From The Streets

From Chris: This was a story that flew out of Cedar Rapids and ended up in papers in Chicago, Minnesota, San Diego and… Russia, China, Japan and Norway. Maybe it was a “slower” news day but the angle of a Facebook friend giving up a kidney pulled in the attention of news managers worldwide.

CEDAR RAPIDS - How far would you go to help out a friend on Facebook?

Would you be willing to donate an organ?

A Cedar Rapids man is scheduled for a kidney transplant tomorrow morning at University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics. Instead of the usual process of getting on the donation list, the recipient’s son put out the call on Facebook — and found a donor.

Nick Etten, 24, of Cedar Rapids may be the ultimate Facebook Friend of 2009.

“I’ve always felt like - since day one - it’s the right thing to do,” said Etten, the day before he is allowing surgeons to cut a kidney out of his body.

John Burge has had polycystic kidney disease (PKD) for 16 years. Two years ago, a doctor said eating right and exercising were not enough anymore.

“My doctor said, ‘it’s time to put you on the wait list’, ” said John Burge, 50, of Cedar Rapids.

Looking for something, anything to help out, Matthew Burge put out a call on his Facebook page for a new kidney for his dad.

No luck the first time.

On September 18th, Matthew Burge put out a second post.

“I thought let’s just try again and Nick responded within the hour,” said Burge, 22, of Cedar Rapids. Nick Etten and Matthew Burge met at Kirkwood years before and stayed in touch.

“I’d never met John until I came here for the blood draws the first time,” admitted Etten.

“I heard his name a couple of times before but I had never met him,” said John Burge.

“Our job is to make sure no federal laws are broken,” said Dr. Alan Reed, head of the University of Iowa Hospital & Clinics Transplant Center.

Dr. Alan Reed says it’s illegal to buy a kidney.As far he’s concerned, there are no laws broken here. He said about 80,000 Americans are waiting on a kidney transplant.

“Clearly people get things out of this,” said Dr. Reed. “The act of donating does something for these folks.”

Thursday’s surgery will definitely do something to Nick Etten and for John Burge.

“I’m a little nervous,” said Etten.

On his Facebook page, Matthew Burge said that, on September 14th, he had ‘had enough of Facebook!’. Yet, his post, four days later and in need of a kidney donor for his father, is what led to tomorrow.

“I can’t thank him enough,” Matthew Burge said of his friend. “What he doing is beyond words. ”

This disease is genetic. John’s late father had it, and his son Matthew is also at risk. Nick Etten admitted some family members are concerned for his safety but he says he’s ready to go with tomorrow’s surgery.

Ever tried to keep the attention of a 5- or 6-year-old… All day?

“Every moment of every hour,” said Nancy Bolick, a kindergarten teacher at St. Joseph’s Elementary School in Raymond, east of Waterloo. “We’re always trying to keep them on task.”

St. Joseph’s Elementary School in Raymond is a bit unique. It serves only kindergarten, first grade and second grade students.

Teachers tell us they are worried and point to the proximity of the proposed range.

“A quarter of a mile,” said first-grade teacher Stephanie Peters, when asked about the distance of the proposed range. “That’s way too close. Bullets can travel two miles but — when we are taking care of these little kids, that’s too much of a chance.”

Black Hawk County Board of Supervisors chair Frank Magsamen said he thinks the safety issues have been addressed but admitted the noise concerns are still there and that it’s for the Black Hawk County Sheriff, Tony Thompson, to work with people in Raymond.

“I think he’s more than willing to plan on how they could utilize that facility with minimal impact,” said Magsamen. He pointed to the possibility of using the range outside of school months.

Bolick says she has been reassured about the safety and even the noise. Yet she still isn’t sold on the idea.

“As a parent and grandparent, I would not want my children to get used to that gunfire going on next door.”

Logan Trumbull has a big Thursday planned. Time for a final read-through…

“The cancer makes Dad too tired to go upstairs,” Logan said as he read through his book, “Logan’s Story.”

In October 2007, Logan was weeks from turning eight. He spent months watching his father, Ray Trumbull, get weaker with late stage gastrointestinal cancer.

Playing flag football was an escape but, when the news came, one practice was cut short.

“Mom speaks softly that Dad died peacefully,” Logan said from the book. “We all hug for a long time, especially me.”

