A new jobs report released by the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics this month shows that nationally 244,600 nursing home jobs were lost during the pandemic and only 55,100 of those jobs have been recovered since. This means that nursing homes have lost 189,500 workers, or 12% of their workforce.

WEST DES MOINES — The Iowa Farm Bureau Federation (IFBF) appreciates the U.S. Supreme Court‘s unanimous decision recognizing EPA has clearly overstepped its authority under the Clean Water Act in the Sackett vs EPA ruling.

When FBI agents led a Dixon, Ill., official out of city hall in handcuffs and the charges against her became public, the most often asked question was “How.”

Not according to the Iowa Raptor Project and the University of Iowa. Raptors used to be rehabilitated at the Mc Bride Raptor Project. Now, instead, with the IRP, there is a focus on falconry. Raptors are purchased or trapped in the wild and forced into a life of captivity and used for market…

I haven’t actually known many people named June. I always assumed the name was given to girls born in that month, as I’d assumed the names of flowers or birthstones associated with months were bestowed. (It was many years before I discovered that my aunt Opal wasn’t born in October, although…

It was probably Benjamin Franklin who first said, “Don’t believe everything you read in the newspapers.” That warning has been quoted and misquoted by so many people since, applied to every medium from the Bible to Facebook, and extended to include those things that we see and hear as well, …

In 2017, the Iowa Legislature responded to concerns from Gov. Terry Branstad and amended Iowa law to ensure when government employees are forced out of their jobs the reasons must be made public and not shrouded in secrecy.

The Iowa Farm Bureau Federation (IFBF) is disappointed in the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) and National Pork Producer Council’s (NPPC) challenge of California’s Proposition 12.

There are over 30 million small businesses in the United States that account for nearly half of all economic activity and two thirds of job creation. Small businesses are the soul of the Iowa economy, representing the willingness of people to take risks and work hard to make their vision com…

The recliner was made for six-foot men, not five-foot women, and the mattress on the bed seemed to want to be a hammock that immobilized its occupant in sleep and was impossible to climb out of without help. Improvised pads of folded blankets and towels improved the chair, except that nothin…

WEST DES MOINES – The Iowa Farm Bureau has long supported property taxpayers, and its members thank the Iowa Legislature and Governor Reynolds for enacting property tax reform and protections in 2023. The legislation places growth limitations on local governments, helping to slow the future …

If you watch the Iowa Legislature in action, there are some truisms you see time and again.

Labels are helpful and even necessary on some things like file folders and medicine bottles, but I know that some of the labels we use are doing more harm than good.

“Hurry and change clothes, we’re going wild-flower hunting,” Mother called out to us the minute we arrived home from school. Depending on the weather and the calendar, it could have been any time from late April through the first two weeks of May. My sisters and I anticipated a springtime st…

I thought the often-repeated desire to weed out waste, fraud and abuse from government spending was something Republicans, Democrats and independents could all agree on in Iowa.

Last week was one to savor. But it also was a week to reflect on how far we still need to travel to have true citizen engagement in our state and local governments.

At some time beginning in late March, my mother managed to provide each of us four girls with a new spring coat. These were usually short, longer than jackets but well above coat-length and sometimes featuring three-quarter length sleeves. Made of light-weight material and satin-lined, most …

My friend Denny and I were as different as night and day. He was conservative; I was wasn’t. I accused him of being to the right of Atilla the Hun. He accused me of working for Pravda, the famed Communist party newspaper.

If you’ve ever spent much time in a hospital or other care facility, you no doubt remember being asked your birthday at annoyingly regular intervals. After the first several dozen replies of “four-eighteen-thirty-four” I start amusing myself by replying with some version of “Paul Revere Day.…

The Iowa Legislature and Governor Kim Reynolds cannot seem to make up their minds whether they support parental rights or are against Mom and Dad being the decision-makers when it comes to their children’s well-being.

April Fool’s Day reminded me of some of the foolish things people do (any time of the year.) Some are real things done by real people, but a good share of them have to do with someone’s version of what real people do or don’t do. I’m thinking mostly about things we see on TV. Commercials are…

People have made it clear that they want affordable, reliable, and clean energy. For too long, Washington’s energy policy has been distorting free markets to pick winners and losers, while spending trillions of taxpayer dollars in an effort to reduce emissions.

Why are wild animals still being used in circuses? The Ringling Brothers Circus no longer includes animals (https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/reborn-ringling-bros-circus-leap-tour-minus-animals-98009746). This should be the case with every circus. More people understand that wil…

World Poetry Day was officially March 21, but we can celebrate poetry all next month, as April is National Poetry Month. We don’t really need to have someone designate a special time for it, for poetry has been with us in some degree or form since before we were born and will remain in us fo…

On a late summer afternoon in Bloomfield 40 years ago, the people of Iowa learned about an unofficial government principle we have seen repeated in recent weeks.

The 1906 Iowa Legislature passed the Forest and Fruit Tree Reservation Act encouraging landowners to hold poorer lands in timber as another source of farm income, erosion control, watershed protection and game habitat. Before 1935 forest reservations had a tax value assessment of $1/acre. Cu…

Iowa needs long term, good-paying union jobs. CO2 pipeline development would only create a handful of jobs for a short time if they’re built. The long-term damage and risks from pipelines simply aren’t worth it.

The upcoming implementation of the FAFSA Simplification Act will streamline the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) process and increase the number of Iowans eligible to receive Pell grants. However, according to a recently published report by Iowa College Aid, the act may also …

Every few months, someone is killed or injured by police somewhere in the United States under circumstances that lead to inevitable questions about what exactly occurred.

Having come across a handful of old snapshots from my childhood, I was tossed back into the 1940’s and memories of some of the social customs of those days. My mother was not particularly intent on teaching us all the social graces and rituals, but we picked up a lot of supposed social “rule…

Ode to Agriculture

Thirty years ago, at a meeting of the U.S. International Council on Disabilities, I first heard the watchword “Nothing about us — without us.” This catchy phrase seemed to make sense. Why would a majority of non-disabled individuals make decisions about what is best for those with different …

What separates average-to-good Iowa towns from thriving ones, former Governor Terry Branstad often said, is the presence of locally owned banks and a dedicated community newspaper.

Some members of the Iowa Senate do not think that public notices published in newspapers remain relevant and necessary. A bill filed in the newly formed Technology Committee just over a week ago moved through committee in two days and last week moved through the Ways & Means Committee in…

Since tomorrow is Saint Patrick’s Day and the 21st is World Poetry Day, it seems appropriate to write about Irish poets and Irish poetry. In my experience, it appears that a generous portion of the world’s memorable poets were, and are, Irish. This may be because Irish people seem to be less…

This has not been an easy time to be a librarian.

For most of civilized history, spring was the time that people packed up and moved to new locations. The original reason for this was the fact that most people were farmers and, if they were to relocate, they needed to be on the new land in time to plant crops for the coming year. Even city …

There is an interesting study in contrasts playing out right now in Iowa.

For a good many years, I’ve been putting together a newsletter for my high school classmates. In early February, I send them Valentine cards with a reminder to write something for the newsletter. By March, the responses have started arriving and I find myself knee-deep in nostalgia.

Do you like affordable electric rates? I find it hard to believe that anyone would answer this in the negative. But understanding how energy rates are set to be affordable is too complicated for simple generalities.