Jonathan Narcisse (photo courtesy of NarcisseForIowa.com)

The “Narcisse for Iowa” committee declares its purpose as “to explore an opportunity to run for governor and run the subsequent campaign for governor in 2010.” Marketing consultant Darren Douglas of Madrid is named as the committee’s treasurer.

Narcisse has hinted at his desire to run for governor for months but has refused to say definitively if he would challenge incumbent Gov. Chet Culver in the Democratic primary or run as an independent in November.

A registered Democrat who campaigned for Culver in 2006, Narcisse served one contentious term on the board of the Des Moines School District. He owns and publishes several publications, including the Iowa Bystander.

In the appeal, Dr. Alan Evans argued that there was insufficient evidence that he knew or should have known that he had human papillomavirus (HPV) or bacterial vaginitis, and that due to his lack of knowledge he had no duty to warn his sexual partner, Karly Rossiter. Evans also held that there was insufficient evidence to prove that he was the source of Rossiter’s dysplasia (abnormal cervical cells). Finally, he questioned his right to a new trial after the jury had determined that Rossiter’s claims of battery, assault and fraudulent misrepresentation were unfounded and still awarded $800,000 in punitive damages.

The court relied on an earlier Madison County negligence case that was heard before the Iowa Supreme Court, Thompson v. Kaczinski, to state that “an actionable claim of negligence requires the existence of a duty to conform to a standard of conduct to protect others.”

“We do not read Evans brief to suggest there is no duty to exercise reasonable care not to transmit a communicable disease. Such a duty is clearly found in Iowa law,” wrote Judge Amanda Potterfield in the decision.

Whether or not Evans actually knew he carried HPV and genital warts was irrelevant, according to the originating trial court, which concluded that he should have known.

“We agree,” wrote Potterfield. “From the evidence presented at trial, viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict, a rational juror could find Evans represented to Rossiter that he was disease-free and monogamous. … We conclude substantial evidence supports the jury’s findings.”

The court also ruled that because counsel for Evans did not object to jury instructions or provide specific grounds for objection his claims that the punitive damages awarded by the jury stand.

In determining reprehensibility, the court considers a number of factors including whether the harm caused was physical as opposed to economic, the tortious conduct evinced an indifference to or a reckless disregard of the health or safety of others, the conduct involved repeated actions or was an isolated incident, and the harm was the result of intentional malice, trickery, or deceit, or mere accident. Id. On our de novo review of the record, we find all of these factors were established in the evidence. The harm caused was not only physical, it concerns the most intimate and private interests, including sexuality and childbearing. Evans‟s conduct demonstrated a reckless disregard for Rossiter‟s health and safety. Evans is a dentist. He has received medical training and should be aware of the risks associated with communicable diseases. Yet, Evans engaged in numerous sexual acts with Rossiter, repeatedly exposing her to genital warts, HPV, and bacterial vaginitis. The harm was not a result of mere accident. … [T]he amount of the punitive damages reflects the jurors’ determination that conduct like Evans’s should be deterred in an amount greater than the actual damages caused.

Evans and Rossiter began a sexual relationship shortly after her first appointment at his dental office. The two discussed sexually transmitted diseases prior to becoming intimate, according to court records, and Evans claimed to be “clean.” Rossiter testified that after their first encounter, Evans phoned and suggested she should get tested for HPV. Upon testing, she was diagnosed with the virus, and was later diagnosed with dysplasia for which she underwent a surgical procedure. Rossiter also testified that Evans had bumps on his genitalia that was consistent with genital warts, a condition for which she was later diagnosed and treated along with bacterial vaginitis.

Dr. Gregory Brotzman, who was called as an expert witness on behalf of Rossiter, acknowledged during his testimony that there is no federally approved test to determine if a male carries HPV. He also stated, however, that “the most common way for someone to know they have HPV is if they have genital warts,” and indicated that it was more likely than not that Evans had transmitted potentially cancer-causing HPV and genital warts to Rossiter.

Evans has denied ever having genital warts, HPV or bacterial vaginitis, and denied being exposed to them. He did admit during trial, however, that at the time he began a relationship with Rossiter that he was also seeing two other women, one of whom eventually birthed his child. His expert witness, Dr. Kenneth Nayor, testified that unless one of the partners (Evans or Rossiter) was a virgin, that it was impossible to say whether or not one had infected the other. He indicated that it was “very unlikely that Evans transmitted an HPV infection” to Rossiter.

