VOLUNTEER TO RUN IOWA DEANCORPS

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Democracy for Iowa is looking to fill the position of DFIA DeanCorps Coordinator.  The ideal applicant would be someone who is already a participant and organizer in DeanCorps, and an active Dean supporter.  If you have no specific DeanCorps experience but have organized volunteer or community service activities in the past, please feel free to apply.

The DeanCorps Coordinator will set up community service projects with the smaller DeanCorps groups around the state, and may coordinate some projects through DFIA Meet Up in conjunction with the DFIA Meet Up Coordinator.

If you are interested in being the DeanCorps Coordinator, please send in a brief resume, a synopsis of your Dean and DeanCorps experience, any other field work/campaign experience you have, and the names and phone numbers of 4 Dean supporters in your DeanCorps group (as references).

In the Subject Line, please type DeanCorps.  Send your application to Blog for Iowa.

VOLUNTEER TO BE THE DFIA MEDIA COORDINATOR

The DFIA Media Coordinator would ideally be someone who has media/PR experience and has or could develop a working relationship with Iowa media, especially small, local newspapers.

The DFIA Media Coordinator will make sure Dean Corps activities are covered, Meet Ups are announced, and each person appointed to a position in DFIA gets a write up in her/his local paper.

If you are interested in being the Media Coordinator, please send in a resume detailing your media/PR experience, a synopsis of your Dean experience, any other field work/campaign experience you have, and the names and phone numbers of 2 Dean supporters in your town and 2 media/PR experience-related references.

In the Subject Line, please type Media Coordinator.  Send your application to Blog for Iowa.

VOLUNTEER TO BE A DFIA COUNTY COORDINATOR

Democracy for Iowa will organize by county.  Therefore, we will need to have a County Coordinator for each county.  The DFIA CC will organize locally, connect with other DFIA members, coordinate operations with our central committee, reach out to other Iowans, register voters, help us find people to run for office, keep an eye out for progressive candidates . . . in other words, it’s a huge job.

DFIA will set up training sessions around the state with 21^st Century Democrats for our County Coordinators to attend.  CCs will be required to attend a training session, and other DFIA members are welcome to attend, too.  The sessions will be scheduled for June.

If you are interested in being a County Coordinator, please send in a brief resume, a synopsis of your Dean experience, any other field work/campaign experience you have, and the names and phone numbers of 4 Dean supporters in your county (as references).

In the Subject Line, please type the name of your county.  Send your application to the County Coordinators email address (click).

Des Moines residents:  Don’t forget to check out the Candidates category.  Ruth Ann Gaines is running for Des Moines City Council.  The primary is Tuesday, April 13.  We’ve updated her contact information.

I added some great new tools to the left sidebar this morning.  I thought I’d tell you a little bit about them.

Iowa County & City Map

This clickable map really comes in handy when you’re trying to figure out just WHERE a county is located in Iowa and where the towns are inside that county.  It also has a search feature in the upper right corner - in case you get tired of the “hit and miss” method.

Iowa Congressional District Map

This is an up-to-date, color-coded map of the newest (2002) Iowa Congressional Districts.  If I didn’t know better, I’d think the Texas Legislature had drawn up this map.

Iowa Congressional Scorecard

See how Iowa’s Members of Congress rate.  This is a feature of the Iowa PIRG (Public Interest Research Group) site, and as you might expect, our beloved Senator Tom Harkin scores very high in matters of public interest, whereas our other senator scores near zero.

Locate Your Iowa Legislators

This site has a great search feature.  You just enter your address and up pop your Iowa legislators and your Members of Congress.  This site is current as of February 9, 2004.

Iowa House District Map

This is a color-coded map of the current Iowa House districts.  If you put your pointer over the map, a box will appear in the bottom right corner that you can click on to enlarge the photo.

Iowa Senate District Map

See Iowa House District map above for directions.

Deanlink

Part of the DFA Commons, you can do searches to find registered Dean supporters near you, or anywhere, for that matter.  You enter the center point zip code of your search and you enter a radius, as in number of miles from your center point, and then you search.

You can set up groups to save people you find, and then you can send out emails to the group (maximum 200 per group) or to individuals.  The recipients have to retrieve the messages at the Deanlink site.

IOWA Ranks No. 9 In Pollution Report

Iowa Channel.com - Des Moines

DES MOINES, Iowa -- The Iowa Public Interest Research Group said Iowa ranked ninth in the nation in the percentage of industries and cities violating their pollution permits during an 18-month period. 

The environmental advocacy group says that of 129 permits issued to Iowa industrial and municipal operations, 92 were violated at least once between January 1, 2002, and June 30, 2003 -- a 71 percent violation rate. (more)

Iowa City Press Citizen - Iowa City

More than 30 years after passage of the Clean Water Act, Iowa ranks ninth in the nation for contributing more than six times the allowed amount of pollutants to waterways, including the Iowa River, according to a report released Tuesday. 

"We want to call on the state and political leaders to muster up the guts it's going to take to better enforce clean water laws," said Rose Garr, Midwest field organizer for the Iowa and Illinois Public Interest Research Group. (more)

View the study here.

Rochester Agri News - Rochester, MN

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) -- The Senate on Wednesday passed an air quality bill that critics say will delay enforcement of pollution standards around livestock farms.

The House bill requires a 3-year study of hydrogen sulfide, ammonia and odor around livestock farms before emissions limits are set.

Under the bill, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources would be required to collect air samples from livestock operations around the state. The agency would use the results to develop new standards that would be subject to public hearing before being adopted.  (more)