Officials say nine Iowa Department of Human Services employees, working at five state-run facilities, have tested positive for the coronavirus…and now six people at a facility housing residents with intellectual disabilities also have the virus. Iowa DHS Director Kelly Garcia said yesterday the agency has asked doctors from the University of Iowa for assistance in dealing with the outbreak at the Woodward Resource Center, near Des Moines. The state reported 534 additional cases of the coronavirus yesterday for a total of 9,703 cases confirmed in Iowa. There were four additional deaths, for a total of 188.
Black Hawk County is no longer the county with the most cases in Iowa; that distinction now belongs to Polk County. There are 1,361 confirmed cases in Black Hawk County with 15 deaths, and Sheriff Tony Thompson paid special tribute at yesterday’s county news briefing to the front line health care providers.
The 2020 Summer Farm Toy Show scheduled for June 5-6 in Dyersville is being canceled due to the coronavirus. The show’s host, the National Farm Toy Museum, remains closed to the public by the State of Iowa mandate. The tentative date for next year’s show is June 26-27, 2021.
Gov. Kim Reynolds apologized yesterday for a backlog of COVID-19 tests in the TestIowa program. The governor said during her daily COVID-19 news conference that the 1,000-test backlog should be processed by the end of that day. Last week, Reynolds said more than 17-thousand Iowans received COVID-19 tests. The governor said the TestIowa validation process is ongoing to ensure the results are accurate. The tests are processed at the State Hygienic Lab at the University of Iowa.
Despite the fact that 77 counties in our state have started the reopening process, Linn County is one of the 22 that have not. Heather Meador of the Linn County Health Department cautioned residents to still maintain precautions.
A Monday morning fire destroyed a home in Mount Auburn. Firefighters with the Mount Auburn Fire Department and First Responders and the Benton County Sheriff’s Office were called to 201 East St. around 7:45 a.m. No injuries were reported, but the home was is believed to be a complete loss. No one was at home at the time of the fire, which remains under investigation.
Five Democrats will be on the primary election ballot for U.S. Senate…but one of them has dropped out and endorsed a now-former opponent, just one day after a major virtual candidate forum. Former broadcaster and businessman Cal Woods has left the race and endorsed Admiral Mike Franken. Others still in the race include Eddie Mauro, Teresa Greenfield, and Kimberly Graham.
The wife of a 54-year-old Marshalltown man who died of COVID-19 says he went in for testing but was refused. Kyle Brown believed he got the virus at his job in Newton. Ultimately he was hospitalized two separate times before he died. Governor Reynolds was asked about the case yesterday at her daily news briefing; she advised that all Iowans should seek a second medical opinion if they have any concerns.
A man who repeatedly threatened a Cedar Rapids bank, its employees, and other individuals from northern Iowa by telephone and text messages was sentenced yesterday to six years in federal prison. 31-year-old Carl Stuber IV from Aurora, Colorado received the sentence after entering a plea of guilty to two counts of transmitting a threatening communication in interstate commerce. Authorities say Stuber called a bank in Cedar Rapids more than forty times over a two-day period in October 2018. During these calls, Stuber threatened to “Columbine” the bank, kill employees, and make false reports to police and fire departments. Stuber continued to make threatening calls to the bank and threatened others by phone, text, and Facebook message over an eight-month period until his arrest in Colorado in June 2019 on federal charges.
