The Johnson County Board of Supervisors consists of five at-large members. Recently some people in the rural community have advocated for a board elected from districts within the county. A House Study Bill a few years ago would have required counties with a population greater than 150,000 to elect supervisors from districts, though a similar bill had failed earlier.

While districting a board of supervisors may appear to provide more representation to rural residents, the opposite would result. Currently, any resident anywhere in the county has five supervisors to whom they can communicate their needs. With districts, residents would have only one supervisor representing them.

There are many reasons electing supervisors from districts is not a good idea for Johnson County. But here is why, in fact, it’s a bad idea.

In Johnson County, our current practice for funding projects is determined using a needs assessment approach. This can be seen in our Five-Year Road Plan and works quite well. It is a triage of sorts, with the greatest need addressed first. With districts, it would become necessary to rotate projects based on the district in which it is located rather than the greatest need.

Imagine what might have happened in the 2016 emergency situation on the Highway 965 bridge over the Iowa River! During routine bridge inspections, county engineers determined repairs to that bridge to be our county’s greatest road need. It was an issue of public safety. Our at-large Board of Supervisors approved that project for immediate repairs.

Had we had districts, that project would land within my district and might have been put on hold, waiting for my district to have its turn at a big roads project. Just a couple years later, Swan Lake Road bridge over I-380, also in “my district” was deemed in need of immediate repair. While there is not a lot of traffic on that bridge, it is an essential route for farmers in the area. The closure was inconvenient during one farming season, but is now open and in good repair.

With districts, that bridge, in particular, would still be closed because it would be unfair for one district to have two big bridge repair jobs done before other districts had one done.

There are many other reasons why Johnson County’s Board of Supervisors should continue as an at-large body. Each county should be allowed to determine its own board of supervisors structure.

Lisa Green-Douglass is a candidate in the Democratic primary for Johnson County Board of Supervisors.

I grew up on a Heritage farm (150 years in the same family) near Sutliff, and attended K-12 in the Lisbon school system. I am an alumnus of the University of Iowa. I have held several positions in the field of human services, including six years with the Department of Human Services and six years as executive director of the Arc of Johnson County.

I am married to Dr. Melissa Fath, a research scientist at the University of Iowa and a volunteer pharmacist at the Free Medical Clinic. We have three adult children — Rachel, Jordan and BJ, and have served as foster parents for another 50+ children.

I am a member of several community organizations, including: St. Andrew Presbyterian Church, Iowa Foster & Adoptive Parent Association, NAMI, Center for Worker Justice, ACLU Hawkeye Chapter, AFT Local 716, and Iowa City Federation of Labor. I also served four years as chairman of the Johnson County Democratic Party.

Some of the accomplishments of which I am proud:

• Leadership during the COVID-19 crisis.

• Leadership during 2008 floods.

• Raising the minimum wage — the first county in Iowa to do so.

• Passed a Human Rights Ordinance — the first county in Iowa to do so.

• Passed a Sensitive Areas Ordinance — the first county in Iowa to do so.

• Passed the Conservation Bond Initiative — the first county in Iowa to do so.

• Passed the Community ID Program — the first county in Iowa to do so.

• Started 1105 Project with gift of old Public Health building.

• Saved Sutliff Bridge after 2008 floods.

• Started trails funding.

• Created the Free Tax Help project.

• Created the Livable Community for Successful Aging.

• Added outdoor warning sirens to unincorporated Johnson County.

• Created the Local Foods Policy Council.

• Heritage AAA Outstanding Elected Official — 2009.

If reelected, my goals are:

1. Continue community recovery from COVID-19;

2. Begin serving people at the GuideLink Center;

3. Improve affirmative action results;

4. Renegotiate six union contracts to the benefit of all.

I am grateful for your past support, and I thank you for your future consideration. I promise to never take this position for granted! I respectfully request your vote on or before June 2.

Rod Sullivan is a candidate in the Democratic primary for Johnson County Board of Supervisors.

I am absolutely thrilled that the Johnson County Board of Supervisors finally has both a person of color and a female majority on the board.

Why?

Because women make decisions and guide communities in totally different ways than men do. Women have a unique ability to communicate with those who need to be heard and to understand multiple sides of any argument.

Because our entire community needs to be represented on our Board of Supervisors. In Johnson County we have a vibrant, diverse, exciting community with the potential to come together to improve the lives of all our citizens and our community.

Because by including representatives from our entire community on our governing boards, those voices have the potential to be heard, and acted upon. This is the best way for us to hear the voices of all our diverse community. Yes, there are more voices to be heard and future elections will make that difference. We have come a long way from the times when every board member was a white male. Let’s keep going!

Because in Johnson County we purport ourselves to be a liberal, inclusive and vibrant community. We are most vibrant when all of us come together, honor each other, listen to each other, work together for common goals and have fun together.

Because that is the kind of community I long to live in. A community where every voice and concern is heard and people work toward solutions together, not from the top down, but from inclusivity, listening, understanding and taking action together.

Because change is most effective when it comes the roots up, not from the top down. Women and people of color have more experience and success working in this way.

Because men want to fix things and people of color and women are more adept at changing things by listening to the voices of concern.

I am enthusiastically looking forward to working with everybody as a member of the Johnson County Board of Supervisors.

Royceann Porter is a candidate in the Democratic primary for Johnson County Board of Supervisors.

Chet Culver really should have known better.

Iowa’s former Democratic governor wrote a letter to current Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds decrying her administration’s declaration that workers who refuse to return to jobs amid COVID-19 fears would be denied unemployment benefits. He was among many who questioned whether Reynolds’ policy is even lawful, considering that unemployment rules allow Iowans to claim benefits for unsafe, intolerable or detrimental working conditions.

“Any such ill-conceived scheme that deprives them of choice and forces those hardworking, yet vulnerable, employees to report to unsafe workplace environments, while the positive incidences of COVID-19 infection are on the rise, is not merely penny-wise and pound-foolish — it is just plain wrong,” Culver argued.

But Culver should have known any overture for the rights of workers during the pandemic would fall on deaf ears. We learned Tuesday that more than 1,600 workers at four meatpacking plants tested positive for the virus. Reynolds continues insisting companies such as Tyson, with more than 1,300 cases at three facilities, are doing all they can to protect workers. In one Tyson facility at Perry, 58 percent of its employees contracted the virus.

