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Haymow Hoop Dreams

From the Publisher

March Madness brought another round of memorable moments in 2026. I can truly say this is my favorite time of the entire year. I grew up with a love of basketball that began in the early 1970’s on our small hobby farm, located 30 minutes south of the state capital in Madison. Our large gambrel style barn was a working barn that housed sheep, black angus cattle, chickens, a couple of mutts, several cats, and dozens of bats that would emerge from the rafters at dusk. It also had mice, one of which ran up my pants leg when I was throwing bales of hay down the chute. The barn was large ...

Steady Leadership, Standing Apart

Local Columns

School districts all over Iowa are having a tough time right now. Enrollment is dropping, costs keep going up, and state funding isn’t keeping pace. A lot of communities have had to make painful cuts — slashing programs, letting good teachers go, and scaling back the very things families count on most. Fort Dodge faces those same pressures. We’ve seen enrollment decline just like everybody else, and that hits our funding directly. But here’s the difference: we didn’t wait for a crisis to start planning. We’ve been making careful, steady adjustments for years so we wouldn’t ...

Hearing was missed opportunity to weigh in on FD property taxes

Editorial

It seems like a segment of the Fort Dodge population has surrendered its right to complain about any potential increase in the city property tax rate that may be coming. As it stands right now, the city’s property tax rate for the 2026-2027 fiscal year is set to go up by 14 cents per $1,000 of taxable value. That would boost the tax rate from $20.75 per $1,000 of taxable value to $20.89 per $1,000 of taxable value. And that higher rate would be levied against any increased value that a piece of property might have. Property owners throughout the city had a golden opportunity on ...

Momentum with intention

Local Columns

There are years when a community stays busy, and there are years that define its trajectory. For Webster County and the Fort Dodge region, 2025 was a defining year. At our annual awards dinner, as we gathered leaders, employers, public officials, educators, health care professionals, developers and investors in one room, the energy was unmistakable. The highlight video we shared told part of the story: projects advancing, ground being broken, capital invested, housing rising, and employers doubling down on their commitment to this region. But the real story goes deeper than project ...

It’s time for spring — and farming

Editorial

It’s getting to be that time of the year. Although it is early in the season, you just may have seen someone working in the fields already. You may have seen a tractor rolling down a rural road. If you are a farmer, perhaps you have been looking over the fields and getting the machinery ready. All that activity means one thing — the time to start planting is drawing near. Yes, there may be a late season snow storm, but spring is coming and with it comes the annual planting. Spring is the time when the pace quickens on the state’s roughly 90,000 farms. According to the ...

Help celebrate National Ag Day

Editorial

As another growing season approaches, the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship is encouraging Iowans to join in the recognition of Tuesday as National Ag Day. One goal of National Ag Day is to recognize the contribution agriculture makes in the lives of all of us. The American Council on Agriculture sponsors and encourages programs during National Ag Week that help Americans: • Understand how food and fiber products are produced. • Appreciate the role ag plays in providing safe, abundant and affordable products. • Value the essential role of agriculture in ...