Man Charged With Theft of McAlister & Sons in Bayard Reaches Guilty Plea

The man arrested and charged with theft in relation to the May robbery of McAlister & Sons in Bayard has officially plead guilty to First-Degree Theft.

According to a release from the Guthrie County Sheriff’s Office, a long investigation with several other law enforcement departments from around the state helped them arrest 33 year-old Todd Hambly of Swaledale, Iowa, back in May, days after McAlister & Sons had been broken into.

The Guthrie County Sheriff’s Office says several brass bushings for heavy construction equipment valued at more than $70,000 had been taken from McAlister & Sons.  The Guthrie County Sheriff’s Office then worked with the Cerro Gordo County Sheriff’s office in the tracking of Hambly.

The investigation and tracking of Hambly eventually led the two law enforcement agencies to Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota, where Hambly and his girlfriend were selling the stolen bushings at a local scrap yard.

The Guthrie County Sheriff’s Office says Hambly has been arrested on multiple felony charges from several different agencies for recently committed crimes.

Hambly’s First-Degree Theft guilty plea in Guthrie County carries a 10 year prison sentence, consecutive to sentences received from Hardin County, Cerro Gordo County, Franklin County, Adair County, Butler County, Grundy County and Jasper County.  He also has charges pending in Van Buren County.

Guthrie County Sheriff Gives Monthly Update to Board of Supervisors

The Guthrie County Board of Supervisors met Thursday morning for the second time this week.  The Supervisors received a monthly update from Sheriff Marty Arganbright.

Arganbright says his department is going through a tough time right now following the loss of veteran dispatcher Darci Sloss.  He says Sloss “did a lot for (his) department” and really “cannot be replaced.”

Arbanbright says he’s thankful for all the support from everyone in the Guthrie County community since Sloss’ passing, and the gestures received “have meant a lot.”  The entire department will be wearing black stripes across their badges to honor Sloss in the weeks ahead.

Later on in his update, Arganbright says his department’s generator was hit by lightning in a morning storm yesterday, though this time around, their new uninterrupted backup battery did immediately activate in order to keep communication lines open.

Arganbright, however, says it is time for his department and the county to pursue a new generator.  It has to be manually restarted whenever it is hit in a storm.

Next, today’s BACooN Ride was discussed.  Arganbright says his entire department will be out at times to help bicycle riders make their way through Guthrie County safely.  The Guthrie County Sheriff’s Office will be assisting the Panora Police Department in monitoring the ride on the Raccoon River Valley Trail.

To end his update, Arganbright went through the final report his office recently received from the state jail inspector.  While there are a couple of things within the jail that need to be corrected, the Guthrie County jail was complimented for being “very clean, well managed and well maintained.”

Iowa DNR Will Be Patrolling Lake Panorama Over 4th of July

While the Lake Panorama Association Lake Patrol will be out monitoring boater activity next weekend for the 4th of July, so too will the Iowa DNR.

The DNR’s Kevin Baskins shares with us and lake boaters what it is DNR officials will have an eye on during the busy holiday.

“Certainly we are looking for safety equipment, making sure they have all the required equipment onboard (the boat)–life jackets, a working fire extinguisher.  Our officers are also out there to watch… one of the most common complaints and dangerous scenarios that we often see is people getting too close to one another, not maintaining the proper distances from other vessels.”

Baskins says boating while intoxicated is another offense the DNR will obviously be looking for next weekend, but he stresses that the DNR is not on the lake to play “bad guy.”  Baskins says their main focus is to keep everybody safe, and that includes by watching the weather.

“The weather conditions can change very rapidly in Iowa and I think we’ve seen a lot of this just in recent weeks, so we’re also out there to be able to work with vessel operators to let them know that there may be some bad weather coming and that it may be time to make it into shore.”

Additional boating safety rules and regulations from the Iowa DNR can be found by CLICKING HERE.