Culver lost in 2010 to the Branstad-Reynolds ticket, a team that would go on to gut collective bargaining for public employees and make it far more difficult for injured workers to get compensation, among other greatest hits composed by its big business allies.

And Culver was bounced from office after issuing bonded debt to help Iowa communities, including Cedar Rapids, recover from natural disasters of 2008. Republicans dubbed him “Big Debt Chet” and decried his mismanagement of a crisis.

Strong management, apparently, is Reynolds’ decision to partially reopen 77 counties even as COVID-19 case numbers grow and deaths mount, and before ramped up testing and modeling provide critical information on the scope of the virus.

On Monday Reynolds received a lofty “A” grade from FreedomWorks and the Committee to Unleash Prosperity. Reynolds appeared on a conference call sponsored by the groups to talk about her strategy for reopening Iowa.

FreedomWorks and the Committee to Unleash Prosperity are conservative groups playing a key role in organizing “liberation” protests in Wisconsin, Oklahoma and elsewhere. FreedomWorks, with roots in the Tea Party movement, has been mobilizing local protesters and organizing events, according to The New York Times. It’s also conducting tracking polls in swing congressional districts and sharing data with presidential advisers and congressional staff.

“This isn’t political, and it shouldn’t be for anybody,” Reynolds told reporters this week when asked about her virus response.

FreedomWorks is among 24 groups who sent a letter to the president in April urging him to waive the Renewable Fuel Standard for the rest of the year due to pandemic concerns, potentially freeing Iowa farmers from more of their already scarce income.

So step aside Big Debt Chet. We’re unleashing prosperity. Even if workers get trampled.

(319) 398-8262; todd.dorman@thegazette.com

Another day, another devastating new uptick in Iowa’s COVID-19 figures.

Several times in the past few weeks, Gov. Kim Reynolds has announced a new daily high in Iowa’s positive COVID-19 tests or deaths. On Tuesday, yet another striking record — 19 deaths in a 24-hour period, or nearly 10 percent of the state’s total COVID-19 deaths to date.

For a governor who says she is staking her pandemic response on data and metrics, those grim numbers don’t seem to weigh heavily on Reynolds’ decision-making.

“The fact is we can’t prevent people from getting the COVID-19 virus,” Reynolds said at her Tuesday news conference. “If we weren’t testing in these areas, people would still have the virus and without being tested, diagnosed and isolated it could spread even further.”

In one breath, Reynolds tells Iowans we are helpless to stop the virus’s spread. In the very next breath, she explains how testing and isolation can help prevent the spread.

It’s just one example of the confusing guidance Iowans are getting from the governor and her team. Iowans looking for answers about how to protect themselves and their families are finding seemingly conflicting answers.

They report we have reached the peak, only to backtrack. They say we’re in this together and there’s a statewide plan to confront the outbreak, but then they tell us it’s really about “personal responsibility.” They tell us to stay home as much as possible, then pivot to emphasizing the need for people who feel sick to stay home.

Sometimes, it almost feels as if Reynolds is blaming Iowans for getting sick.

Early on, Reynolds used a regional strategy to track the virus, based on factors such as hospitalizations and health care resources in six multicounty regions across the state. That approach has been brushed aside with little explanation to the public.

Instead, Iowa now has “open” and “closed” counties — 22 where significant restrictions remain intact, and 77 where businesses can open in a limited manner. After less than a week under the county-by-county strategy, there are early signs that the 77 counties are seeing an uptick in confirmed COVID-19 cases.

• Gov. Reynolds is disrupting her own virus response plan

Reynolds’ response in this phase of the pandemic is just as crucial as the initial phase, to prevent a deadlier wave. Shifting to the personal responsibility path also decentralizes leadership, which creates more uncertainty.

If Iowa’s “open” counties see a surge, will Reynolds relent and reimpose restrictions?

We have reason to doubt it. Just this week, Reynolds co-authored a Washington Post guest column with other governors, arguing “our approach worked.”

In Reynolds’ mind, she has already defeated the virus, so she’s retreating from the fight. That’s bad news for Iowans who are still very much on the front lines of this pandemic.

(319) 398-8262; editorial@thegazette.com

The upcoming primary election is a pivotal moment for Iowa City. For the past several months, I have talked to people throughout the district who are ready for change. They believe their Democratic representative should show up for people throughout the community, especially those in need. They expect a legislator from Iowa’s bluest district to be a leader in the party, raising money to support Democratic candidates up and down the ticket and making the strongest possible case for progressive legislation. They are ready to start now in building the future of the Democratic Party and state government in Iowa. And I am honored that they are putting their trust in me.

There is a lot at stake in this election. The coronavirus has laid bare and magnified preexisting inequities — inequities brought about by the Legislature’s disinvestment in education, health care, and worker rights and safety. Small businesses are now struggling to survive, when for years the state has been giving large corporations hundreds of millions of dollars in tax credits. Water quality, climate change and gun violence still need our attention, even as we continue to invest in keeping people safe from COVID-19. We have never needed strong leadership more than we do now.

I will be a champion for progressive values because I have lived them. I know how hard it can be for people to get by even when they work hard. I grew up in a trailer in rural Florida. Neither of my parents graduated high school. My dad was a construction worker who suffered for years with emphysema. When his health insurance was canceled, my family had to choose between paying for his medicine and everything else. Fortunately, public education gave me the opportunity for a better life. My teachers taught me well and helped me to apply to college. Public university tuition was affordable then, and I was able to work my way through engineering school and law school.

Today, I am a law professor, an environmental engineer and a mother. I believe I have the skills, energy and passion that Iowa City needs at this critical point in time. I will show up for every member of our community and fight for a better future for all of Iowa.

It’s time for change in Iowa City. Please vote for me in House District 85 and help to build the future that Iowa deserves.

Christina Bohannan is a candidate in the Democratic primary for Iowa House District 85.

Republican voters in the Iowa 2nd District have a pretty simple choice on June 2.

On the one hand, there’s my opponent, Mariannette Miller-Meeks. She’s the establishment darling, and she’s got plenty of experience campaigning! This is now her fourth time running for Congress (She lost the first three times).