Logan’s Story is a book about his experience: from seeing his father get sick, his death, and all the repressed feelings a seven-year-old had at the time.

Logan will read the book to his class on Thursday. Watch Logan read his book:

“When you have a 7-year-old, they don’t really know how to communicate their feelings,” said his mother, Deanna Trumbull.

But Logan has done exactly that, in words and even in his original drawings. Logan’s early sketchings are on the inside cover, both back and front.

Add in a neighbor and illustrator to take Logan’s words to a wider audience.

“This story itself was so sad but here was this adorable kid. Let’s focus on football,” said illustrator Mary Moye-Rowley.

That’s what the end product is. A story told through the eyes of a child. Years from now, when Logan is a man — he will always have these words…and thoughts… Of his dad.

“One day we will be happy again. I think football will always remind me of Dad.”

CEDAR RAPIDS - A group of volunteers dealt with a terrifying moment as they worked on demolition for a flood-damaged home in Cedar Rapids.

A detached garage collapsed just before 9 a.m. on Saturday, according to fire investigators, at 1626 8th Street N.W.

“They were knocking out walls,” said Greg Buelow of the Cedar Rapids Fire Department. “They had not touched the structural members of the garage. The foundation may have given way. The detached garage started moving to the side.”

Buelow said two people were hurt in the collapse. He described the injuries to a 60-year-old man as ‘serious’. Volunteers said the injured man was a sponsor for this particular group of eight volunteers. Buelow said the man was taken to St. Luke’s Hospital in Cedar Rapids.

The other injured man, a 24-year-old from California, was trapped under the garage until firefighters cut a hole in the roof of the garage. He did not request treatment.

One of the owners of the house did not want to speak on record but said she and her husband bought the property before the June 2008 flood with the idea of fixing it up. She said she was very grateful for the AmeriCorps volunteers.

The volunteers found themselves in Cedar Rapids but came from all over the nation, including New York City, Massachusetts, Chicago and Ohio. AmeriCorps would not allow volunteers to speak publicly about the collapse. The eight volunteers left in a van soon after fire investigators departed.

Buelow said the garage collapse can also serve as a reminder for people working on demolition projects in flood damaged areas.

“We’ve had a lot of buildings that have sat for a year and a half and a lot of those foundations can give way. We can also have problems as the ground settles and gets soft.”

Chris’s Note: Months later, I still keep in touch with Richard Twohy. Fascinating man. Also ellicited plenty of comments, good and bad, on his odyssey for 65 years. Entertaining story of an “up” and “down” life and I hope he keeps it together.

IOWA CITY - Richard Twohy has led a life where he isn’t shy of his opinions.

It’s been this way since his years as a law student in at NYU in New York City in the 1960’s or as a successful California trial attorney in the 1970’s. In Iowa City, Twohy’s name often shows up in newspapers on a variety of current legal or political subjects.

He backpacked around the globe for two years and even was on Wheel of Fortune, back when they still gave out low-end prizes instead of just cash.

Yet Twohy, 64, also lost plenty along the way because of drug use. “I’ve gotten used to a life of functional poverty because of a life of crack cocaine poisoning. It completely got in the way of everything in my life.”

Drug abuse led to Twohy moving to Iowa City 18 years ago, where he lives on a modest monthly disability check. Yet he admits he still craves the ‘action’. Not drugs but lottery tickets. “I’m an addictive personality,” Twohy said.

On August 3rd, Twohy paid $20 for a pair of Iowa Lottery Bingo Times 10 scratch-off tickets. The first one was like so many others for him, a loser. The second ticket was worth a second take.

Twohy held a lottery ticket that not only held the top prize but also had a ‘10X’ symbol, maximizing Twohy’s winnings to $250,000. He went back in to check.

“I thought the machine was just broken but it turned out it was just a winner,” said Naomi Keasler of the Kum and Go on East Burlington Street in Iowa City.

With a prize claim for $250,000 in his pocket, Twohy spent the following weeks and months sorting out his future. “I know I’m going to meet relatives I never knew I had.”

At the Iowa Lottery office in Cedar Rapids, Twohy walked out with a certified check for $175,000. 25% is taken out for federal taxes with another 5% for state taxes.

