Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
A recently introduced bill could have far-reaching impact on the U.S. sugar industry, including American Crystal Sugar, a farmer-owned cooperative that locked out 1,300 Midwest workers on Aug. 1.
The chairman for Herman Cain’s Iowa effort says the campaign “relied more on the word of farmers than Washington regulators” in deciding to run an ad containing claims the Environmental Protection Agency says are false.
The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
Davenport-based Lee Enterprises Inc., publisher of the Quad City Times, Mason City Globe Gazette, Sioux City Journal and 45 other daily newspapers around the country, announced Tuesday that its earnings were 21 cents per share for its first fiscal quarter ended Dec. 28, 2008, compared with 48 cents a year ago.
Net income after paying preferred dividends slid to $6.8 million, or 15 cents per share, from $22.1 million, or 48 cents per share, in the prior-year period.
Chairman and Chief Executive Mary Junck said in a statement that the company is cutting costs, eliminating more than 10 percent of its work force during the quarter, with additional cuts recently announced. Lee Enterprises also has outsourced or combined printing operations at several sites and outsourced some of its distribution efforts.
Lee announced last week that it received an extension on $306 million in debt related to its subsidiary St. Louis Post-Dispatch LLC until Jan. 30. The waiver was set to expire last Friday, and without the extension Lee would have faced a technical default of several provisions under its debt agreements.
Junck said the company expects these moves, along with narrower page widths for its papers and the termination of some specialty publications, will lower cash costs by 10 percent to 11 percent this year.
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