The problem with Miller-Meeks is that, like too many career politicians, she will say or do anything to get elected. Miller-Meeks claims to be pro-life, but here’s what she told a 2018 League of Women Voters candidate forum:

“I am pro-choice, but it’s a very sensitive issue. … Ultimately as a doctor and a health care provider, I think these are decisions that are best left to providers, to doctors, and to patients.”

After that video clip surfaced, I called on Miller-Meeks to either endorse the heartbeat bill — a bill that would ban abortion after the moment a baby’s heartbeat could be detected — or drop out of the race. She has no plans to do either, but in the meantime she’s going to continue to run ads telling you how pro-life she is!

Voters have another option on June 2. I’m Bobby Schilling. I’m a Catholic, pro-life, pro-family, pro-free market, former union member, Trump-supporting Republican. I own a few pizza restaurants in the Quad Cities area. And my wife, Christie, and I have — count ‘em — ten kids!

I served as a member of Congress after winning my race in 2010. I know how Congress works. And I know how to stand up for conservative principles even when liberals, RINOS and fake news journalists are trying to get you to vote the wrong way.

We need someone who can be tough in the face of political pressure and remain firm in their convictions. We need a fighter who is willing to work with President Donald Trump to make America great again, even if it means upsetting the establishment in Washington. Unfortunately, my opponent has shown herself to be very wishy-washy. We don’t know how she’ll vote. We just know she wants to be there. We can absolutely do better than that.

I want to go to Congress to fight for America — and fight for Iowa families. That’s why I’m in this. I hope you’ll consider voting for me on June 2.

Bobby Schilling is a candidate in the Republican primary for Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District.

I’m Steven the electrician, not the politician. I’m asking for your vote and support in getting there.

• Never held public office in Iowa or Illinois, check my competitors.

• No endorsements so no worries about draining that swamp here.

• Pro-life and Birthright supporter.

• 2nd Amendment and gun rights supporter.

• Legal immigration and revision of laws.

• Supporter of the constitution as written.

• Israel supporter.

• Farm owner and advocate for agriculture and fair trade.

• Check who funded my campaign, I owe no favors or pay backs.

• Still working hard for my family and married 40 years.

• I will budget your money if elected, and no tax increases.

• End of government overreach.

• Proud of our military and their never-ending service.

I’m not the establishment, but your candidate.

Steven Everly is a candidate in the Republican primary for Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District.

Several hundred cars were parked outside a food bank in San Antonio on Good Friday — the food bank fed 10,000 people that day. Such scenes, increasingly common across the nation and evocative of loaves and fish, reflect the cruel facts about the wealthiest nation in the world: 80 percent of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, and 100 percent of Americans were unprepared for the COVID-19 pandemic. People are hungry due to macroeconomic and environmental factors, not because they did something wrong. Although everyone is at risk in this pandemic, the risk is not shared equally across socioeconomic classes. Universal basic health care could resolve this disparity and many of the moral and economic aspects associated with the pandemic.

Increases in the total output of the economy, or the gross domestic product (GDP), disproportionately benefit the wealthy. From 1980 to 2020, the GDP increased by 79 percent. Over that same time, the after-tax income of the top 0.01 percent of earners increased by 420 percent, while the after-tax income of the middle 40 percent of earners increased by only 50 percent, and by a measly 20 percent for the bottom 50 percent of earners. At present, the top 0.1 percent of earners have the same total net worth as the bottom 85 percent. Such income inequality produces poverty, which is much more common in the U.S. than in other developed countries. Currently 43 million Americans, or 12.7 percent of the population, live in poverty.

At the same time, 30 million Americans are uninsured and many more are underinsured with poorly designed insurance plans. The estimated total of uninsured and underinsured Americans exceeds 80 million. In addition, most of the 600,000 homeless people and 11 million immigrants in the U.S. lack health care coverage. Immigrants represent an especially vulnerable population, since many do not speak English and cannot report hazardous or unsafe work conditions. Furthermore, many immigrants avoid care due to fear of deportation even if they entered the country through legal channels.

Most people in poverty and many in the middle class obtain coverage from federal programs. On a national level, Medicaid is effectively a middle-class program and covers those living in poverty, 30 percent of adults and 60 percent of children with disabilities as well as about 67 percent of people in nursing homes. In Iowa, 37 percent of children and 48 percent of nursing home residents use Medicaid. Medicaid also finances up to 20 percent of the care provided in rural hospitals. Medicare, Medicaid and the Children’s Hospital Insurance Program (CHIP) together cover over 40 percent of Americans.

In addition to facilitating care, health care policy must also address the “social determinants of health,” since the conditions in which people live, work, and play dictate up to 80 percent of their health risks and outcomes. This means that health care reform requires programs in all facets of society. Winston Churchill first conceptualized such an idea in the early 20th century as a tool to prevent the expansion of socialism, arguing that inequality could persist indefinitely without social safety nets. Since that time most developed countries have implemented such social programs, but not the US.

All developed countries except the U.S. provide some type of universal basic health care for their residents. Universal basic health care refers to a system that provides all people with certain essential benefits, such as emergency services (including maternity), inpatient hospital and physician care, outpatient services, laboratory and radiology services, treatment of mental illness and substance abuse, preventive health services (including vaccinations), rehabilitation, and medications. Providing access to these benefits, along with primary care, dramatically improves the health of the community without imposing concerns regarding payment. Perhaps not coincidentally, the U.S. reports a lower life expectancy and higher rates of infant mortality, suicide and homicide compared to other developed countries.

Countries such as Canada, Great Britain, Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, Australia, and Japan all produce better health care outcomes than the U.S. at a much lower cost. In fact the U.S. spends about twice the percentage of its GDP on health care compared to these countries. With that being said, the Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA), which facilitated a decrease in the rate of the uninsured in the U.S. from 20 percent to 12 percent, also decreased the percentage of the GDP spent on health care from 20.2 percent to 17.9 percent in just 10 years. For this reason, most economists agree that universal basic health care would not cost more than the current system, and many would also argue that the total costs of the health care system cannot be further reduced unless everyone has access to basic care.

Achieving successful universal basic health care requires a serious long-term commitment from the federal government — contributing to Medicaid and financing its expansion are not enough. It requires courage from our elected leaders. The ACA took several important steps toward this goal by guaranteeing coverage for preexisting conditions, banishing lifetime maximums for essential services, and mandating individual coverage for everyone, though Congress repealed this final provision in 2017. At present, the ACA requires refinement and a public option, thereby preserving private and employer-based plans for those who want them.