Recognizing this quick influx of cash and his self-admitted ‘attention deficit hyperactivity disorder’, Twohy says that he has been sober for 18 years and still attends Alcoholics Anonymous meetings to remember what he has been through. Instead of self destruction, Twohy is focusing on helping out his family and he also wants to help out some of the causes he believes in.

CEDAR RAPIDS - Sunday morning brings empty aisles and stocked shelves. Especially in the toy aisle.

“This afternoon, it’s going to be a different story,” said Rose Kanealy of Theisen’s in Cedar Rapids. The store is in the middle of its holiday retail season, where a good chunk of Theisen’s shifts from lawn and garden supplies into toy aisles.

When going through the flyers for Black Friday, as shopping the day after Thanksgiving is often known as, people can still see offers for $20 DVD players or deeply discounted clothing. Yet, in 2009, there seems to be less of an emphasis on Friday itself but trying to offer shoppers solid deals throughout the season.

“Most of the stores are starting earlier and I don’t think there will be that big of a rush that day after Thanksgiving,” said Kanealy. “But who knows?”

Many stores are assuming that rush of shoppers will be in place, bright and early Friday morning. Jason Thompson, assistant store manager at Target in Cedar Rapids, said the store will have information for shoppers outside on where specific items will be located. Thompson said the Target Black Friday ads will come out on Thanksgiving Day.

Kanealy is already working through the Theisen’s flyer so that she can tell shoppers the exact location for the toys. Especially when Theisen’s opens at six on Friday morning.

“We set it in our minds where the toys are,” Kanealy said. “A lot of customers will come in with their flyer and ask, ‘where is this?’ or ‘where is that?’”

As Kanealy and her colleagues will stay focused on toys, Thompson said, for 2009, flat-screen televisions could drive traffic.

“You’re going to see televisions on sale or competitively priced in the ads, weekly for us.”

Chris’s Note: For all of the attention this story accumulated, the real question now is whether the CRPD has actually written the $500 citation. Weeks after this aired, police told us this was just a warning.

CEDAR RAPIDS - The Cedar Rapids police want to tell drivers to have their insurance up to date or be ready to pay hundreds. A $500 fee will be added if police impound vehicles for operating while intoxicated, numerous criminal activities and even driving without insurance.

Todd Phillips operates ATC Pro Tow Recovery, a towing facility with the police contract on 76th Avenue SW, near the Eastern Iowa Airport. He says he is getting ready for more business. “A 30-40% increase in tows and storage impounds until people realize they need insurance,” Phillips said.

The Cedar Rapids Police Department says it will enforce a code ordinance — Section 61.137A — allowing officers to seize and impound cars and trucks in certain criminal offenses.

Offenses included with the $500 fee.
- Operating While Intoxicated
- Driving With a Suspended, Revoked or Barred License
- Hit and Run
- Attempting to Elude
- Possession of a Controlled Substance
- Possession of Drug Paraphernalia
- Carrying Weapons
- Possession of a Firearm as a Felon
- Possession of an Offensive Weapon
- Reckless Use of a Firearm
- Intimidation With a Dangerous Weapon
- Failure to Post Security Against Liability (No Insurance)

“A large percentage of our in-custody arrests are these driving violations,” Sgt. Joe Clark of the Cedar Rapids Police Department said.

With a $500 civil fee, the price tag to spring your vehicle could run much higher.

Phillips said it could be about $1,000. “They’ll end up getting the insurance, paying the city fees, our fees are going to be minimal to what they have to pay everyone else,” Phillips said. He also expects more vehicles to come through his fenced yard at Pro Tow — but also cars and trucks to stay inside the yard longer — at $10 a day for storage.

Police say they hope this $500 fee will force people to stay current on their insurance and also make sure others who may drive their vehicles are not involved in criminal activity. But is $500 - too much?

“This has been tested in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and they’ve said $500 is not excessive,” Sgt. Clark said.

In comparison with other nearby cities, Sergeant Clark said that Chicago charges a $1,000 fee in these cases. Police in Dubuque tell us they charge a $20 administrative fee for these situations. Waterloo and Iowa City do not charge on top of the violations and towing charges.

Cedar Rapids police did tell us on Wednesday that, if you have no insurance — they will waive the $500 fee for the first offense — but can still impound your car or truck.

