Amie Rivers

Amie Rivers is Iowa Starting Line’s newsletter editor. She writes the weekly Worker’s Almanac edition of Iowa Starting Line, featuring a roundup of the worker news you need to know. Previously, she was an award-winning journalist at the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier; now, she very much enjoys making TikToks and memes and getting pet photos in her inbox.

Have a story tip? Reach Amie at amie@new.iowastartingline.com. For local reporting in Iowa that connects the dots, from policy to people, sign up for Amie’s newsletter.

Latest from Amie Rivers

  • Local

    He tried to scam her. He didn’t know her husband was a journalist

    A Central Iowa woman almost fell for a believable scam about missing jury duty. If you get the same phone call, here’s how to tell it’s a scam. When she went to check her voicemail, Adriana Torres Martínez freaked out. It was “in regards to some legal documentation that I would need to go over…

  • Local

    Hy-Vee will close stores in Cedar Rapids, Waterloo, Davenport, creating food deserts

    Midwest grocery chain Hy-Vee is closing three stores in low-income neighborhoods, which will have the effect of creating three new food deserts in Iowa. Hy-Vee announced this week it would be permanently closing three stores— a northeast Cedar Rapids store on First Avenue NE, a north Waterloo store on Logan Avenue, and a west Davenport…

  • Local

    Elder fraud on rise: Older Iowans lost more than $16.4 million in 2023

    A new report shows the number of Americans getting scammed is on the rise, and elder fraud is the most common. Iowa ranked 33rd in the nation for elder fraud, or the number of residents over 60 years of age reporting fraud, and 34th in the nation for the amount of money taken, according to…

  • Local

    Harsh: lowa Republicans tried to crack down on THC drinks

    Some Iowa Republicans wanted to crack down on the sale of THC drinks in the state. But the bill they passed won’t really change the drinks you can get. As the Biden administration prepares to reclassify marijuana as a drug with medicinal properties, instead of being illegal for all purposes, Iowa Republicans tried to go…

  • Local

    4 reasons why the WNBA should expand to Iowa

    The WNBA is ready to expand, and it should expand to Iowa—giving us our first professional team. The WNBA starts up this weekend, and it’s arguably getting the most attention since its founding in 1997. Everybody knows that’s largely due to Iowa Hawkeye Caitlin Clark, who broke nearly every record and won nearly every individual…

  • Local

    AEAs cutting workers in wake of Republican legislation

    Iowa legislators said a new bill cutting money for agencies that help students with disabilities wouldn’t affect services. But area education agencies (AEAs) across the state are now beginning to cut their budgets, and staff, because of it. “This is a day of grieving,” one staffer at the Green Hills AEA wrote on Facebook last…

  • Local

    Hail Mary: Iowa has two women’s tackle football teams you can see this summer

    Do you like football? Do you like women’s sports? Have we got great news for you this summer! Women’s tackle football has been around Iowa for the last two decades, and teams (and leagues) have come and gone in that time. (Diehards will remember the Iowa Crush, which played under the now-defunct Independent Women’s Football…

  • Local

    Increasingly desperate Iowans stretching food banks to capacity

    Leaders of a dozen food pantries across Iowa are sounding the alarm about a “soaring number” of Iowans seeking help at food banks, putting these already stretched organizations into a “crisis situation.” The leaders and other advocates recently issued a joint press release about “a rising number of Iowans experiencing food insecurity” in the past…

  • Local

    Read a new book from one of these 10 Iowa authors

    You probably have heard all about “The Bridges of Madison County.” Or how occasional Iowa resident Mark Twain counted Muscatine’s sunsets among the best he’d ever seen (and he was a world traveler!). Or how Kurt Vonnegut finished “Slaughterhouse-Five” at the prestigious Iowa Writer’s Workshop. But did you know the state of Iowa continues to…

  • Local

    Iowa City closing an elementary school, blames underfunding from state

    Hills Elementary School will close next school year after nearly 60 years of educating students, and members of the Iowa City School Board cite inadequate state funding as one of the reasons why. “It is the result of chronic and persistent underfunding by the state that has been going on for the past decade,” school…