The jury ultimately awarded Rossiter $700,000 for damages — $50,000 for past physical pain and suffering, $150,000 for past mental pain and suffering and $500,000 for future mental pain and suffering. They also awarded Rossiter $800,000 in punitive damages.

Counsel for Evans has not yet indicated if they will seek further appeal of the case.

Jonathan Narcisse

Narcisse’s gubernatorial aspirations first popped up last month. During an interview with Dave Price of Des Moines NBC affiliate WHO-TV, Narcisse attacked both Democratic Gov. Chet Culver and many of his Republican rivals. However, he made it clear that while he was considering a run he had no intentions of making his plans public.

Many dismissed Narcisse’s words as simply trying to build interest in a series of debates around the state that he was getting ready to embark on with former House Speaker and Republican gubernatorial candidate Chris Rants. But according to The Register’s Staci Hupp, Narcisse will announce next week that he will jump in the campaign.

“I honestly believe I have a legitimate shot at getting elected,” Narcisse said.

“I’m probably going to run, depending upon the feasibility of this, which will be determined by whether we can raise the money and put together a viable organization.”

A registered Democrat who campaigned for Culver in 2006, Narcisse served one contentious term on the board of the Des Moines School District. He owns and publishes several publications, including the Iowa Bystander.

As tough as the upper-chamber debate promises to be, many of the thorniest conflicts will likely be re-contested when Democratic leaders in both chambers meet, probably in January, to iron out the differences between their bills. The legislative disparities revolve around such high-profile topics as the public option and coverage of abortion, but also include lesser-noticed issues, like whether to honor a White House deal with the pharmaceutical industry and how to approach the Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Senate Republicans are also eyeing many of these hot-button issues, with hopes of using them to divide the Democrats in order to kill the larger bill. But with the considerable House-versus-Senate discrepancies awaiting conference negotiators, fending off opposition from Senate Republicans in the meantime could prove to be the least of the Democrats’ troubles as they attempt to pass the most consequential health-care reforms in generations.

Who Pays?

Chief among the differences between the Democrats’ bills is how each chamber has proposed to pay the considerable cost of covering tens-of-millions of uninsured Americans. The House pays the freight largely with a 5.4 percent tax on the nation’s highest earners — individuals making more than $500,000 per year, and families pulling in more than $1 million.

The Senate, on the other hand, has proposed an excise tax on the highest-cost insurance plans — those exceeding $8,500 for individual coverage and $23,000 for families. The Senate bill would also apply a 0.5 percent Medicare payroll tax to individuals earning more than $200,000 and families earning more than $250,000.

Liberals and labor unions have supported the House approach, arguing that an unprecedented tax on insurance plans would erode decades of work to secure comprehensive, employer-sponsored health-care coverage for workers. Conservatives, meanwhile, are warning that higher taxes on the wealthy will only exacerbate the nation’s economic troubles in the middle of an employment crisis.

Coverage vs. Care

Both the House and Senate bills rely heavily on a Medicaid expansion to cover the country’s poorest uninsured residents. The House would extend eligibility to 150 percent of the federal poverty level (net income), while Senate eligibility would expand to 133 percent of poverty (gross income).

The more significant difference, though, revolves around Medicaid reimbursement, which is so low in some states that many doctors and dentists now refuse to see Medicaid patients. The House bill recognizes the problem, bumping up Medicaid payments for primary care services to 100 percent of Medicare rates by 2012. Despite an effort to get similar language into the Senate legislation, a controversial funding proposal kept the provision out of the final bill.

The reimbursement increase doesn’t come cheap. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the provision would cost $28.7 billion over the next five years and $57 billion over the next 10.

Abortion

Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) lit a firestorm earlier in the month when he amended the House bill to prohibit abortion coverage under subsidized exchange plans. The Senate bill would also ban federal funding of abortions, but would allow women receiving exchange-plan subsidies to segregate their premiums and co-payments in order to access abortion services. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) has already said that he’ll offer the Stupak provision on the floor, though supporters will have the difficult task of rallying 60 votes to pass the measure.

Indeed, the Stupak provision is poised to cause more havoc in the House than the Senate, with some House liberals vowing to oppose the larger bill if the language survives the conference negotiations, while Stupak and other anti-abortion Democrats are hinging their support on the provision remaining intact. Satisfying both camps for the sake of the bill’s passage will likely require some delicate wording from Democratic leaders.