As for all of this revenue, Sergeant Clark said any money from the civil fee will go back into the general fund to offset police expenses.

AMANA - Millions of rocks come in and out of town as people from all over the Midwest spend their weekend in Amana. Seeing plates from all over the Midwest isn’t unusual for the Amana R-V Park, just north of town, but what is unusual inside is also what’s valuable.

Hundreds of thousands — maybe millions if you have enough time to count — of rocks are coming through Amana this weekend for the Cedar Valley Rocks & Minerals Society’s Two-Day auction.

Thousands of rocks. Plenty of laughs.

Yet for some people, rocks are their business. “We have all of this inventory and we sell it on eBay,” Roxanna Peterson of Pierre, South Dakota told us. She claims 3 tons of rocks on her property.

“I’m third generation,” Bruce Birkemeyer of Mankato, Minnesota, said as to why he got into rocks.

Bob Roper of Cedar Rapids also had a reason. “I want to do stuff with my boys and that’s a good family thing,” Roper said.

People have their reasons but people also have their favorites, from Montana moss agates to Mexican agates. Tyler Zinkula, 7, of Mount Vernon shone with his simplicity. “I like that they’re shiny,” Tyler said.

Birkemeyer not only collects but also cuts and polishes and he says that can make for a real financial hole. “The equipment is costly and you work with industrial diamond equipment,” Birkemeyer said. Still, he said he cuts and polishes just for the show in Amana.

“It’s somebody’s collection they getting rid of and hasn’t seen the light of day in a long time,” Roper said. “It’s great material hunted in the 60’s and 70’s.”

Yup, I think we’re finally at that point.

As a 30+ year viewer of televised football, this has been creeping for the past decade.  When the experience of watching a football game is much better at home than sitting in the stands.

If you combine ticket prices that can range in the hundreds for some NFL and college games, the costs of food and parking, traffic issues, mouthy fans against the current economy, this may really not bode well for the NFL and for some major college programs.

Go down the numbers.  Bear with me here.  Two weeks ago, my doting 7-year-old son & I drove east to South Bend, Indiana to watch Nevada at Notre Dame in person.  We had the chance for a once-in-a-lifetime football experience (Notre Dame tickets can be very hard to secure) plus the priceless bonding time for the two of us.  No surprise, to those who know me, but we did the trip “on the cheap”.  Less than $250, including tickets, food, gas and even renting a car for the weekend.

Break down what that trip could have been:

- $300 a ticket.  We were on the 50.  That’s what prime tickets were going for in the open market.

- $40 to park

- $30 for food

- $50 for gas

- 60 cents for the I-80/I-94 tolls near the Indiana border, Illinois side.  I’m nothing if not detailed here.

That’s $720.60 for two people. 

This very week, for $720.60, you can walk into just about any store in Eastern Iowa that sells LCD televisions and leave with a 42″ screen.  Possibly a 47″.  Maybe even have enough to pay for the NFL’s Sunday Ticket or the College Football Gameplan.

Throw in rude fans, a long walk and — I hate to say it — I’m happy with a couch, two pizzas and a long, tall beverage of my choosing.  On college football Saturdays, I can still flip between 12 or 13 games instead of committing myself to one game for an entire Saturday.

My wife would probably even be pleased to know that, if I enjoy the early games — at home with my stomach full of copious caloric intake — I still have the desire to handle menial domestic tasks, like mowing or clearing leaves. 

This leaves some of these NFL and college programs in a real pickle.  With the current economy, are we at the point where some longtime fans will now pick up on the notion that it’s a better experience “at home”?  The NFL has loaded up its product with so many commercial breaks that games are, often, anti-climactic.  Even the Big Ten home games are reaching this point, with stretches of inactivity after punts.

I heard one radio talker put it best this week:  ”The NFL is a blue-collar sport with white-collar ticket prices.”   

Of course, hardly anyone wants to admit this line of thinking that home is better.  It’s always about, “we’re going to the game!”.  My son & I always cherish the pictures that we’ve taken from the games we’ve been to since moving here last April.  Two games at Kinnick last year, one at the UNIDome, our game earlier this month at Notre Dame plus a surprise LSU-Arkansas game over Thanksgiving 2008 on a family trip. 

