The Iowa Public Information Board will continue to weigh options for giving government bodies more tools to deal with people who allegedly use public records requests in a harassing way.

Discussion during the board’s September 21 meeting revealed sharp differences of opinion over the proper role for the state board, which is charged with providing guidance and resolving disputes over Iowa’s open records and open meetings laws. Board members agreed to have a committee gather more information before deciding whether to proceed with a legislative proposal giving government bodies a way to have troublesome individuals declared “vexatious requesters.”

Nancy Dugan lives in Altoona, Iowa and has worked as an online editor for the past 12 years. 

Last week, North Dakota Attorney General Drew Wrigley denied a request from three counties in the state to investigate Summit Carbon Solutions’ investors. A new statute in North Dakota, which went into effect on August 1, tightens restrictions on foreign ownership of land in that state, among other measures.

But Summit Carbon Solutions, LLC as it exists today was formed in Delaware in 2021, according to the Iowa Secretary of State’s database of business entities. (That database shows the Summit Carbon Solutions, LLC created in Iowa in 2020 as “inactive.”) Wrigley explained in a recent letter to county commissioners that the effective date of the new legislation means “this office is unable to conduct a civil review of the company.”

Wrigley’s argument underscores one of the more disturbing aspects of the Summit Carbon matter, which is the false premise that state and local governments are powerless to regulate a Delaware LLC whose ownership structure remains largely a mystery, and whose own legal arguments identify the pipeline it proposes to build as a security threat.

Bruce Lear lives in Sioux City and has been connected to Iowa’s public schools for 38 years. He taught for eleven years and represented educators as an Iowa State Education Association regional director for 27 years until retiring. 

As Republican presidential wannabes traipse across the countryside, offering 30-second solutions for complex problems, a more immediate election is looming. School board elections on November 7 will help determine whether our community school thrives, suffers, or dies.

Currently, Governor Kim Reynolds and a group of legislative lemmings are committed to creating a two-tiered school system in Iowa, separate and unequal, both funded with public dollars. One tier is used as a political punching bag, has new laws to cope with, accepts all students, and is chronically underfunded. The other tier has funding from a new voucher entitlement, can pick and choose who to accept, and has little to no accountability to taxpayers.

Bruce Morrison is a working artist and photographer living with his wife Georgeann in rural southeast O’Brien County, Iowa. Bruce works from his studio/gallery–a renovated late 1920s brooding house/sheep barn. You can follow Morrison on his artist blog, Prairie Hill Farm Studio, or visit his website at Morrison’s studio.

Every summer we enjoy the monarch butterflies in our pastures and acreage, from their first arrival to their final departure. And each a different generation!

There are so many amazing mysteries in the natural world, and these iconic butterflies are right at the top of the list.  According to MonarchWatch.org, over the summer there are three or four generations of monarch butterflies, depending on the length of the growing season. Each female lays hundreds of eggs, so the total number of monarch butterflies increases throughout the summer. Before the end of summer, there are millions of monarchs all over the U.S. and southern Canada.

Randy Evans is executive director of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council and can be reached at DMRevans2810@gmail.com. 

Many decades ago, Mrs. Gentry and Mr. Halferty put up with an inquisitive kid’s classroom questions about American democracy and the workings of government.

I did not imagine back then how the meaning of some words could take on such importance in government. Take, for example, a much-talked-about word in Iowa last week, vexatious. It means abrasive, aggravating, annoying, irritating or nettlesome.

Whether you vote for Democrats, Republicans or Whigs, everyone should have access to government records that are not confidential. That is a way for you to understand what your state and local government is doing.

Rick Morain is the former publisher and owner of the Jefferson Herald, for which he writes a regular column.

Republican Speaker of the U.S. House Kevin McCarthy announced on September 12 that he had ordered an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden.

Democrats should reply, “Bring it on.”

Gerald Ott of Ankeny was a high school English teacher and for 30 years a school improvement consultant for the Iowa State Education Association. Top photo of Ta-Nehisi Coates speaking at Oregon State University on February 2, 2017 is by Theresa Hogue, available via Wikimedia Commons.

Steve Corbin made a solid point his latest column (published in Bleeding Heartland and later in the Cedar Rapids Gazette): “Many of today’s GOP-oriented governors and legislators, far rightwing groups, conservative media and Republican presidential candidates have either passed or supported book banning, anti-LGBTQIA and laws prohibiting teaching about racism.” 

“It’s a blatant attack on … the rights of students, parents, teachers, general public and book authors,” wrote Corbin. 