Illegal Immigrants

Both chambers propose to screen exchange-plan applicants to ensure that illegal immigrants don’t receive the federal subsidies available to those living below 400 percent of poverty. The Senate bill, however, goes a giant step further, proposing to exclude illegals from purchasing even unsubsidized insurance coverage on the exchange. That provision has riled a number of lawmakers and immigration advocates, who are wondering how allowing folks to buy insurance coverage from private companies with U.S. dollars could harm the country, fiscally or otherwise.

“It makes no sense for anybody,” said Jonathan Blazer, public policy attorney with the National Immigration Law Center. “Nobody’s willing to defend it on policy grounds.”

If the Senate language emerges from the conference negotiations, it will likely lead to a showdown with House members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, who early in the debate had threatened to vote against the House bill if it excluded illegal aliens from unsubsidized exchange coverage.

CHIP

Though largely unmentioned throughout the health reform debate, the House bill would terminate the Children’s Health Insurance Program at the end of 2013, shifting those kids into Medicaid or private plans on the exchange. House leaders — who had championed CHIP for the past 12 years — say their proposal will expand coverage by getting kids and parents under the same plan.

But some children’s health-care advocates have raised alarms over that strategy, arguing that the private plans will likely be more expensive, thereby discouraging low-income parents from getting their kids any coverage at all. And Sen. Jay Rockefeller agrees. The West Virginia Democrat — who successfully amended the Senate bill to reauthorize CHIP through 2019 — is vowing to fight to keep the program intact.

“Health care reform should improve the coverage children have,” he said, “not take their coverage away.”

Rockefeller, though, has been a lonely voice in support of preserving CHIP, leaving the ultimate fate of his amendment in question.

The Big Deal with Big Pharma

In June, Democratic leaders in the White House and Senate caused a stir when they announced a deal with the pharmaceutical lobby. Under that bargain, the drug companies promised $80 billion over the next decade to close Medicare’s drug-coverage gap (partially) if the lawmakers agreed to oppose efforts to empower states to negotiate drug prices for residents enrolled in both Medicare and Medicaid. The Senate bill keeps that agreement intact, with Finance Committee members shooting down an amendment allowing such price haggling for the sake of closing Medicare’s donut hole altogether.

House Democrats, on the other hand, have said all along that they weren’t a part of the discussions with the drug makers, and they don’t feel bound to any deal they never agreed to. As evidence, the House bill allows states to negotiate drug prices on behalf of their lowest-income seniors — a provision the CBO estimates would save more than $42 billion over the next decade.

The Public Option

At the heart of the debate over health-care reform this year has been the public option — a strategy, popular among liberals and consumer advocates, to create a public, non-profit insurance plan to compete with private companies. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) surprised many political observers last month when he proposed to create such state-based plans in the bill he weaved together from the different proposals passed by the Finance and health committees. Reid’s bill would empower the plans’ administrators to haggle directly with doctors, hospitals and other health-care providers over reimbursement rates, but it would also leave states the option not to participate.

The House bill is similar, but creates a national insurance option rather than numerous state-based plans. Additionally, the House bill doesn’t include the state opt-out language.

Unlike the other topics mentioned here, the toughest fight over the public option seems destined to occur on the Senate floor, rather than in conference. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) has repeatedly vowed to filibuster any bill that includes a public plan, whether it’s opt-out, opt-in, trigger-based, or any other configuration. Meanwhile, some upper-chamber liberals — including Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Roland Burris (D-Ill.) — are hinging their vote for the health reform package on the inclusion of a strong public option.

“This legislation cannot simply be a huge subsidy to private insurance companies that will get millions of new customers and be able to raise their rates as high as they want,” Sanders said in a statement last week. “I strongly suspect that there are number of senators, including myself, who would not support final passage without a strong public option.”

All of this, of course, could change. Although the House passed its health-care reform bill earlier in the month, the Senate proposal is just hitting the chamber floor today. The upper-chamber is expected to debate the measure through most of December, with hundreds of amendments likely to be offered from both sides of the aisle.

Democratic leaders hope to pass the bill out of the Senate before the holiday recess, pushing the conference negotiations to sometime in January. That 2010 is an election year won’t make those discussions any smoother.

Mike Lillis covers congress for The Washington Independent, a Center for Independent Media site.

Congressional campaigns had to turn in their quarterly fundraising reports this week, documenting money raised and spent between July 1 and Sept. 30. Information about other elected officials and challengers is below.

Fourth District Rep. Tom Latham, R-Ames, is next on the list, raising $153,507 during the quarter. His campaign has nearly $420,000 cash on hand.

