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Fiscal responsibility?

Letters to the Editor

To the editor: How is your water bill? As we care for our families and manage our households, we are expected to be financially responsible. We are expected to live within our means and pay our bills on time. We are expected to prioritize our money to meet our needs and our desires. If we fail to prioritize appropriately, we fall into debt. If we fall into debt, there are consequences. We expect the same from our City Council in managing city finances. The City Council is expected to prioritize the needs and wants of the city. I believe the City Council has stumbled with prudent ...

Thank you, Gov. Reynolds, for listening to rural Iowa

Letters to the Editor

To the editor: Sometimes, leadership means slowing down and taking a hard look at the facts. That’s exactly what Gov. Kim Reynolds did when she vetoed HF 639 — and I want to thank her for it. As someone who works every day alongside farmers and ethanol producers, I see what’s at stake. Prices are low. Margins are tight. And our industry is under pressure to adapt or fall behind. At CornLP, we’ve partnered with projects that help us stay competitive and open up new markets. These aren’t theoretical decisions — they’re about survival and long-term success. In Cerro Gordo ...

Q&A: Senate legislates One Big Beautiful Bill

Local Columns

Q: How will the Senate version of the One Big Beautiful Bill impact Iowans? A: Based on my county meetings, emails and phone calls, Iowans are paying close attention to the One Big Beautiful Bill moving through Congress. After passing the House of Representatives, the committees of jurisdiction in the Senate are now hammering out policy details on agriculture, taxes, immigration, health care and more. The bill is advancing in the Senate under the expedited reconciliation process that doesn’t require a 60-vote threshold and can’t include non-budgetary matters in the bill. As a ...

Doesn’t like 15th Street proposal

Letters to the Editor

To the editor: It seems to me that this project has already been decided. Like most projects in this town, without the input of the citizens. If $600,000 has already been spent you know d—n well it's going to happen. So when will we get to all deal with this detour fiasco? Have you considered the complications for state softball and all the activities at Harlan? And let's not forget that the F.D school buses are parked on the north end of 15th. But thank God we'll have lanes for bikes afterwards. Apparently the sidewalks that were redone don't work anymore. Cory Weiss Fort Dodge

Commends organizers

Letters to the Editor

To the editor: I want to commend the people who organized the No Kings rally in Fort Dodge on June 14. Participants were peacefully exercising their First Amendment right to free speech. Unlike the mischaracterization given by The Messenger’s coverage of the first protest in May, the only “angry” people I experienced on June 14 were mostly young, white males in trucks or muscle cars who kept trolling the intersection and hollering out of their windows at protestors. There was also the white, middle-aged couple in the white, Subaru Legacy who yelled obscenities as the woman showed ...

Juneteenth celebrates end of slavery

Editorial

Juneteenth is a national holiday commemorating June 19, 1865, which is the day that Union troops entered Galveston, Texas, and declared that all the slaves in that state were at last free. That date is often considered the final end of slavery in the United States, although it took a constitutional amendment ratified later that year to truly eliminate it. Clearly, Black Americans have the most emotional connection to Juneteenth, but people of every race are invited to join in celebrating a day which helped to create a modern United States in which no one thinks twice about things like ...