Gazette Daily News Briefing, June 5
This Stephen Schmidt from the Gazette Digital News Desk, and I’m here with your update for Monday, June 5.
There will be the return of haze to greet you on Monday. According to the National Weather Service there will be widespread haze before 4 p.m. in the Cedar Rapids area. Not helping that at all will be a calm wind of 5 mph. It will be mostly sunny, with a high near 88 degrees during the day.
Our next chance for rain appears to be Tuesday, but even that's not for certain, so make sure to water those vegetable gardens.
According to reporting from the Associated Press, the body of one of three men who had been missing after the partial collapse of an apartment building in Davenport has been found, a city official confirmed Sunday.
Branden Colvin Sr.'s body was recovered Saturday, city spokeswoman Sarah Ott said. Two other men — 51-year-old Ryan Hitchcock and 60-year-old Daniel Prien — still are unaccounted for.
Colvin, 42, is the first person confirmed to have died in the collapse.
The Quad-City Times reported that Colvin's son, Branden Colvin Jr., graduated from high school Saturday. He and other family members had been at the collapse site almost constantly, hoping for a miracle.
The discovery of Colvin's body came a day after authorities announced that the search for survivors had been completed, with attention turning to shoring up the structure so recovery efforts could begin.
Over the past four decades, 35 percent of fish kills have been related to agriculture, according to an Investigate Midwest analysis of state data from 1981 to 2022.
Iowa is one of the top 10 agricultural states in the country. It is the nation’s leading producer of corn, a commodity whose productivity depends heavily on fertilizer.
It is also the nation’s largest hog producer. Nearly one-third of the nation’s hogs are raised in Iowa, with the collateral effect of generating thousands of tons of animal waste or manure.
Jamie Mootz, the water monitoring data analyst at the Iowa Department of Natural Resources who handles the fish kill database, describes these events as unintentional incidents.
“You could call all of them an accident, but some are avoidable,” Mootz said.
Despite millions of dollars lost from fish kills over the decades, the amount of fines handed out is just one-sixtieth of the monetary value lost from fish kill events.
Cedar Rapids residents can enjoy access to new and emerging workforce technology through the Maker Room at the Cedar Rapids Public Library this summer.
After expanding its space and equipment at the downtown branch, the library is set to reopen the Maker Room Monday.
The new expanded space will host a laser cutter, 3D printer, Cricut Maker, a photo scanner, and access to the Adobe Creative Suite to bolster access to new technology and skills being implemented in the workforce.
Cedar Rapids Public Library Programming Manager Kevin Delecki said the program is focused on making cutting-edge technology accessible for all Cedar Rapids residents.
“Now with these emerging technologies that are starting to become more and more integrated into schools, workplaces and job skills for the next generation — those skills are starting to become an expectation,” Delecki said. “But the equipment to learn those skills isn't widely available, it isn’t affordable, and it does not have equitable access.”