Third District Rep. Leonard Boswell, D-Des Moines, raised $104,132, bringing his cash-on-hand total to $343,215.

Second District Rep. Dave Loebsack, D-Mt. Vernon, raised $101,200 and has $278,404 cash on hand.

Fifth District Rep. Steve King, R-Kiron, raised $70,570 and has $173,833 cash on hand.

Several challengers also filed reports. Republican Dave Funk, who is running against Boswell, raised $16,477and ended the quarter with $6,226 cash on hand. Democrat Mike Denklau, who is running against King, raised $13,615 but has more than $10,000 in campaign debt.

U.S. Rep. Tom Latham, R-Iowa, listens to question at a town hall forum in Indianola.

Health care dominated Latham’s discussion with nearly 200 people at the Warren County Administration Building just south of Des Moines, and while he was quick to point out his opposition to many of the ideas being floated to fix the nation’s health care system, he was equally quick to dismiss untrue claims being spouted of late by reform opponents.

Despite the fact that many of his fellow Republicans say otherwise, including fellow Iowan and U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, Latham said so-called “death panels” are not in the bill. The provision in question deals with funding for voluntary end-of-life planning, he said.

You also won’t find any mention of abortion, he said. An advertising campaign paid for by anti-abortion groups says a lack of specifics on abortion in the bill will end with taxpayer dollars being spent on abortions.

The bill that has been passed by the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee stipulates that the only abortion services that could be paid for with government funds would be those in which the mother’s life was endangered or in cases of rape or incest.

“There is nothing in the bill one way or another,” Latham said, later adding that while there have been amendments in committee that would specifically prohibit it, those were voted down.

In contrast to the civil discourse inside the town hall meeting was this poster, taped to the side of a truck parked just outside.

There is no question something has to be done to fix America’s health care system, Latham said, because there are too many people without access to quality health insurance.

But because any health care reform will touch the lives of every citizen, it should not be “rushed through in the middle of the night” without giving lawmakers and the American people a chance to weigh its ramifications, he said.

He opposes any government-run option, but he does think there is a lot of room for improvement.

“We’ve got to step back and work together,” Latham said, later adding: “We should be careful when we label insurance companies as ‘bad guys.’ Des Moines is the second-largest insurance city in the country. We’re talking about Iowans here.”

Latham’s solution to health care would include setting a permanent floor for Medicare payments to eliminate geographic disparity for doctors in rural states; allowing small businesses to pool together across state lines to negotiate affordable health insurance with private providers; and allowing individuals to fully deduct the cost of insurance from their taxes, regardless of whether coverage is through an employer.

“We have got to have competition in the marketplace,” he said. “And there are a lot of things we can do to make things better.”

Latham also discussed nonprofit health care cooperatives, an idea making the rounds as a possible alternative to a new government insurance plans. Until he sees how they will be structured, Latham said he cannot give an informed opinion or say whether he would vote for or against bills that supported the idea. But he did say he is not comfortable with the idea of the government providing funding for the co-ops.

Cooperatives, which can be defined as private, nonprofit, consumer-owned providers of health care, have already been attempted in Iowa with no success. As the New York Times pointed out Tuesday, Iowa adopted a law to encourage the development of health care co-ops in the 1990s. However, the extreme competitive advantage insurance companies like Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield hold in the Midwest killed the only co-op ever created in Iowa, and to this day no one has established another.

There was very little of the contentiousness that lawmakers faced in other states, as the audience was polite and respectful. That is, until the final question, asked by a woman who said she has had problems holding down a job and maintaining insurance coverage because of chronic illnesses. Before she finished her question, several audience members shouted her down, with one telling her to “Shut up, get a trade and get a job.”

Latham, who had already announced that the forum was over, left after the yelling without addressing either party.

The University of Iowa's coal power plant in Iowa City.

The University of Iowa, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa are among the state’s biggest producers of coal ash, a toxic byproduct of coal combustion. All three schools dispose of their ash in an unlined, unmonitored former quarry in Waterloo that received a waiver from the state in 2002 allowing it to use the ash as fill in its reclamation process.

Because the site is unmonitored, its potential risks to public health are unknown. State regulators say they are waiting for the federal government to issue new rules governing coal ash disposal, despite admitting to The Iowa Independent that contamination could already be taking place. Environmentalists point to studies released this spring showing a much higher risk of toxins leaching into groundwater supplies than previously thought. They believe the state should take action in order to protect its citizens from any potential health risk.

