Before Ian Roberts' arrest, before the national news firestorm, before the guilty plea in a federal courthouse, Joseph Hill wanted the Des Moines School Board to fire its superintendent.
The ex-husband of a Des Moines Public Schools contractor says Roberts threatened him with a gun when he found the superintendent in his wife's bed before the district paid her for consulting.
Roberts' relationship with Nicole Price — and what DMPS officials knew about that relationship at the time ― came under fresh scrutiny in April. After district officials asked for a review of Roberts' spending while in office, Iowa State Auditor Rob Sand scrutinized the superintendent's work for Price.
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Roni's Mac Bar is opening its second Iowa location, this time in Waukee.
The store celebrated with a grand opening on Saturday, May 16.
The quote, "Think outside the box" is painted on the wall inside the mac and cheese bar, and the menu certainly inspires customers to do just that.
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Could Iowa be facing another 1980s-style farm crisis, a severe downturn marked by foreclosures along with job and population losses?
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Dr. Alison Lynch, a psychiatrist at the University of Iowa, prefers spending most of her days directly with patients, but paperwork and administrative tasks often get in the way.
For every 20 minutes she spends with patients, another 5 to 10 minutes are dedicated to paperwork, including the taxing pre-approval process insurance companies demand before they'll approve care, she said.
But at the Monroe County Hospital in Albia on Wednesday, May 13, Lynch watched as Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed a bill aimed at reducing administrative burdens for prior authorization requests and streamlining access to care.
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The Iowa Department of Natural Resources confirmed the sighting of a white fawn on the Indian Hills Community College campus in Ottumwa on Tuesday, May 12.
A photo provided by the Iowa DNR shows the newborn deer sleeping curled up at the base of a tree. In other images, the fawn appears to be standing alone in an open field near a fence line.
Iowans have spotted both albino and piebald deer in the past, including two likely albino deer seen by a northeastern Iowa family last April. Two white deer were previously spotted together outside West Union in northeast Iowa in June 2023.
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Pieper Lewis got a second chance after absconding from probation three years ago. She did not get a third, and now will serve a 20-year prison sentence.
Lewis pleaded guilty in 2022 to voluntary manslaughter and willful injury for fatally stabbing Zachary Brooks in 2020. At the time, Des Moines investigators say, Lewis, now 21, was a 15-year-old runaway from her adoptive home and was a victim of sex trafficking. Placed with Brook by her pimp, Lewis said she stabbed him the morning after he had raped her for at least the fifth time.
Lewis, who received an outpouring of public support, initially was granted a deferred judgment, which was revoked in 2023 after she cut off her ankle monitor and left an Iowa treatment facility. She was placed on probation again, this time at a residential center in Georgia.
But in March 2024, she was removed from that facility following rule violations and vanished until December 2025, when she turned herself in to authorities in Des Moines.
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Archie was in the pediatric intensive care unit for four days, hooked up to monitors and breathing tubes before his death at just seven months old. His parents decided they wanted to help bring "peace in the chaos" after his death.
Archie Lee Talamantez was born to Haley, 28, and Theo Talamantez, 29, of Clive, on March 17, 2025. He "completed our family," Haley said in an interview with the Register.
During naptime at daycare on Oct. 27, 2025, Archie was found with a blanket covering his face, unconscious and not breathing. He died on Oct. 30, 2025, due to injuries related to his brain.
The Talamantezes had decided while Archie was still in the hospital to start the Archie Lee Foundation. They wanted to support parents in the PICU and to prevent what happened to Archie from happening to other children.
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Brenna Bird established the Iowa Cold Case Unit in 2024 to solve forgotten cases. One case has been solved, and three arrests have been made.
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Des Moines leaders are trying to temper residents' worries about possible cuts — including closures — to the city's public library system in the aftermath of new state property tax-cutting legislation.
The Des Moines Public Library Board of Trustees discussed the "potential nature of cuts" at a May 7 meeting, board president Tim Hickman told the Des Moines Register.
The anticipated reductions are part of a slate of cuts expected to wallop the city budget in the 2028 fiscal year. City leaders pointed fingers at a property tax reform bill approved by Iowa lawmakers last week, which includes a 2% growth cap on local governments' general fund levies, with exceptions for new construction.
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Summit Carbon Solutions proposed removing eight counties, 200 miles and 400 property owners from the planned route of its $9 billion carbon capture pipeline.
The Ames company, owned by Republican megadonor Bruce Rastetter, said Wednesday, May 12, it is refining the route after moving the project’s final sequestration destination to Wyoming from North Dakota.
Summit said it has filed a request with the Iowa Utilities Commission to modify the route, sending the pipeline from Iowa through Nebraska to Wyoming, instead of the original plan to send it from Iowa to North Dakota via South Dakota.
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Ember was an 8-week-old puppy when she came to the Animal Rescue League of Iowa "horribly abused," animal welfare advocates recalled.
Officers of the state's largest animal shelter found the dog thin, shaking and stained with blood, unable to stand or sit, when they were called to assist Des Moines police during a domestic violence investigation in March.
The puppy, who they later named Ember, suffered from a broken leg and jaw, a severely injured eye and another injured leg, bruising and swelling and a fractured jaw — an injury veterinarians say is consistent with multiple instances of abuse.
But on Monday, May 11, Ember joined animal welfare advocates, state lawmakers and Gov. Kim Reynolds at the Animal Rescue League of Iowa in Des Moines to witness Iowa's chief executive sign a law that would impose stiffer penalties in animal abuse cases such as Ember's.
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Could Iowa be facing another 1980s-style farm crisis, a severe downturn marked by foreclosures along with job and population losses?
For more on this story, tap the link in our bio.
#Iowa #farmcrisis #politics #farmers