DNR Conservation Officer Jeremy King has officially confirmed to Raccoon Valley Radio that he will be out at Lake Panorama patrolling next weekend.

Latest Main Street Iowa Visit to Guthrie Center Focuses on Volunteer Development

Officials from Main Street Iowa were back in Guthrie Center this week, this time visiting with Main Street Guthrie Center’s Organizing Committee.

New Main Street Guthrie Center Director Julie Bailey was at the successful session with Main Street Iowa Specialist Debi Flanders, and she tells us how the meeting went and where the Organization Committee goes from here.

“We decided to focus (the meeting) on volunteer recruitment and orientation and recognition of our volunteers.  The Organization Committee for Main Street Guthrie Center had already been working on that–they have developed a brochure and a form so that people can actually sign up to become a volunteer.  We’ll then build a database of those names and the skills that they have so that they can then be called upon when any of our four committees are looking for volunteers.”

Bailey says the main role of the organizing committee will be establishing the right “processes” that Main Street Guthrie Center will follow in the weeks and years ahead.

“It’s fundraising, volunteer development and it’s things that will form a good foundation for Main Street Guthrie Center–that’s what the organization committee is focused on that.  Right now because we’re so young as an organization, that committee is key to our continued success.”

Main Street Iowa will next pay a visit to Guthrie Center on July 8th.

Nelson Excited for Today’s Relay for Life of Guthrie County

Relay for Life of Guthrie County teams convened Monday night to hand in their donations and finalize plans for this Saturday’s big event at the Guthrie Center High School track.

Gigi Nelson, one of this year’s team captains, says her excitement for today’s 12-hour event has now gone through the roof, and she hopes area residents are growing excited too.

“We’ve worked all year on this–it’s not just something that we do during the month of June.  This is an event for the American Cancer Society, and we are so proud of what all the American Cancer Society does for those of us who are survivors and our caregivers too.”

Nelson herself is a breast cancer survivor of six and a half years, and her deep involvement in Relay for Life is attributed to the fact she simply wants to give back to an organization that saved her life.

“What I’m so proud of about Relay for Life and the American Cancer Society is that we put so much of our money into research.  We have 46 scientists who have gone on to win Nobel Prizes in the research they’ve gone for cancer.  Two of the drugs that they discovered in that research saved my life–they were the two drugs I had to have in order to beat cancer.”

And from the sounds of their fundraising efforts for this year’s event, Relay for Life of Guthrie County has helped the American Cancer Society take yet another step toward beating cancer.  Nelson says she anticipates the final fundraising total to be announced today to be well over $60,000 for the second straight year.

Deep Frost the Official Cause of Problems at West Central Valley Athletic Complex

It had been the assumption for many months, but now it has officially been determined that excessive frost depth is what caused the heaving issues at West Central Valley’s new track this winter.

According to a statement from Superintendent Dr. David Arnold, the district’s school board, along with site contractors, architects and Geo-tech experts have come to such a consensus after reviewing the heaps of data collected at the complex in recent months.

Arnold says it was harder to determine the direct cause of the heaving and divoting on the football field because frost and frozen water was already gone at the time of initial inspection.  Ultimately, contractors believe the field’s problems resulted from its drain lines being frozen shut, causing water to flow throughout the surface materials rather than funneling out the drain lines as designed.

In his statement, Arnold says Hellas Corporation, the group that constructed the new turf field, “was instrumental in getting the field back into working condition at no cost to the district.”  The field and the track both now meet state guidelines for use by district athletes.

After consulting with their attorney last week, the School Board has decided to to wait and see how the track and field are impacted by a “normal” Iowa winter in 2014-15 before taking any legal action against complex contractors.  Arnold says the district has taken the necessary steps “to ensure that (the complex’s) recall and warranty rights are protected.”

Dr. Arnold and the West Central Valley School Board anticipate having a full fall football schedule at the complex in just a couple of months.