Without universal basic health care the people living at the margins of society have no assurances that they will have access to basic health care services, especially during times of pandemic. Access to food and medications is less reliable, large families live together in small spaces, and public transportation facilitates frequent exposure to others. Childhood diseases such as asthma, chronic diseases such as diabetes, and diseases related to smoking such as COPD and cancer are all likely to worsen. Quarantine protocols also exacerbate the mental health crisis, further increasing rates of domestic violence, child abuse, substance abuse, depression, and suicide. In the last six weeks over 30 million Americans have applied for unemployment benefits, and as people become unemployed, many will lose health insurance.

Access to basic health care without economic or legal consequences would greatly enhance all aspects of pandemic management and response, from tracing contacts and quarantining carriers to administering tests and reinforcing supply chains. The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected minorities and the impoverished in both mortality and livelihood. Universal basic health care helps these vulnerable populations the most, and by reducing their risk it reduces the risk for everyone. In this way, universal basic health care supports the best interests of all Americans.

Like a living wage, universal basic health care aligns with the Christian tradition of social justice and is a moral and economic imperative for all Americans. Nurses, doctors, and other health care providers often observe a sharp contrast between the haves and have-nots when seeing patients. The homeless, the hungry, the unemployed, the working poor, the uninsured; people without families, patients with no visitors, those who live alone or lack support systems; refugees and immigrants — all of these people deserve the fairness and dignity provided by universal basic health care and programs which improve the social determinants of their health. The ACA moved U.S. toward this goal, but now it requires refinement and a public option. The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the urgency of this imperative by demonstrating how universal basic health care could decrease the risks to those less fortunate, thus significantly decreasing the risks to everyone.

James M. Levett, MD, serves on the board of Linn County Public Health and is a practicing cardiothoracic surgeon with Physicians’ Clinic of Iowa. Pramod Dwivedi, MS, DrPH (c), is the health director of Linn County Public Health.

In August 1919, the Cedar Rapids Evening Gazette opined in favor of the passage of a $5 million congressional appropriation to “investigate influenza, its cause, prevention and cure.”

“We all remember without effort the darkness and terror which engulfed the land last fall and winter as death stalked swiftly from seaboard to seaboard, into crowded city and unto lonely plain, sparing not the cottage of the poor nor the mansion of the rich,” the editorial said. “In four short months, influenza claimed a half million lives and pressed millions of others onto beds of sickness, suffering and helplessness. The nation’s mortality rate leapt high and with astounding speed. The nation was unprepared to cope with a disease calamity such as it has never known.”

The Gazette lamented that billions of dollars in loss were wrought by the pandemic of so-called Spanish influenza, compared with only $5 million being spent to investigate the virus.

“More has been spent in studying diseases of hogs,” the editorial argued.

Just less than a year earlier, The Evening Gazette did not see “darkness and terror” coming. A front page, above-the-fold story Sept. 25, 1918, asked: “Spanish Influenza just the old-fashioned grippe?” “Grippe” is an old-time term for the flu, by the way.

“As a matter of fact, in the opinion of City Physician Beardsley, and a good many other Cedar Rapids men in the same profession, Spanish influenza is just another name for the regular old fashioned influenza and is no different from the influenza we have always had. A bad cold is a bad cold, and a worse cold is grippe, which covers a multitude of things ...,” The Gazette reported, optimistically.

An earlier strain of influenza in the spring of 1918 had been less virulent and deadly. But the second wave was no ordinary grippe.

By mid-October, according to reports in The Evening Gazette, influenza caseloads exploded. On Oct. 12, 1918, the local health board shut down pool rooms, billiard halls and bowling alleys. It pleaded with store owners to avoid allowing crowds to linger. On Oct. 16, stores were ordered to discontinue any special sales that might draw more shoppers.

Restrictions tightened as the pandemic worsened.

Death notices were stacking up on Gazette pages, in rows reminiscent of small tombstones. Many victims were cut down in the prime of life by a virus that struck young, healthy people hardest. Mothers and fathers died, leaving young children. Soldiers serving in World War I died far away from home. Visitors to town never returned home.

Young brothers died and were mourned at a double funeral. A sister who came to care for a sick brother died, and so did her brother.

Ray Franklin Minburn, 24, died of influenza, leaving behind six sisters and two brothers. “Mr. Minburn was a faithful son, a devoted companion, a good neighbor,” concluded his death announcement on Oct. 21, 1918.

On the same page that day came news, tucked among the tombstones, reporting that Iowa Gov. William Harding had recovered from influenza, in the midst of his reelection campaign, and was back in the office. You might remember Harding as the governor who banned German and other languages during World War I and who was nearly impeached for bribery in 1919.

Not far from Harding’s update came news from the prison in Anamosa that “whisky and quinine” were being deployed to attack the grippe.

The pages of The Evening Gazette also were dotted with advertisements for supposed cures and treatments.

“Danger of infection from influenza or any contagious disease can be eliminated by using preventive measures,” prescribed by Ruby S. Thompson, chiropractor and naturopathic physician. Those included “Sulphur-vapor baths, Carlsbad mineral bath.”

You could build up your blood using “Gude’s Pepto-Mangan,” the “Red Blood Builder.” Keep your strength up with Horlick’s Malted Milk.

One ad looked exactly like a news story, carrying the bold headline “Druggists still asked to conserve stocks of VapoRub needed in ‘flu’ districts.” In a tiny notation at the end of the “story” were the words “The Vicks Chemical Co.”

That August 1919 Gazette editorial I mentioned makes me wonder what we’ll be writing in a year or so after our current pandemic.

Death stalking us swiftly from seaboard to seaboard in an unprepared nation, preceded by the casual insistence it’s no worse than the seasonal flu, sounds eerily familiar in 2020. More attention is being paid to hogs than the health of humans working in meatpacking plants.

Will we be writing in 2021 how reopening states and counties too soon led to our own second wave? Here in Iowa, reopening began before we had a fully working predictive model to chart the pandemic’s course and before new testing efforts had a chance to ramp up. Will decisions made without crucial information look smart in 2021? Or will we wish we’d waited just a couple more weeks?