The pictures and memories are fabulous.  I don’t put any Facebook pictures of me watching a game in my living room.

The only trouble is that, the actual experience just may now be better…at home.

In the midst of the end of Cash For Clunkers, some thoughts on my old car that I keep firing up each and every day.

Do you drive one of these?

The engine rattles a little bit or maybe a little bit more than that, you may find a french fry from 2002 under the console, the A.C. quit working sometime around when John Kerry accepted the Democratic nomination.

I’m a proud driver of a P.O.S.  My piece of…steel.

It’s a 1998 Toyota Corolla.  Midnight blue.  140,000 miles and I’m hoping to hit 200,000 before I push, pull or drag it into a car lot for another car.

The plan is, by that time, I’ll be pushing 40 and just getting all fitted for my Midlife Crisis car.  Let’s just say that it won’t be a 1998 Corolla.

The circumstances behind the arrival of the 1998 Corolla are out of riveting fiction.  A 16-year-old blows through a stop sign and totals my wife’s car.  She was more shocked than anything else but then we had to go car shopping.  Tired of the constant mechanical troubles with her three-year-old car, we zoomed over and checked out a used Corolla.

Even for a “used” car, we shelled out $13,000 for the 1998 Corolla when we signed on the dotted line in September of 1999.  That was a ton of money for us — especially when you factor in the Financial Apocolypse of Y2k.  (What?  You didn’t squirrel away money and head for a secluded cabin in the Minnesota Northwoods?)

Here is the true beauty of driving and old car with a current Kelley Blue Book Value of, drumroll please… $1,025:

- Dents?  What Dents?  We have all had the friends with the new car or SUV that is about 50% of their salary.  They wash the cars every three days, scan weather radar to check for any hail, refuse to park next to other cars at the mall and, in the words of Ferris Bueller, “spend their time rubbing it with a diaper”.  I would feel comfortable driving that Corolla in the Baja 500, the nastiest off-road race in the Western Hempishere.  Provided I got the A.C. fixed, of course.

- The Glory Years With No Payments.  We haven’t had any payments on Bad Blue in years.  With a $1,025 KKB value, I imagine that we should be about five years since the payments ended and that’s about right.  I think of people shelling out $379 or $445 - maybe even more - for their vehicle.  For many people, no car payments would equate to about $4,000 or $5,000 a year.  That’s substantial.  You could feed a kid — or even really save for college for a few years if you can even go four years without those payments. 

Of course, many people find it necessary to drive late-model cars.  If my commute was longer than three miles, I probably would take a look at something that is not more reliable — this Corolla has been fairly trouble-free — but something more, ahem, “upscale”.  Managers, realtors, sales specialists and many other professions also have a quiet, unspoken need to ‘present an element of success’.  I definitely understand that.

Yet with the constant push, even aided by the government, to trade in these “clunkers”, I kept thinking of me and my Corolla.  We’ve been through good times and desperate days — three moves, four cities and two children.  Years ago, it was still the ‘primary vehicle’, the car that we took each of our two children home from the hospital in.  That’s trust.

Now, it’s different.  We’ll put new tires on it and quietly hope that will take care of the power train deficiencies, even though we know it’s not the case.  My wife, who originally picked the Corolla, now treats the car like the old green couch that used to be in the living room and is now in the basement. 

That’s fine as well.  

Still, I hope that the experience with the Corolla also rubs off on my two children.  I’m now nine years from having to figure out a way to afford insurance for a 16-year-old.  No, I have no plans to still have the ’98 Corolla in working order when my son turns 16.  That would be a 20-year-old car.  (Side note: Classic cars are different because of generational shifts.  When I got my driver’s license on Friday, November 8, 1990, a 20-year-0ld car would be a ‘70 Chevy Nova — a true classic design, much more so than a 1998 compact.  I’d NEVER do that to my off-spring).  

Besides, now that I pass a decade with the Corolla, I am pushing for another four or five years of ratting down the roads of Cedar Rapids in it.  Then, I’ll finally be ready with the cliche of the Midlife Crisis car.  Silver, sporty but still less than the $13,000 we paid in 1999 for this car.

Yet before I sign the contract, at age 40, to drive away in the cliche, I’ll stop by the grocery store to mark the end of care-free car ownership.

I’ll make sure to pick up diapers.