Here First

The Board of Regents is backing the University of Iowa’s acquisition of Iowa City’s Mercy Hospital. Polk County supervisors unanimously approved a resolution to start using county funds to pay for rape victims’ emergency contraception. Plus, Cedar Rapids is coming to voters for hundreds of millions of dollars this November for its school district.

Applications for Iowa’s new Education Savings Accounts have been approved in 96 of the state’s 99 counties. Iowa City’s Mercy Hospital has filed for bankruptcy. Court filings show the community hospital might find a second life as part of the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics. Plus, Iowa and Nebraska sued the Environmental Protection Agency over their request to make E-15 gas available year-round.

Seven Republican presidential candidates running against former President Donald Trump spoke at a fundraiser in Cedar Rapids. Governor Reynolds has issued disaster proclamations for Lee and Sioux Counties for severe weather that struck on Friday and Saturday. Plus, how the town of Greene pulled together to get their newspaper out.

More applications have been approved for Iowa’s new state-funded Education Savings Accounts. Urbandale schools is changing course in how it responds to a new law restricting books with sexual content and teaching related to LGBTQ topics. Plus, how ranchers across the Midwest and Great Plains are working to build their own meat plants.

Governor Kim Reynolds is deploying more than 100 Iowa National Guard soldiers to Texas. The board that governs the three state universities approved budgets for the schools. Plus, the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico is smaller this year, but that’s largely because of dry conditions in the Mississippi River basin.

Iowa State University’s starting quarterback has been accused of gambling on Cyclones sporting events – including football. Hunter Dekkers is among four current or former ISU athletes facing similar charges. Polk County officials are urging people to keep firearms properly stored, to help prevent increasing gun fatalities among young people. And, state officials have released a report on the cause of death for three people killed in the collapse of a Davenport apartment building.

A new report says about a third of Iowa’s counties can be considered “maternity care deserts” – meaning they have no OB/GYN’s and no birthing hospitals or centers. Iowa is moving its DMVs out of malls and into free-standing buildings. And, a new aviation school is a few weeks from opening in Sioux City.

Iowa officials say about 120,000 people have been disenrolled from Medicaid since April. Most have been for procedural reasons, like not returning paperwork. The state attorney general says her office should decide “soon” on the future of using the state victims compensation fund to pay for sexual assault survivors’ emergency contraceptives or abortions. And it’s been a good couple of years for agriculture in the U.S., but there are signs of challenges ahead.

Former President Donald Trump will join his GOP rivals at a Republican Party fundraiser in Des Moines tonight. It’s the first multi-candidate event he’s attended in Iowa since announcing his run for the White House. Historic preservation advocates in Cedar Rapids have a petition drive underway to save a century-old elementary school building from demolition. And the Iowa Lottery says it set a sales record for the fiscal year that just ended.

Iowans face another day of heat advisories and warnings today, and officials are reminding employers to make sure their workers are safe in the high heat. U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley says he opposes a bill in Congress that would require the U.S. Supreme Court to create a code of ethics for itself. And, some people in northwest Iowa’s Dickinson County want local leaders to enact a moratorium on new wind farm construction.