What of the protesters demanding liberation? What about the president, running for reelection in a nation harmed by his crisis mismanagement? What will a new normal look like?

Will there be newspapers around to editorialize in the aftermath? After all, most of the pitches for fake cures are online now, some even extolled at White House briefings.

And will we be better prepared next time? I bet editorial writers in 1919 figured we’d have this pandemic response thing down to a science by now.

Little did they know that in 2020 we’d have so little respect for science. And after a century-plus, the darkness and terror apparently slipped our minds.

(319) 398-8262; todd.dorman@thegazette.com

With over 11,000 positive COVID-19 cases in Iowa and a mounting death toll, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds went to Washington DC. to declare her approach to the pandemic a success.

Her victory lap included a sit down with the president and a Washington Post op-ed. The op-ed was co-authored with four other GOP governors and declared, the “common-sense approach helped keep our states on track and have set us up to come out of this pandemic stronger than ever.”

On May 8, Vice President Mike Pence came to Iowa to celebrate Iowa’s success. But what does Iowa’s success actually look like?

Well, two of our counties are national hot spots for the disease.

Experts from the University of Iowa project that Iowa has yet to reach it’s peak for cases and warn that without proper measures a new wave of infection will hit the state in the fall.

Iowa’s success looks like the TestIowa initiative getting off to a slow start due to problems with the test machines and thus far, failing to achieve it’s promise of 3,000 tests per day. And mounting concerns about the accuracy of the tests, after the Des Moines Register reported that several test samples were unable to be processed.

Success looks like Minnesota having 3,000 fewer positive COVID-19 cases with 2 million more residents and nearly 40,000 more tests completed.

The week of Reynolds victory lap was the week that Iowa saw a 28 percent increase in hospitalizations, a 51 percent increase in ICU admissions, and a 39 percent increase in patients needing ventilators.

Reynolds declaring victory now is like crowning yourself the winner in Monopoly before you even made it all around the board. It’s like demanding your marathon medal on mile 13. It’s like declaring you are flattening the pandemic curve, before your COVID-19 cases skyrocket by thousands. OK, that’s not a metaphor, that’s something our governor actually did. Just weeks ago.

This is what Reynold’s success looks like: 231 deaths and vulnerable being forced to return to work before it's safe. And these are not just numbers, these are people.

Perhaps the most damaging thing that this pandemic response has done was to turn individual lives into a chart on a scoreboard. A game of chess, where we are willing to sacrifice some pawns to keep winning at making money.

AP reporter Ryan Foley noted on Twitter that those dead from COVID-19 in the state include a Bosnian refugee who left behind a heartbroken husband and a Latino father who was raising three kids on his own after their mother died of cancer last year.

Those lost include Willi Levi, one of the men who escaped servitude from the Atalissa turkey processing plant.

But as state Rep. Steve Holt argued in an op-ed this week, if we have enough room in our hospitals, why not open the economy? The logic was repeated during Reynolds May 7 news conference — our hospitals can handle it so we move forward. This is what success looks like: Enough hospital beds for us all to die in.

Before the pandemic came to the state, Holt and Reynolds were both pushing an amendment to the state constitution that would strip protections for abortion.

The Venn diagram of those people telling you COVID-19 isn’t that bad and so what, some people will die, and the people who call abortion murder is just one flat circle of hypocrisy.

Holt has even been tweeting about how shut down orders violate our personal liberty. But where is all that personal liberty when it comes to my uterus, Holt?

Our success didn’t have to look like this. Our success could have involved fewer deaths, fewer infections and a reduced risk for a resurgence, if we had just waited two more weeks.

Dr. Eli Perencevich, professor of internal medicine and epidemiology at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine, and one of the authors of a report for the Iowa Department of Public Health, which warned against reopening too soon. He spoke to me in an interview last week, where he explained that if Iowa could have remained closed just a little longer, we’d be closer to safety. Ideally, explained Perencevich, if Iowa had truly shut down immediately and decisively for two weeks in the beginning, we wouldn’t be in this situation. Absent that, shutting down for two more weeks would ensure greater safety.

This pandemic didn’t have to be a choice between the economy or lives. We are the world’s richest nation, we could have come up with a solution. But doing so would mean that we’d have to face America’s deep inequality, we’d have to enact social change and pump money into food benefits and health care, two things Reynolds has slowly been defunding during her tenure as governor. Each of these deaths was preventable not inevitable. But our governor and federal government have given up the fight, and called it success. They’ve accepted that some people will die, and even more will get sick and lose their livelihoods and income and be forced to bear mounting medical costs.

It’s easier to say you win, before you’ve even played the game. And so here we are, dying from all this success.

lyz.lenz@thegazette.com; 319-368-8513

VOTE411 provides voters with information about the candidates on the ballot in the June 2 primary election. The League of Women Voters created the election-related website as a one-stop location for nonpartisan information for the public.

Each candidate was invited to respond to a set of questions. You can see their responses online at VOTE411.org. If you don’t see responses from every candidate running in your house or senate district, please contact them asking that they participate in VOTE411.

For this primary election, we are asked to vote absentee if possible. Input your address in the VOTE411.org website and get information about how to get your absentee ballot, register to vote, and who will be on your ballot.

The League of Women Voters of Iowa wants you to educate yourself and then vote in the June 2, 2020 Primary Election.

Cathy Eisenhofer

LWV Johnson County

Coronavirus provides a chilling lesson about crowding. The disease originated in a densely packed Chinese City. As it moved worldwide it struck most heavily in crowded places where people live and work in proximity.

Medical experts advise us to stay home and keep fellow humans at a distance. Isolation works. If a pathogen can’t reach us it can’t cause harm.

The same holds true for food. Years ago farmers planted diverse crops in relatively small fields, and raised modest numbers of chickens, pigs, and cattle. One cornfield or chicken coop was, essentially, isolated from the next closest counterpart, making it hard for a disease to jump from one farm to the next.

Modern Agriculture, in contrast, raises hundreds of thousands of chickens and turkeys crowded together in single buildings. Hogs and cattle are also crammed together, as are crops. Essentially the Midwest is one continuous cornfield stretching from Ohio to Nebraska. Once a pathogen mutates a new disease can easily sweep across vast fields or through crowded growing buildings, leaving a path of death and food shortages in its wake.

