Amie Rivers

Gov. Kim Reynolds wants to reduce the number of state agencies and cut staff, but those who know and use the programs worry Iowans will suffer. Reynolds proposed a bill in the Iowa Legislature to slash Iowa’s 37 cabinet-level positions to just 16—a 56% decrease— saying it “will elevate the state’s services and programs to…

The vast majority of speakers at an Iowa House subcommittee hearing were against several sections of a new bill that would drastically restrict and burden low-income Iowans using food assistance and Medicaid. A provision to prevent the purchase of fresh meat had already whipped up a national firestorm of controversy. “There’s a number of harmful…

After more than eight months on strike, Burlington CNHi workers will be heading back to work with a new contract. United Auto Workers (UAW) members who work at the CNHi plant in Burlington, as well as another 600-some who work at one in Racine, Wisconsin, jointly ratified their contract with CNHi on Saturday, ending a…

Through days topping 90 degrees with no shade and days at 11 degrees below zero coupled with dangerous wind chills, unionized workers in Cedar Rapids held the line for nearly six months despite the pressures of being out of work. On Sunday, after 175 days on the picket line, it all paid off. Eighty-eight workers…

Workers who have been on strike since last summer at an ingredient and starch manufacturer in Cedar Rapids will be voting on a potential contract this weekend. The contract’s details were slowly hammered out since around 116 workers at Ingredion—organized with the Bakers, Confectionary, Tobacco and Grain Millers (BCTGM) Local 100-G union—began striking Aug. 1,…

Iowa Senate Democrats filed a bill decriminalizing personal amounts of marijuana and allowing cities to OK retail shops selling it, even though majority Republicans are unlikely to pass this one to the left. As national Democrats slowly try to grind away at the prohibition of cannabis nationwide, with bills like the MORE Act in 2020…

Faculty at the University of Northern Iowa (UNI) say their pay hasn’t kept up with inflation for years, and are asking the Iowa Board of Regents for nearly 10% raises to make up for it. United Faculty UNI, which represents around 500 professors, associate professors, assistant professors, and adjunct professors at the Regents university in…

Gov. Kim Reynolds says her 2017 law gutting collective bargaining for many state and local workers was “badly needed” and “Iowans are better for it.” But advocates for those workers say the opposite has been true in the past six years, with fewer employees handling even more work than before and paltry annual raises of…

An Iowa City company started during the pandemic as the “last mile” delivery service for Amazon will close next month. GRIT Delivers LLC, which delivered Amazon packages in Amazon-branded delivery vehicles to the Cedar Rapids/Iowa City area, notified the state it would close on Feb. 5 and lay off 62 workers. The company’s website had…

A manufacturing plant and major employer in northeast Iowa will close next month, leaving 45 workers out of a job. Commercial Vehicle Group (CVG), an Ohio-based international company that supplies components for the commercial vehicle market, announced in October it would shutter its Monona plant. Its final day is Feb. 3, according to Iowa’s Worker…