Corbin’s point is well-taken, and others have said the same, but action or litigation to blunt the attack is nonexistent. Where are the fair-minded parents, politicians, students, teachers, et al whose outrage could demand instructional integrity and curtail naive book bans? 

The Iowa Public Information Board will consider options for government bodies to deal with individuals who file “excessive and abusive” public records requests. During a September 15 telephonic meeting of the board’s legislative committee, members E.J. Giovannetti and Barry Lindahl tabled proposed legislation that would allow governments to have some people declared “vexatious requesters.”

But they agreed to put the topic on the agenda for the full board, which could adopt an advisory opinion for dealing with burdensome records requests, or could ask the state legislature to address the issue.

Prior to the meeting, the Iowa Freedom of Information Council warned Iowa Public Information Board members that the proposed changes to Iowa Code would “seriously erode” the state’s open records law and would violate the constitution while trying to solve a “nonexistent problem.”

Steve Corbin is emeritus professor of marketing at the University of Northern Iowa and a freelance writer who receives no remuneration, funding, or endorsement from any for-profit business, nonprofit organization, political action committee, or political party. 

I fondly recall my senior year in high school when Mary Beth Tinker, John Tinker and Christopher Eckhardt wore black armbands to their high school to protest the Vietnam War. Their suspension from school was cast around the thought that wearing armbands would disrupt learning.

In a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case from 1969, Tinker v. Des Moines, seven justices agreed students’ freedom of expression should be protected. The majority refuted the school’s stance by candidly stating “Students don’t shed their constitutional rights at the school house gates.”

Many of today’s GOP-oriented governors and legislators, far right-wing groups, conservative media, and Republican presidential candidates have either enacted or endorsed book banning or limits to curriculum on LGBTQ and anti-racist topics. It’s a blatant attack on the constitutional rights of students, parents, teachers, the general public, and book authors.

Education is shaping up to be a defining issue in an open-seat race for a strongly Republican Iowa House district.

State Representative Stan Gustafson, who currently represents House district 22, is planning to retire at the end of his current term. Samantha Fett, a former Carlisle school board member and chapter leader of Moms for Liberty, announced last month that she will seek the Republican nomination. Fett has spoken at several Iowa House or Senate meetings during the past two years, urging lawmakers to approve various education-related or anti-LGBTQ bills.

Garrett Gobble announced his candidacy for the same district in a September 8 Facebook post. He previously represented part of Ankeny in the Iowa House for one term. A recent guest commentary for the Des Moines Register indicated that Gobble hopes Governor Kim Reynolds and groups focused on school policies will stay out of his upcoming race.

Kara Grady is a wildflower enthusiast living in eastern Iowa. Her work has been published in the Erythronium newsletter of the Iowa Native Plant Society. When she’s not going on rare flower adventures, she can be found reading the latest botanical books or attending prairie seminars. The University of Iowa’s Facilities Management website has more information about Macbride Nature Recreation Area in Johnson County.

“And this is called the Mother Oak.”

Land manager Tamra Elliott and I stood together beneath the white oak’s branches, which were so heavy with leaves that they drooped towards the ground. “People kept telling me that it was dead or dying. But I knew it was alive. Our team worked to open up the canopy around it and it came back to life.”

Herb Strentz was dean of the Drake School of Journalism from 1975 to 1988 and professor there until retirement in 2004. He was executive secretary of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council from its founding in 1976 to 2000.

A timely editorial on the U.S. Supreme Court and judicial ethics—“Injudicious investments”—began as follows: “The U.S. Supreme Court sits on a ticking time bomb. The high court’s integrity and prestige will be damaged severely when the bomb goes off.”

The Supreme Court is the nation’s only judicial body without a code of ethics or standards to guide the justices on when, among other things, a justice should not take part in deciding a case. Randy Evans covered such issues well in a recent column. His points are underscored in an Iowa Supreme Court website devoted to the Iowa Judicial Qualifications Commission. The commission deals with allegations of misconduct by Iowa judges, magistrates and court employees.

So the editorial quoted above is timely and provocative.

That’s because the Des Moines Register published the “ticking time bomb” editorial, written by Gil Cranberg, more than 43 years ago — on June 11, 1980. It focused on how to avoid having a justice’s stock portfolio influence court decisions.

Randy Evans is executive director of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council and can be reached at DMRevans2810@gmail.com. Joaquin Sapien reported for ProPublica on September 7 about the Navy’s spending on littoral combat ships, which “broke down across the globe” and are being decommissioned.