Modern mass agriculture is efficient, providing consumers with inexpensive eggs, milk, vegetables and meat, but it is vulnerable. Today’s farmers recognize disease potential and practice scrupulous biosecurity to keep pathogens away from their crops and animals. Still, all it takes is one mutation or introduction of a foreign microbe and a high percentage of American food is lost.

Families can reduce their vulnerability to mass food production by growing some at home. During The Second World War the government encouraged families to plant victory gardens and keep one to two hens per family member. Many households were able to grow up to 40% of their annual dietary needs, even in small yards. It freed commercially produced food for the military. Yards remain capable of growing significant quantities of nutritious food using three techniques.

Gardening: An amazing quantity of nutritious food can be grown in even a small sunny backyard, especially when intensive gardening techniques are used.

Foraging: Delicious wild foods grow in unsprayed yards and are free for the picking. Our family, for example, enjoys nettles, lambsquarters, purslane, acorns and dandelions. Learning to identify, harvest, and process them is not difficult. Ironically spraying a yard kills plants people can eat to favor inedible grass.

Chickens: A six hen backyard flock will produce two dozen eggs a week. They need some commercial feed but recycle kitchen scraps and garden weeds into eggs. Cedar Rapids and other towns allow families to keep chickens with a few restrictions.

Families unable or unwilling to grow backyard food can boost food security by buying vegetables, meat and eggs from small local producers.

Coronavirus has taught us about contagion and helps clarify the threat that mass production poses. Raising backyard food enhances resilience. It’s satisfying and helps ensure there will be something to eat.

Rich Patterson of Cedar Rapids is a writer, former nature center director and ecological consultant who co-owns Winding Pathways LLC with his wife, Marion.

One in five people will have some kind of mental illness in their lifetime. Yet despite how common these conditions are — as common as silver cars, and more common than being left-handed — stigma remains the greatest barrier to individuals seeking help regarding their mental illness.

May is Mental Health Awareness Month. This serves as a great opportunity for our community to begin eliminating stigma by starting conversations and increasing understanding about mental illness.

Now, more than ever before, it is important to talk about mental illness. Many of us could be feeling increased anxiety, stress and feelings of isolation due to the COVID-19 outbreak and social distancing requirements. For those Iowans who already live with a mental illness, this pandemic could be causing symptoms to compound.

A recent study released by a team at Iowa State University states that increased unemployment and social isolation measures related to COVID-19 could result in an increase in suicide rates of close to 50,000 individuals.

Despite the challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic, there still is help available: Telehealth services during this crisis is critical. Our state leaders, Iowa Insurance Commissioner Doug Ommen and Gov. Kim Reynolds responded immediately by encouraging health providers, insurers and businesses to work together to remove barriers and ensure telehealth is accessible.

Your Life Iowa, a state-operated service, offers referrals for problems related to alcohol, drugs, gambling, mental health or suicidal thoughts and can be contacted by phone, text or online chat 24/7.

Between March 1 and April 19, Your Life Iowa received nearly 500 contacts related to COVID-19 and traffic on the website — YourLifeIowa.org — is up 27 percent. Crisis lines and mental health counselors around the state and country are also reporting an uptick in patients reaching out for resources or virtual counseling. This is important progress.

However, the greatest barrier for those in need of mental health services is stigma.

If you know someone who is struggling, be a voice of support. The silence around mental illness is preventing our fellow Iowans — our friends, neighbors, co-workers and family members — from feeling better. By breaking down the stigma around mental illness, we can help them access the resources and treatment they deserve.

If someone opened up to you about their mental illness, would you know what to say? Do you have a general understanding of the most common mental illnesses? Do you know how to support loved ones dealing with mental illness? There are free resources available at MakeItOK.org/Iowa to learn more.

You can also read stories of Iowans who live with mental illness, take a pledge to end mental illness stigma and learn more about how you can get more involved with Make It OK through ambassador trainings, upcoming events and workplace programming.

Together, we can end the stigma and Make It OK.

Jami Haberl, Iowa Healthiest State Initiative; Lori Weih, UnityPoint Health — St. Luke’s Hospital; Tricia Kitzmann, Linn County Public Health and Mona McCalley-Whitters, Ph.D., NAMI Linn County.

When Andrea Wilson approached me five years ago with her idea of creating a space for writers in our community separate from any offered by the University of Iowa, I must admit I was a bit skeptical, if not defensive. Over a long coffee discussion, I shared with her a detailed look at the literary landscape of Iowa City and all of the things my organization, the Iowa City UNESCO City of Literature was doing to make those assets more visible and accessible.

• Coronavirus closes the Iowa Writers’ House - for now

Despite this, Andrea mentioned the need for an “on ramp,” a way for people who don’t feel a part of that community to find their path, to access those riches. It was there, I thought to myself. She just hadn’t looked in the right place.

Then she built that ramp in the form of the Iowa Writers’ House. As she and her team defined what that ramp should look like, what role it should play, the Writers’ House evolved from being an idea with promise to a vital part of our literary infrastructure. She showed that people were hungry for further instruction. They desired more and different ways to connect with one another. These were things beyond the scope and mission of the UI and the City of Literature. She had found her niche, and filled it, nicely complementing what was offered by my organization and others.

But those services do not come without cost. Andrea and her team scrambled, using the house as a literary bed-and-breakfast that was used by many visiting writers. They scheduled workshops. They held fundraisers. But that thin margin disappeared with the onset of COVID-19. Unable to hold those workshops, to serve as a bed-and-breakfast, to provide meaningful in-person connections, the Writers’ House was unable to carry on in its current configuration.

We have every hope and expectation that the Iowa Writers’ House and Andrea will continue to be a part of our literary landscape in the future. This will come perhaps in another form, another space. Conversations have been underway for months about the needs of the literary community beyond the UI. Andrea has been a key part of those discussions, and the work that she and her team has done offer vital information about where those conversations need to go. Gaps have been identified, and while they won’t be filled in the same way, they will be filled.

These conversations join those that have been taking place in our community for decades about the need for space and support for writers and artists. As we all have realized over these past few weeks of isolation just how much we miss when we are not able to gather to create and to celebrate those creations, perhaps those conversations will accelerate and gain focus once we reconvene. The newly formed Iowa City Downtown Arts Alliance, of which we are proud to be a part, is an additional voice in that conversation.

