Bettendorf City Administrator Decker Ploehn is asking the city council if it wants to stay the course on a 10-year expansion of city debt – now $132 million and within 17 percent of the legal maximum – to continue to fund an "aggressive" program for capital improvements from streets to so-called "WOW" projects under discussion.

In his presentation to the council August 25, Ploehn said historically low bond interest rates and the need to fix and expand streets in the city justify the high debt strategy adopted five years ago by the council. He also pointed out that additional significant bonding may be required for the possible WOW projects, which were listed as: development of I-80/Middle interchange; sports complex; replacement of city pool, fitness center and community center with a new recreation facility; and a potential riverfront development project.

Davenport's wastewater treatment plant dumped 317 million gallons of partially treated sewage into the Mississippi River in late June and early July after heavy rains and river flooding overwhelmed the treatment capacity of the plant along Concord Street.

Flood water and storm water runoff infiltrated sewer lines after the heavy rains and the plant began "bypassing" secondary treatment of the sewage, dumping an average of 10 million gallons of sewage per day into the river after only primary treatment of the wastewater. Primary treatment only involves removal of solids from the wastewater, essentially bypassing the normal secondary biological treatment of the waste.

The sewage "bypassed" by the Davenport plant was in addition to the 129 million gallons of sewage Bettendorf pumped into the river during the same period.

Despite a $2.3-million loss for its first quarter ended July 27, Isle of Capri Casinos, Inc. stock gained nearly 5 percent this week to close Friday (8/29) at $8.27 per share.

Stock in the St. Louis-based gambling firm – owner of the Bettendorf casino riverboat – had climbed to more than $10 per share in July after rumors surfaced about a possible buy-out of the company by a real estate investment trust. The stock price had since fallen to nearly $7 a share earlier this month before the recent run-up.

The first quarter loss of $2.3 million, or $6 cents a share, compares to a loss of $4.9 million, 12 cents per share, for the first quarter last year.

Net revenues totaled $241 million for the first quarter, compared to $238 million for the same period a year ago.

The University of Iowa Athletic Department has hired a marketing firm to find out why it can't fill each of Kinnick Stadium's 70,000 seats and attract more students to every home Hawkeye football game.

As the parent of a marching band member, I'm in a unique position to give an unbiased assessment to the university. I like football and the Hawkeyes, but I would not have attended any of the home games last year if not to watch the halftime show.

These are in no special order, so feel free to pick and choose my "solutions" to the falling number of fans, particularly students, at Hawkeye games.

• The games are slower than baseball. Television time-outs take any air of momentum out of the game and fans have way too much time to ponder why they are sitting in cramped hard seats in extremely hot or cold weather while football players stand around waiting to get the signal to play from a guy in a red hat who seems to control the entire contest. Seriously, last year in 90 degree weather, the first half took more than two hours. Last time I checked, a half in a football game was only 30 minutes long.

• Fans must be required to sit down, and stay seated, unless they are jumping to their feet to watch an exciting play. Why pay $50 for a seat, and then be required to stand the entire game to actually see the players on the field. I watched most of the game on the jumbotron replay because other fans were blocking my view. I contend most of the standing by fans is not related to excitement on the field, but seats the width of a small plate. . . on which most fans can no longer fit their derrière.

Lee Enterprises reported a loss of $9.7 million for the third quarter ended June 29, after paying $19.7 million in interest expense and $21.7 million in debt financing costs in the period. The Davenport-based company – publisher of the Quad City Times and Muscatine Journal – lost 19 cents per share in the third quarter, compared with a 3 cent per share profit for the same period a year ago. Despite the loss, company officials were upbeat in their remarks to stock analysts about the growth of digital advertising revenue, mobile advertising and the launch of its "full-access" subscription initiative which seeks to convert print subscribers into paying online subscription customers.

Iowa air quality monitors have recorded 42 exceedances of ambient air quality standards from sulfur dioxide pollution and 13 from fine particulate matter (PM 2.5) pollution during the first seven months of this year. During all of 2013, a total of 67 exceedances of National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) were recorded involving sulfur dioxide along with 15 involving PM 2.5 (particulate matter of less than 2.5 microns) pollution. As with last year's air monitoring, the majority of the NAAQS exceedances occurred in Muscatine.

Bettendorf aldermen are expected to set a special election September 23 to fill the vacant Bettendorf Park Board seat – created by the election of Frank Baden to the city council July 1.

The city consulted with the Scott County Auditor last month and were told all voting in the special election could be held in one polling location, rather than in each ward, to reduce the cost of an election. The special park board election would be the second special election this year in the city.

The City of Bettendorf had to flush nearly 129 million gallons of sewage into the Mississippi River last month to prevent the Waste Water Treatment Plant in west Davenport from being overwhelmed by sewage, combined with a large volume of storm water that had seeped into Davenport and Bettendorf sewer lines.

The "Sanitary Sewer Overflow Events" began June 30, with eight large pumps transferring sewage from the backed-up sanitary sewer lines into storm water pipes, which flow into the Mississippi River. The pumps ran from June 30 until July 13, according to the report filed by the city with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (IDNR).

Cities must contact the IDNR when it begins "bypassing" sewage treatment by pumping into the river, and it must report the total amount bypassed once the pumping ends. The city filed its report with the state July 15.

Wendell Berry, America’s farmer/poet and advocate for peace and justice, met with Centre College Professor Eric Mount at the Crescent Hill Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky May 18 with over 200 people in attendance.

Berry and Mount engaged in a rambling conversation in which Berry explained that when we abstract important concepts that are critical to the real lives of people, we loose their interest in solving real problems that the world faces.

An example of such abstractions is the idea of environmentalism.

People understand their relationship with the air they breathe and the water they drink and the weather events that are destructive.

“Environmentalism” is an abstract concept, something that academics discuss and argue over, but real people want clean air to breathe, clean water to drink, and weather patterns that one can plan for and live with.

As the conversation progressed, Berry read a prayer from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer entitled, “For Every Man In His Work.” The prayer, in part, reads as follows: “Deliver us, we beseech thee, in our several callings, from the service of mammon, that we may do the work which thou givest us to do, in truth, in beauty, and in righteousness, with singleness of heart as thy servants, and to the benefit of our fellow men.”

The steady decade-long decline in admissions and revenue at Bettendorf's Isle of Capri casino continued during fiscal 2014.

Admissions for the 12 months ended June 30 fell to 923,000 – more than 1 million fewer than the casino's peak year in fiscal 2000.

Revenues declined to $70.4 million during fiscal 2014, down nearly 6 percent from the previous fiscal year. At its peak in 2004, the Isle had revenues of more than $105 million.