Early this summer, all three of Iowa’s public universities vowed to investigate any possible health risks that could result from the disposal of their coal ash at the Waterloo quarry. In the end, the schools decided they would not alter their methods.

Holly Jones, a University of Iowa student and an organizer with the Sierra Club Student Coalition, said many students are not aware that this is happening at their school. Most don’t even know there is a coal plant sitting all three campuses.

“It’s so ironic that here we are attending a university that is supposed to be fostering learning and growth, and right on campus we have a coal plant that is detrimental to the student body’s health,” she said.

To remedy that, Jones said student organizers plan to work to raise student awareness of the issue and force the school’s administration to alter its coal ash disposal methods.

“The university can do better, and we have to challenge them to do so,” she said.

Pantelis Korovilas, an Iowa State University student who has been active in the environmental movement, said student organizations know the issue of coal ash well. While groups have previously only worked on their specific campus, coal ash could become one of the first issues tackled by a new statewide student organization formed in the spring.

Following the Iowa Earth Summit held at Drake University on March 28, student environmentalists formed the Iowa Sustainability Alliance, Iowa’s first statewide student environmental effort.

“This issue is bigger than just one campus,” Korovilas said. “So, the fact that a state network is getting underway right now, this is the perfect opportunity to tie something in across campuses and work on something at a statewide level.”

Initial efforts will focus on educating the student body on the issue and making them aware that, despite what each of the universities say about their commitment to the environment, the reality is they are some of the biggest polluters in the state, Jones said.

“The universities are always talking about sustainability and renewable energy,” she said. “But then you hear that how they dispose of coal ash doesn’t seem to be much of an issue to them, and that is really discouraging. This is something in the coming year that students will rally around.”

In addition to pushing each school’s administration, Korovilas said students might speak to the Board of Regents, the governing body for the state’s public universities. When contacted to discuss the coal ash issue, Sheila Doyle, the board’s spokeswoman, said it “would not be appropriate to comment at this time.”

Doyle did say that to the best of her knowledge, the universities’ method of coal ash disposal has never been brought before the board.

Coal ash, which contains high levels of toxins like arsenic, mercury and boron, is usually disposed of in dump sites mandated to follow strict landfill standards, including liners, groundwater monitoring and financial assurances that the site owner can clean up any contamination. The Waterloo quarry used by the universities, along with three other sites around the state, received waivers from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources allowing them to act as coal ash dumps without following those regulations.

Last year, the University of Iowa helped derail tougher regulations on coal ash, writing a letter to the DNR claiming that no evidence exists that “the current practice causes harm to human health or the environment.”

The main reason no evidence of contamination in Iowa exists is because there has been no monitoring for such contamination.

For their part, Jones said students would make coal ash disposal a priority in the fall, and push for the universities, which are mandated to serve the public, to stop engaging in a potentially dangerous practice.

“Iowa is such an amazing state as far as looking at quality of life for our citizens, so to think that something as serious as this is going on, especially at public universities, is strange,” she said. “It is definitely a surprise to me that this is something that has gone unnoticed for so long and has been swept under the rug like this.”

While most state legislative races are decided largely on the basis of personalities, reputations, and name identification, this one could be close enough for other political factors to tip the scale in one direction or the other. Here are a few open questions that could define how the HD90 campaign fits into the broader political picture:

Iowa House District 90 (Source: www.legis.state.ia.us)

Which party has momentum right now? If the GOP senses an opportunity to change the current political narrative to prove that its candidates are gaining traction statewide, they could divert more resources to Burgmeier. Likewise, if Democrats or their allies decide that their whole agenda, not merely one house district, is at stake, the cash could start piling up.

Will state Rep. Kerry Burt’s scandals hurt Hanson? It seems unlikely, but now that there’s video of Burt’s arrest on OWI charges during this year’s legislative session, the question is worth asking. Sure, running a last-minute ad connecting that scandal (or the other Burt scandal) to other House Democrats could easily backfire, but a campaign that’s down five points a week before election day might be willing to trot it out.

How healthy is the relationship between House Democrats and the labor movement? Though HD90 does not have a huge labor presence, statewide labor groups will have to decide whether to divert resources to the race like they usually do for Democratic candidates. But after a second disappointing legislative session in which Democrats failed to deliver on key labor priorities, they may not be in such a helpful mood.

