Editorial

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

John Delaney said something near the end of the Heartland Forum on Saturday that caught our attention, but he didn’t have time to expand on it: There has been a massive capital outflow from the Midwest as industries like agriculture, retail and manufacturing consolidate and seek efficiency. And this stunning statistic: 80% of venture capital is invested in 50 of the 3,100 counties in America — mainly in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston and New York.

We called to follow up and he was more than happy to talk.

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

Our gratitude goes out to the five candidates who went out of their way to come to Storm Lake on Saturday to discuss rural issues with the Iowa Farmers Union at Buena Vista University. It was a serious and productive discussion invigorated by sound audience questions on education, health care, clean water and healthy soil, and vertical integration in agriculture. Huffington Post streamed the discussion live to a national audience and put rural concerns on the radar. That enough was worth our while.

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

Five presidential candidates taking the stage Saturday for a forum on rural issues will be greeted by an audience of farmers under a depth of income stress not seen in 35 years. The Iowa Farmers Union is bringing them in by the busloads from the Dakotas, Minnesota and Wisconsin to rally in the morning at Storm Lake High School with farm activist groups and will ask questions of candidates at Buena Vista University in Storm Lake in the afternoon.

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

The State of Iowa released its annual report this week on progress with its voluntary nutrient reduction strategy to surface waters. Most of the 60-plus pages detail the amount of funding ($16 million per year from public sources, not including the Conservation Reserve Program and other “baseline” conservation programs in the farm bill), the efforts at public outreach, the organization of new levels of bureaucracy in each watershed, and the demonstration projects put in place.

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

The Iowa Public Information Board has consistently shirked its statutory responsibility to enforce the Iowa Public Records and Open Meetings Laws when citizens are denied access to their government. The board last week put an exclamation point on that history with a superficial ruling that ignored its own administrative law judge’s prior conclusions that a certain police body camera video should be made public. Its ruling should be appealed, and ultimately the board should be disbanded as ineffective by design.

Art Cullen

The Iowa Legislature this week, with the concurrence of Gov. Reynolds, allowed for a 2.3% increase for K-12 schools for next fiscal year. That comes after years of increases in the range of 1%, half the rate of inflation, which have put a lot of pressure on school districts and teachers. Minority Democrats urged a 3% increase to make up for underfunding in past years. The GOP proposal will cost about $90 million more. The Democratic proposal would cost an additional $43 million.

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN

EDITORIAL

BY ART CULLEN