In the meantime, we want to thank Andrea, Associate Director Alisha Jeddeloh, and the team at the Iowa Writers’ House, not just for identifying a need, but for taking the rare and valuable step of actually rolling up their sleeves and doing something to meet it.

John Kenyon is executive director of the Iowa City UNESCO City of Literature.

With the throng of websites on the internet vying for people’s attention, it will be hard to stand out if you don’t have an appealing or dependable business website. Investing in building your own website and acquiring a reliable domain and web hosting provider are some of the things you must do right to make […] More

When it comes down to creating your brand you want something that is original but stands out. Here is what makes a good logo so you can stand out. More

Wondering why you should hire a web design company? If so, click here for five reasons why you should hire a web design company now! More

Recent advances in technology have helped both small and large companies to automate their business process to improve productivity. In fact, experts have also emphasized that productivity has stalled over the last couple of years. Numerous large-scale businesses also complained that their productivity was in decline despite implementing innovative workplace guidelines to improve the workflow. […] More

Scrum and Kanban are terms often used interchangeably in project management, though they have their differences. In fact, that’s why they may be used at the same time for tracking and managing various aspects of work. For example, a Kanban board might be used to track work during a Scrum sprint. However, each has its […] More

Instagram has become the rising star of social media marketing platforms. It is a very attractive option to marketers that are growing frustrated with Facebook’s algorithm changes. Instagram also has a very large user base. Over 116 million Americans are on this popular image sharing site. Marketers can also reach millions of users in India, […] More

Web clients love custom designs. Enough unique changes can turn a pre-made template into a beautiful, original site design. While there’s nothing wrong with tweaking a website for your clients, customization can be taken too far.   Granting excessive requests can put your projects into overtime and drive you mad. If you want to avoid […] More

How does a single plugin become the basis of a thriving technology ecosystem? Partly by leveraging the extensibilitythat WordPress’s event-driven Hooks system makes possible.

Before 20 years, the websites are developed with text and static HTML only. But as technology is growing we have lots of new ways to create any complex to a simple website. There are so many options available to develop a user-friendly website.

Do you want to duplicate your WordPress database using phpMyAdmin? WordPress stores all your website data in a MySQL database. Sometimes you may need to quickly clone a WordPress database to transfer a website or to create manual backups.

Do you want to create a WordPress intranet for your organization? WordPress is a powerful platform with tons of flexible options that makes it ideal to be used as your company’s intranet. In this article, we will show you how to create a WordPress intranet.

f there is one thing you should include in your WordPress website’s strategy, it’s search engine optimization. Because when you do it right, you’ll be rewarded. Hugely rewarded. With tons of high quality visitors.

Installing an SSL certificate on your domain is an essential step you should take to secure your WordPress site and now with Let’s Encrypt you can get one for free.

Dazed Media a interrogé les créatifs et leur a demandé d’imaginer des affiches répondant aux changements provoqués par la pandémie et appelant à un avenir meilleur. Dans le cadre de cette campagne #AloneTogether, plusieurs artistes et designers célèbres ont contribué, tels que Vivienne Westwood, Christopher Kane ou encore la créatrice de mode Katharine Hamnett. Ces […]

“Je n’ai pas de sœur, c’est peut-être pour ça que je la cherche dans chaque femme” confie Maria Clara Macrì dans les pages de son livre 13 Moons to Find Her, qui devrait être publié prochainement. Cette quête de sororité s’est réalisée au travers d’une série de portraits (un projet au départ intitulé In Her Rooms) pour laquelle la photographe italienne a rencontré […]

En ces temps de confinement, l’heure est à l’évasion de l’esprit. Nous vous proposons aujourd’hui de découvrir le joli travail de l’illustratrice russe Darya Shnykina. Elle est l’auteure d’une série de créations intitulée Places I’d Love To Live In.  Elle a imaginé représenter d’adorables petites maisonnées solitaires en pleine nature. Des petits havres de paix où chacun […]

En 2016, la route du photographe finlandais Konsta Punkka croisait celle de deux pumas. Il se situait alors au cœur de la Patagonie, au Chili, dans le vaste parc national Torres del Paine. Spécialiste des clichés d’aventure et d’animaux dans leur habitat naturel, le photographe a passé une dizaine de jours à suivre les félins pour tirer de […]

Durant cette période de confinement, les créatifs rivalisent d’ingéniosité pour rester créatifs et continuer leur pratique. C’est le cas du photographe Florian W.  Mueller. Contraint de rester chez lui avec son fils de 6 ans et donc dans l’impossibilité de voyager pour réaliser des projets, il a opté pour la création à domicile. Lorsque son […]

Cette période inédite de confinement a inspiré de nombreux artistes, dont fait partie l’illustrateur Mariano Pascual. L’artiste argentin établi à Barcelone a traduit en images les sentiments flous, désordonnés et un brin anxiogènes induits par la pandémie. Stocks de papier toilette, télétravail et laisser-aller derrière les portes closes de son domicile… À travers une série de visuels […]

I just came across a interesting new plugin built on the wonderful jQuery library. It’s called Flip!, head on over and check out the cool demo!

The post Flip! A jQuery plugin appeared first on WPCult.

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Here is a really neat trick! Access your PHP5 while running PHP4. If you haven’t created a .htaccess file, you may want to check out the WordPress Codex on permalink structure. Anyway, open any text editing document and paste in this code: AddType x-mapp-php5 .php That’ it! Save your text document as .htaccess and your […]

The post Run PHP5 on your PHP4 Server appeared first on WPCult.

I talked about Disabling search engine on search pages in a previous post using the meta tag. Today lets go over the web bots Cached copy of your site. If you are working on builder your blog, or have a temporary site up, use the following code: <meta name="robots" content="noarchive"> This will tell any bot […]

The post Disable caching of your site or post appeared first on WPCult.

Here is a neat trick. Say you want to show a custom field in you post or in a certain categories post. There is a simple code you need to write in order to accomplish this: <?php $image = get_post_meta($post->ID, "image", $single = true); ?> <?php if($image != '') : if(in_category(7)) { echo ''; } […]

The post Echo custom fields in any category appeared first on WPCult.

