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Editorial

PICA has major positive impact on Fort Dodge

The impact of a group of volunteers known as Pride In Community Appearance can be seen throughout Fort Dodge. Usually called PICA, the group makes the town look beautiful by taking care of flower beds and landscaping on public property. PICA members tend to flower beds in parks and around the welcome signs at the gateways to the community. They give the landscaping at Harlan and Hazel Rogers Sports Complex a thorough grooming before the girls state softball tournament every summer. In perhaps the group’s biggest project, its members turned a stub of street off Martin Luther King ...

Today is Earth Day

The late 1960s were turbulent years in America. It was a time of rapid change when young protesters expressed disillusionment with many aspects of the world their elders had built. The divisions in society that emerged from those conflicts decades ago still haunt our society in the 21st century. Some of the emotional scars from those bitter disputes will influence American politics well into the future. There is, however, one legacy of those chaotic times that unites rather than divides us — Earth Day. The first Earth Day was April 22, 1970. Today marks 53 years of Earth ...

Officials’ DC trip is worthwhile

Visiting Washington, D.C. is always a fascinating experience. The Capitol, the White House, the Supreme Court building, the towering Washington Monument and even the cherry trees surrounding the Tidal Basin make the city a unique place. And within that place, history is made every day and has been since the original portion of the Capitol opened in about 1800. What happens in Washington affects Fort Dodge and Webster County. That’s why a group of local government leaders is in Washington right now. They traveled to the nation’s capital on Monday. They spent Tuesday meeting with ...

Is your family eligible?

For those area families who have a long, proud history of farming the land, it is not too early to think about the 2023 Century Farm and Heritage Farm awards. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig is encouraging eligible farm owners to apply for the 2023 Century and Heritage Farm Program. The program is sponsored by the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship and the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation and recognizes families that have owned their farm for 100 years in the case of Century Farms and 150 years for Heritage Farms. It has been more than 187 years since land that is ...

Keep Iowa’s roads safe during planting

This is one of those times of the year when big, slow-moving farm vehicles rumble out onto roadways dominated by faster-paced traffic. That shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who lives in farm country. Even so, all of us should pay special heed to safety considerations as we share the roads with agricultural vehicles heading to the fields. Iowa has been doing a good job of keeping accidents involving farm vehicles to a minimum. According to data from the Iowa Department of Transportation, fatalities and major injuries resulting from such accidents have been on the decline in recent ...

River’s Edge Discovery Center deserves wide support

Future visitors to the nature center being built along the Des Moines River in downtown Fort Dodge will be immersed in the water of Iowa. Not literally, of course. No one will be getting soaking wet. But they will be immersed in detailed, colorful displays full of information about lakes and rivers. The place will be called the River’s Edge Discovery Center. It will be owned and operated by Webster County Conservation. Construction of the center is starting to make visible progress. The crews from Jensen Builders Ltd., of Fort Dodge, have the foundation walls well underway and ...