Which party is at fault for the struggling economy? Without an incumbent on the ballot, there is no obvious person for voters to blame for their problems — not that Whitaker’s (virtually uncontested) 2008 campaign had much of a problem with that. But now that Democrats control federal and state government, conventional wisdom says they could find themselves where the GOP found itself in 2008. That could hurt Hanson, or, if voters still blame the GOP for lingering economic woes, it could hurt Burgmeier.

Which party has a stronger campaign apparatus in place between election years? Though state Rep. Chris Rants (R-Sioux City) was ousted as minority leader after last year’s election, much of the infrastructure he built to support House Republican campaigns has reportedly remained in place. The House Democrats’ Truman Fund maintains a staff in between elections, as well. If one side was able to mobilize its operation faster than the other side, they would get a head start on fundraising, voter contacts, and absentee ballot requests that could make the difference in a close race. (If it’s any indication, Democrats announced their candidate before Republicans, but both parties had announcements ready pretty quickly.)

We don’t yet know the answers to these questions, and as I said at the beginning, they may not even matter if one candidate runs away with the race early. But if it’s close, any one of them could make the difference.

Fred Phelps and members of the Westboro Baptist Church, a fundamentalist splinter group from Kansas that travels around the country staging hate-filled protests, will be in Waukee, Ames and Marshalltown on July 24.

In Waukee, the group will rally against the Iowa Jewish Historical Society, because, according to the group’s Web site, “history says Jews killed Jesus,” and “while we’re passing through, we thought we would help Iowa with a little history lesson.”

The Ames protest will take place near the campus of Iowa State University in order to tell students “God hates you.” It will focus on April’s Iowa Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage.

The group’s main protest will be outside the Marshalltown Community Theater, which is staging a production of “The Laramie Project,” a play that depicts the events of the death of Matthew Shepard, a gay student at the University of Wyoming who was murdered in an apparent hate crime.

Phelps and his church are monitored as a hate group by the Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center. The organization has 71 confirmed members, 60 of whom are related to Phelps. A representative of the group told the Marshalltown Times-Republican that 18 church members had signed up for the trip, however City Clerk Sheri Coughnhour told the paper the group had not yet filed for a permit to protest.

(The group’s schedule can be found on its Web site, which readers might find offensive or inappropriate.)

Today Joseph Sarachek, the Chapter 11 bankruptcy trustee for the beleaguered Agriprocessors meatpacking plant, filed a supplemental motion requesting the court reconvene the auction to consider the sale of the plant to SHF Industries, Inc. The actual sale of the plant, although recommended by Sarachek, must be approved by both the bankruptcy court and federal prosecutors.

SHF Industries, incorporated in Iowa, is owned by Hershey Friedman, a Canadian businessman, and two additional partners. Prior to presenting an offer for the plant, SHF first approached two key debt-holders and was able to hammer out an agreement to purchase their interests, according to documents filed with the court. Earlier court proceedings listed the major debt interests at over $20 million, Sarachek told the Associated Press that the actual buyout was “significantly less.”

With the two key debt holders placated, however, it is much more likely that a bid for the plant will be successful.

Agriprocessors, the site of a massive immigration raid on May 12, 2008, never fully recovered when 389 workers were bussed out of town by more than 800 Immigration and Customs Enforcment agents. Federal prosecutors, once finished with the immigrant workers, began picking their way up the plant’s management team. The arrest of Sholom Rubashkin, a son of company founder A. Aaron Rubashkin, led to the Chapter 11 filing and the temporary closing of the plant.

SHF, according to court documents, is offering an “as is, where is” sum of $8.5 million in addition to what has already been invested in existing debt. SHF is also willing to allow the existing trustee continued access to records.

“The condition to closing is the entry of an order by the bankruptcy court authorizing the sale of the assests to SHF, free and clear of all claims, liens and other encumbrances. … SHF is not acquiring, nor assuming, any debts or obligations of the debtor or the estate.”

Finally, SHF, according to the motion filed by Sarachek, is willing to provide the court with an affadavit, “sworn under the penalty of perjury,” that establishes any connections or affiliations the company has either with existing creditors or other parties of intest in the case, including members of the Rubashkin family or any of the multiple corporations the family has created.

The sale needs the approval of federal prosecutors not only due to continued criminal investigations and charges against former plant operators, but because the sale, as described in court documents, would also include certain company trademarks — items the federal government have already marked for forfeiture.

More details regarding the offer should be forthcoming when Sarachek files an asset purchase agreement with the court prior to a continuance of the bankruptcy sale.