Ricardo Sousa, who writes for Smashing Magazine created a great plugin called Twittar. This plugin will use someones Twitter Gravatar if their email address is not connected with a Gravatar. For more info check out the full post at Twitter Avatars in Comments: A WordPress plugin Image credit: Ricardo Sousa

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Here is a nifty trick for your comments.php template. If someone comes to your site and leaves a comment but doesn’t leave a url back to there site, the default link that is shown in place of the php code comment_author_url is the current page link. That might not look good. So, here is a […]

The post Display custom url if comment authors url is blank appeared first on WPCult.

Ever wanted to display the title of a post somewhere but limit the amount of characters that are shown? For instance, this post has a very long title, and if I were to use <?php echo the_title() ?> it would show as follows: Limit the characters that display on the_title. That may not fit well […]

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If you are using the cforms II, you may want to head over to Mr. Seidel’s site for more info on the matter.

The post Goodbye to cforms II appeared first on WPCult.

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I recently went looking for a good audio player for WordPress. I came across WPAudioPlayer from 1 pixel out. The plugin is extremely simple to use and has a really awesome automatic color detention tool which will match to your site with ease. For more info visit the demo page at http://www.1pixelout.net/code/audio-player-wordpress-plugin/

The post WordPress Audio Player Plugin appeared first on WPCult.

Today Matt Mullenweg from MA.TT declared today official plugin developer day because the plugin directory hit 4,000 plugins, check it out: 4,000 Plugins.  

The post January 28th declared plugin developer day appeared first on WPCult.

Just like in Mac OS X, you can change the DNS servers on your iPhone. This can significantly speed up Safari and other iPhone apps that use the Internet. For a general introduction to DNS, and to learn why you would want to change the DNS servers on your iPhone, see How to Change Your Mac's DNS Servers.

Before we start, you should know a couple things about how iOS handles DNS. First, these instructions only work for Wi-Fi connections - iOS does not allow you to change the DNS servers when connected to cellular networks. Also, the changes are network specific, so you'll need to change the DNS servers every time you connect to a new wireless network. The good news is that iOS remembers the settings, so you won't have to do anything the second time you connect to a network.

Here's how to change your iPhone's DNS servers:

1. From the iPhone's home screen, tap Settings.
   
   
2. Tap Wi-Fi. The screen shown below appears. The available wireless networks in range of your iPhone appear, as shown below.
   
   
3. Find your wireless network in the list, and then click the arrow. The screen shown below appears.
   
   
4. Tap the DNS field.
   
   
5. Delete the current DNS servers, and enter the new DNS servers. (If you enter more than one DNS server, be sure sure to separate the servers with commas.)
   • To use OpenDNS, enter 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220
   • To use Google DNS, enter 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4
6. Test your new DNS servers to make sure they're working.
   • If you're using OpenDNS, visit the OpenDNS test page.
   • If you're using Google Public DNS, follow these testing instructions.

That's it! You've updated your iPhone's DNS servers!

Related Articles

• How to Find the Best DNS Servers
• How to Change Your Mac's DNS Servers
• How to Change Your iPad's DNS Servers
• Change an AirPort Extreme's DNS Servers

Meet Your Macinstructor

Matt Cone, the author of Master Your Mac, has been a Mac user for over 20 years. A former ghost writer for some of Apple's most notable instructors, Cone founded Macinstruct in 1999, a site with OS X tutorials that boasts hundreds of thousands of unique visitors per month. You can email him at: matt@macinstruct.com.

When you connect an iPhone to a wi-fi network, the iPhone remembers that network and will automatically attempt to connect to it in the future. This is a great feature for wi-fi networks you trust and use frequently. But mistakes happen. If you connect to the wrong network at a coffee shop, your iPhone will automatically attempt to join that network every time you visit the coffee shop in the future. And if the password for a known network changes, your iPhone might have trouble connecting to it.

What's the solution? Telling your iPhone to forget the wi-fi network. Forgetting a network will remove the network's password and prevent your iPhone from joining it automatically in the future.

Here's how to tell your iPhone to forget a wireless network:

1. From the home screen, tap Settings.
   
   
2. Tap Wi-Fi. The window shown below appears.
   
   
3. Locate the wireless network you want the iPhone to forget, and then tap the blue arrow next to the network name. The window shown below appears.
   
   
4. Tap Forget this Network. The iPhone will forget the wireless network.

You have successfully told your iPhone to forget the wi-fi network. The iPhone will not attempt to connect to the network in the future. And if the network required a password, that password has been forgotten.

Related Articles

• How to Connect an iPhone to a Wi-Fi Network
• Make Your iPhone Ask to Join Wi-Fi Networks

Meet Your Macinstructor

Matt Cone, the author of Master Your Mac, has been a Mac user for over 20 years. A former ghost writer for some of Apple's most notable instructors, Cone founded Macinstruct in 1999, a site with OS X tutorials that boasts hundreds of thousands of unique visitors per month. You can email him at: matt@macinstruct.com.

By default, your iPhone automatically connects to known wi-fi networks. (To stop an iPhone from automatically connecting, you can tell your iPhone to forget a wi-fi network.) But what happens if you take your iPhone to a new location? You'll need to manually connect your iPhone to a wi-fi network.

That's a hassle. But if you have the foresight and inclination, you can save yourself time in the future by making your iPhone ask to join wi-fi networks when no known networks are available. Instead of having to open settings to join a network, you'll be able to easily select a network from an on-screen prompt.

Here's how to make your iPhone ask to join wi-fi networks:

1. From the home screen, tap Settings.
   
   
2. Tap Wi-Fi. The window shown below appears.
   
   
3. Move the Ask to Join Networks slider to the On position.
   
   
4. The next time you're in a location with no known networks, your iPhone will prompt you to connect to an available wi-fi network, as shown below.
   
   

In the future, this prompt will be displayed when no known networks are available. (To actually see the prompt, you'll need to do something that requires network access, like try to check your email or open a webpage.) To connect to a wi-fi network, select a network and enter a password, if one is required.

Related Articles

• How to Connect an iPhone to a Wi-Fi Network
• Tell Your iPhone to Forget a Wireless Network

Meet Your Macinstructor

Matt Cone, the author of Master Your Mac, has been a Mac user for over 20 years. A former ghost writer for some of Apple's most notable instructors, Cone founded Macinstruct in 1999, a site with OS X tutorials that boasts hundreds of thousands of unique visitors per month. You can email him at: matt@macinstruct.com.