4424 or www.waukon.lib.ia.us.
 

Lansing Iowa Food Trust (LIFT) has announced that it has received a $1,500 grant from ITC Midwest to be used to support food insecurity in eastern Allamakee County. Specifically, the grant will be used to help not only the truly poor, but the working poor, the elderly poor and anyone who has a need. Through the ITC Charitable Giving Program, ITC Midwest makes contributions to local nonprofits as part of the company’s commitment to the many communities it serves. ITC supports qualified nonprofit organizations whose programs and projects emphasize the company’s focus on education, environmental stewardship, social services, and health and wellness.

“ITC Midwest is pleased to present this check to Lansing Iowa Food Trust, an organization that provides essential support to those in need in the Lansing community,” said ITC Midwest Area Local Government and Community Affairs Director Lori Broghammer. “We appreciate the important work this organization does.”

Lansing and Harpers Ferry are “Calling all runners, walkers, bikers and paddlers!”

The Relay of Voices relay team will be coming into Lansing August 7 from La Crosse, WI and leaving August 8, and entering Harpers Ferry August 8 and leaving August 9 to move on to Guttenberg, and the public is invited to greet and meet the Relay of Voices relay team as they enter and leave each community. Lansing and Harpers Ferry will each host the relay team and its crew with a community potluck, local entertainment and an opportunity to gather along the Mississippi River and share local stories.

Iowa Public Television was scheduled to replace the broadcast antennas serving the Decorah and Lansing viewing areas beginning July 23. The replacement process will cause a temporary service outage for several hours both Tuesday and Wednesday, July 23-24, while the existing antennas are removed and new equipment is installed. The outage was expected to begin around 9 a.m. each day with service being restored by 7 p.m. IPTV’s crew will work to limit the necessary outage as much as possible.

During the outages, PBS KIDS programming, usually found on IPTV’s primary channel and IPTV KIDS.2, is available to live stream, with many shows on-demand, at Iptv.org/iptv-kids and through the PBS KIDS Video App on mobile devices and streaming services, including iOS, Android, Amazon, Apple TV, Roku, Chromecast and the PBS KIDS Plug & Play.

Congresswoman Abby Finkenauer will give the keynote address at the Allamakee Democratic Party’s  Fundraising Dinner Sunday, August 4 at the Old Rossville Store in Rossville. Finkenauer represents the people of  Iowa’s First Congressional District in the United States Congress in Washington, D.C.

Congresswoman Finkenauer was raised in Sherrill, a small town in rural Dubuque County, in a family who taught her the importance of hard work, caring for others, and the value of public service. After graduating from Drake University in Des Moines, she was elected to the Iowa State House of Representatives at the age of 25. Throughout her two terms in the State House, Finkenauer made improving the lives of Iowa’s working families her top priority. She ran for the U.S. Congress in 2018 to continue to focus on building a stronger economy and middle class.

Through the 2019 4-H Ag Innovators Experience (4-H AIE), local Iowa teens had the opportunity to teach and guide younger youth through the Native Bee Challenge to learn about how increasing habitat for native bees benefits the food supply and agriculture.

Madi Palmer, a 4-H teen from Waukon, was excited to participate in the 4-H Ag Innovators Experience because she is passionate about agriculture and understands that pollination is extremely important to the sustainability of the industry.

“I didn’t know a lot about native bees and realized that most of the public probably doesn’t either,” Palmer shared. “I wanted to be able to educate the public and let them know that bees aren’t just annoying little bugs. They actually are very important to the pollination of the plants that other farmers and I raise.”

The Iowa Department of Education, Bureau of Nutrition and Health Services has announced its policy for free and reduced price meals for children unable to pay the full price of meals served under the National School Lunch Program, School Breakfast Program and the Afterschool Care Snack Program. State and Local school officials have adopted the family size and income criteria viewable in the chart accompanying this article for determining eligibility, effective July 1, 2019.

Households may be eligible for free or reduced price meal benefits one of four ways listed below.

by Jeremy Leitz, Allamakee County Executive Director (563) 568-2148

Upcoming Deadlines/Dates
May 15 - August 1: Primary Nesting Season. No MCM activities on CRP acres.
June 3 - August 23: CRP Continuous Signup 52 
June 14: COC Nominations Begin
June 17 - September 20: Dairy Margin Coverage Program Sign-Up
August 1: Last day to file a COC nomination form

County Committee (COC) Election
FSA is now accepting nominations for county committee members.  Agricultural producers who participate or cooperate in an FSA program may be nominated for candidacy for the county committee. Individuals may nominate themselves or others as a candidate. The last day to file a nomination is August 1. Forms can be obtained online or at our office.

Robotic milking, ventilation and manure management all on the agenda

One of the most critical aspects of a productive dairy farm is the design and setup of the buildings. A good design saves energy, increases cow productivity, and provides comfort and ease of access for the farmer and the herd.

To help dairy farmers evaluate their design, Iowa State University Extension and Outreach is offering two Dairy Design Workshops in August, with a focus on robotic milking setups, ventilation and manure handling facilities.

Both workshops are the same, but are held at different farms in northeast Iowa. The first will be held August 27, at Iowa’s Dairy Center, Room 115, located at 1527 State Highway 150, Calmar. The second will be held August 28, at Pattison Dairy, located at 22127 Highway 52, Garnavillo.

Both workshops are from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.