News

The Cedar Valley Nature Trail will be closed between Frost Street south of Brandon in Buchanan County and 51st Street in Benton County starting July 5. The closure is necessary to replace a deteriorating bridge over Bear Creek that was slated for replacement later this year. “Our contractor informed us of an opportunity to move this bridge project up a few months ahead of the original schedule,” said Randy Burke, Linn County Conservation Outdoor Recreation Planner.

By: Co-Reporter, Juliana LuisThe Vinton-Shellsburg FFA officers attended the annual COLT (Chapter Officer Leadership Training) Conference on Friday, June 9th. At this event, the officers went to different workshops to discuss how team dynamics should work on an officer team. Some of the other workshops consisted of learning how to be a great teammate, as well as how to communicate effectively.

By: Co-Reporter, Izzie BirkerVinton-Shellsburg FFA members spent many hours preparing for various summer competitions. Competitions took place at both Iowa State University and Kirkwood Community College in June. Iowa State competitions included State Ag Mechanics, State Food Science, and State Agronomy on Thursday, June 8th. The Vinton-Shellsburg FFA State Ag Mechanics team consisting of Dallas Fairbanks, Jaice Tuttle, Wes McKenna, and Ben Buhr received a Silver rating.

With the help of Noah Lindauer, Vinton Unlimited has created a 1-minute video promoting our town. The video showcases how great we support our local businesses! The video is competing to win a free mural for the community through the Iowans Unite Community Video Contest.We need your votes every day until June 29th at 5:00 pm. Votes will determine the finalists, then on to the judging!Right now Vinton is 200 votes behind Muscatine.

If you have to go outside, chances are your first reaction is to think that it's foggy. And then you smell the smoke from the Canadian wildfires which has reached Iowa.  The smoke was seen in New York over the last few weeks and has slowly made its way to the Midwest. It doesn't appear that the fires are close to being put out.So far, more than 19.

A former member of 4H, Erma Neve, of Vinton, had never entered a sewing project into the Benton County Fair. Ever. At a mere 91 years old, and with the encouragement of her daughter Peggy Cronk, she entered her "Days of the Week" towel set. One of the judges commented, "Wow!! Outstanding, no extra threads, super job!"  Erma won a Blue Ribbon as well as the Reserve Best of Show for sewing.

In a bit of a mixup last week, J&R Sanitation had to remove the carts that they were collecting from a city lot that S&J Sanitation had reserved for the new carts. In a statement J&R Sanitation said, "Vinton residents we are still way behind from the breakdown on Tuesday and trying to pull carts. Cart removal was going well till the city administrator called and said the city was kicking us off the city lot where they pile snow ….

Every seat was taken for a fun trip through Iowa railroad history conducted by Phil Borleske at the Center Point Historical Society Depot Museum in Center Point, Sunday, June 25.Rev. Borleske, Vinton, is on the Benton County Historical Society Board (specializing in the depot) and is a member of the Benton County Historical Preservation Commission.He showed a glorious glut of slides of Iowa trains, past and present, and said that railroads were so important in the state in the 19th century that often if a town wasn’t on a railroad, they either moved it TO the railroad or the town died.

Virginia Gay Hospital Clinics will be closed for a few hours on Tuesday, June 27th for educational training sessions.  The hours are listed below. Urbana:  9:30-11Atkins:  12-1:30Van Horne:  2:30-4