Iowa is about as far removed from an ocean as you can get. But this state figures in recent news reports about the U.S. Navy—and not in a puff-up-our-chest-with-pride way.

One of the reports was a New York Times examination of the Navy’s largest ship-building budget in history, $32 billion this year alone, and the tug-of-war that pot of money has created inside the seagoing service. 

Nancy Dugan lives in Altoona, Iowa and has worked as an online editor for the past 12 years. 

While testifying before the Iowa Utilities Board on September 5, Summit Carbon Solutions chief operating officer James “Jimmy” Powell outlined the company’s need for large amounts of water at each of the sites identified as pipeline “partners” throughout the five-state route proposed for a CO2 pipeline. “We’ll need the water supply at every plant, so we’re working with individual plants,” he said. According to the Summit Carbon website, the pipeline would connect to thirteen ethanol plants in Iowa.

Online records from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office show that twelve Summit-affiliated LLCs filed Certificates of Authority as foreign limited liability companies on the afternoon of August 31. A thirteenth LLC, Saint Ansgar SCS Capture, LLC, filed an application for a Certificate of Authority on July 3, which was approved on the same day.

All are identified as member-managed firms formed in Delaware, and all share an address with Summit Carbon Solutions in Ames. SCS Carbon Removal, LLC is identified as the member or manager firm on all of the applications. Jess Vilsack, general counsel for Summit Carbon Solutions, signed for each of the LLCs.

John and Terri Hale own The Hale Group, an Ankeny-based advocacy firm working for better lives for all Iowans. Contact them at terriandjohnhale@gmail.com.

“In Nature, a flock will attack any bird that is more colorful than the others because being different is seen as a threat…”

That’s a phrase from a now-trending music video titled The Village from an artist known as Wrabel. It tells the story of a transgender teen and the intense emotional challenges faced as they struggle with their own thoughts and feelings, unsupportive parents, community, church and school.

It’s a powerful video that everyone should watch—regardless of your views on LGBTQ issues, political leanings, faith, etc.  

Wrabel’s message to the LGBTQ community—especially trans kids—is “There’s nothing wrong with you. There’s something wrong with the Village.”

The Village is that part of society that endorses efforts to discriminate against, if not erase, the LGBTQ community—in particular those who are transgender.

In Iowa, Republican legislators introduced a record 29 anti-LGBTQ bills during the recent session. Twenty-nine bills that called for blocking access to basic human rights for our LGBTQ friends, children and families, co-workers and neighbors. 

These measures called for everything from taking away the right to same-sex marriage, to censuring teachers from using words—and librarians from having books—that acknowledge the existence of LGBTQ Iowans, to denying parents and their doctors the right to make life-saving decisions for transgender kids.

Each bill, whether it became law or not, sent destructive messages to the LGBTQ community: “You are not wanted here. You don’t deserve the same rights guaranteed to others, including the right to love who you love. You don’t have the freedom to flourish in Iowa.”

Why the attacks on the LGBTQ community? Simply put, they are easy pickings. The LGBTQ population is outnumbered. They do not have immense political power, though it is growing. Misinformation, distortions, and confusion lead people to fear what they do not understand. Like the colorful birds in the quote above, being different is seen as a threat to life as many have known it. Many Republicans are capitalizing on that fear, riling up their base of voters and promising that, if elected, constituents can count on them to deal with what they insinuate is a clear and present danger.

This is Iowa in 2023: a horribly divided state, and as anti-LGBTQ legislation shows, a religious state that too often doesn’t practice what is preached—to treat others the way they want to be treated, to show some charity and be kind, to love and accept others for who they are.

We’re blessed with wonderful friends in the LGBTQ community who are making tremendous contributions to their workplaces, neighborhoods, communities, states,and nation.

They’ve told us how the bills—and accompanying rhetoric—make them feel. Some plan to leave Iowa. Others plan never to move here.

As allies, we’re disgusted by the attacks on our LGBTQ friends and colleagues. We’re tired of the holier-than-thou attitudes of many elected Republicans and candidates. Enough is enough.

We can all take action to stop it.

Allies of the LGBTQ community: invite your Republican legislator(s) to meet with you. Try to get to know them as people, not just lawmakers. Ask what they believe and why. In a direct and non-confrontational way, tell your story and why you support the LGBTQ community. If their contact with the LGBTQ community has been minimal, offer to arrange additional opportunities to build relationships.

