Stock of Lee Enterprises – owner of 45 daily newspapers including the Quad City Times – fell nearly 20 percent after the company reported Thursday (8/6) that its third quarter operating income declined more than 13 percent compared to the same period a year ago.

A federal lawsuit seeking to remove endangered animals from the troubled Cricket Hollow Zoo near Manchester will proceed to trial in October after the judge denied a motion for summary judgement filed by animal welfare attorneys.

Chief Magistrate Judge Jon Stuart Scoles heard nearly an hour of oral arguments Thursday (8/6) before denying the motion and setting a pre-trail conference for Sept. 29. The bench trial is scheduled to begin Oct. 5 in U.S. District Court, Northern District, in Cedar Rapids.

Pleasant Valley and North Scott schools will share the cost and use of iWireless Center in Moline for their graduation ceremonies next year, joining Davenport schools in utilizing the much larger civic center to accommodate the crowds of family and friends at the commencements.

That leaves Bettendorf as the only school district on the Iowa side of the Quad Cities still using its gymnasium for graduation ceremonies.

The amount of partially treated sewage dumped into the Mississippi River by Davenport's Sewage Treatment Plant last month totaled more than 136 million gallons.

The so-called "bypassed" sewage received only primary – not secondary – treatment because flows to the plant on Concord Street were beyond its capacity as storm water runoff infiltrated sewer lines after heavy rains.

As the sewage flows backed up in lines to the treatment plant, Bettendorf pumped more than 29 million gallons of sewage and storm water into the river after the heavy rains in late June and early July.

Iowa gambling revenues for fiscal year 2015 increased slightly thanks to a new casino property in Sioux City, but the decade long decline in admissions and revenues continued at Bettendorf's Isle of Capri riverboat.

Revenues for the fiscal year were down 2.4 percent to $68.5 million, while admissions at the Bettendorf casino dropped more than 8 percent to 848,000 gamblers during the 12-month period.

Blackhawk Bank & Trust wants to rezone land in Bettendorf to pave the way for a new branch facility at Middle and Belmont Roads, a highly visible corner with a long history of neighborhood concerns about commercial development.

The federal inspection of Cricket Hollow Zoo in May found something troubling enough to temporarily suspend the facility's license, but exactly what prompted the closure won't be known until an appeal of the findings is complete later this month.