Leaders in business and industry: step up and speak out on behalf of your valued LGBTQ employees and customers. You have a powerful voice. Legislators may listen to you when they may not listen to others.

Republican legislators: before proposing or voting on additional anti-LGBTQ legislation, seek to understand and really get to know those in the LGBTQ community whose lives you may be dramatically altering.

Legislators are in their districts until the start of the next session in January. They, and we, should take advantage of this time to meet, talk, listen and hopefully learn.

If reasonable and influential voices are silent, things will not get any better. Sadly, they could get even worse.

Top photo taken outside the state capitol during a March 5, 2023 rally to support LGBTQ Iowans is by Michael F. Hiatt and available via Shutterstock.

“It was a great day to hear from Iowans,” Department of Management Director Kraig Paulsen told reporters on September 6. He was speaking in his role as chair of Iowa’s temporary Boards and Commissions Review Committee, after nearly 70 people had testified about proposed changes to more than 100 state boards and commissions.

The two-plus hour public hearing created the impression that affected Iowans had ample opportunities to provide feedback in person. The committee is also accepting comments submitted via email (BCRCcomments@iowa.gov) through September 17.

Although some testimony or written comments may prompt the committee to tweak its plans for certain boards, the reality is that in many ways, Paulsen and other committee members prevented Iowans from offering meaningful input on the proposed changes.

Dr. Emily Boevers is a Ob-Gyn physician practicing primarily in Waverly, Iowa. When not taking care of patients she enjoys spending time with her husband and three children.

Labor Day: a celebration of American ingenuity, prosperity and economic achievements. Like Independence Day, this holiday requires ongoing recognition and defense of the important role that citizens play in its origins. From its inception as a labor union holiday to its current position as a day for the working-class people of America, this is a day for American workers to be recognized for the sweat and stress they contribute to the modern economy.

It is estimated that the women of America supply $21 billion per day to the US economy, not including unpaid domestic labor. Part of economic wellness is also a strong supply of the next generation of skilled workers. As an expert in maternal health, I cannot help but wonder at the limited recognition of women’s complex role in this measure.

Governor Kim Reynolds’ office told a state regulator no public funds were used for the twelve “Fair-side chats” Reynolds held with Republican presidential candidates during the Iowa State Fair last month.

Reynolds conducted friendly interviews with the candidates in the courtyard of JR’s SouthPork Ranch, a restaurant on the state fair grounds. A sign produced for the events featured a logo and the words “Gov. Kim Reynolds’ Fair-side chats.”

I sought to clarify who paid for the sign and other expenses associated with the chats, because Iowa Code Chapter 68A.405A prohibits statewide elected officials from spending public funds on “any paid advertisement or promotion” bearing the official’s “written name, likeness, or voice” in a range of settings, including “A paid exhibit display at the Iowa state fair […].” Reynolds signed that statute (commonly known as the the “self-promotion law”) in 2018.

Democratic State Senator Herman Quirmbach submitted the following written comments to members of the Boards and Commissions Review Committee. They are an extended version of remarks he delivered during the September 6 public hearing at the state capitol. You can view the committee’s draft recommendations here.

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Boards & Commissions Review Committee:

Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you on September 6. What follows is a review and extension of my remarks.

I offer the following observations as a member of the Tobacco Use Prevention and Control Commission (Tobacco Commission) and of the College Student Aid Commission (CSAC). I have served on both these commissions for approximately twenty years as an ex-officio non-voting member. Both commissions oversee the implementation and administration of critical state programs to protect the public health (Tobacco) and enhance educational opportunities and workforce development (CSAC). Beyond the functioning of existing programs, members of the commissions provide exceptionally valuable expertise to help guide the development of public policy for the future.

Mitch Henry chairs the Iowa Unity Coalition.

Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird is appealing a judge’s decision that cleared the way for election officials to offer non-English voting materials to the public.

Under Polk County District Court Judge Scott Rosenberg’s June 28 ruling, Iowa counties are allowed, at their discretion, to provide citizens with voting materials (including ballots, voter-registration forms, and absentee ballot request forms) in languages other than English. The decision dissolved a 15-year-old injunction that had blocked Iowa counties from printing the forms in other languages. Former U.S. Representative Steve King was among the plaintiffs in a lawsuit against then Iowa Secretary of State Michael Mauro, which led to the injunction in 2008.

The court’s recent ruling stemmed from a lawsuit the League of United Latin American Citizens of Iowa filed in 2021 to challenge the state’s application of the English Language Reaffirmation Act to election materials.