Amie Rivers

The City of Waterloo committed to using only renewable energy sources citywide by 2035, only the fourth city in the US to pledge to do so. The resolution, which notes the city will achieve 24/7 carbon-free electricity, passed unanimously during Monday night’s meeting. “It is easy to fall into climate nihilism—that the problem is ‘too…

I’m hiking every beautiful place I can think of around my home state, to showcase the beauty Iowa has to offer. Follow along on social media using #AmieTakesAHike to pass along your suggestions and see where I’m headed next. On a hot, humid July day, taking a sweaty hike is a bit less appealing. The…

Neo-Nazi flyers pushing the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory with antisemitic rhetoric were found hanging in an Oelwein city park in northeast Iowa recently. The “Great Replacement’ conspiracy theory”, long promoted by hate groups on the fringes of society, is now being pushed to more mainstream right-wing networks, emboldening such groups. Crew 319 describes itself on…

From Starbucks baristas in Iowa City to Grinnell college student workers, workers in Iowa—and across the US—are forming workplace unions at a pace we haven’t seen in decades. Maybe it’s the reality of low wages of workers versus the astronomical pay and stock packages of CEOs. Maybe the pandemic laid bare the differences between what…

What will Iowa’s road and bridges look like without enough construction workers to repair them? We could soon find out. Iowa’s new unemployment law goes into effect Friday and it limits workers to just 16 weeks of unemployment, a 10-week reduction from the previous 26. It also tries to push workers into lower-paying jobs—requiring job-seekers…

There are more jobs open in Iowa—tens of thousands more—than there are people to fill them. Just 46,800 Iowans were unemployed out of 1.7 million working Iowans, an incredibly low unemployment rate of 2.75%, according to a recent announcement from Iowa Workforce Development. According to Gov. Kim Reynolds, who signed a new law limiting unemployment…

From the time he learned English as a young kid, Jorge “Junior” Ibarra was frequently called to translate for his Spanish-speaking parents. Sometimes, the stakes were low. At parent-teacher conferences, when his teacher would say that Ibarra was a frequent talker and getting in trouble, “I’d turn around and say, ‘Mom she thinks I’m a…

I’ve probably never done so many stairs on a single hiking trail before. My calves and the pads of my feet are sore. My dog has never slept so well in his life. But MAN, that VIEW! Palisades-Kepler State Park in Mount Vernon may be an 840-acre M.C. Escher painting. But just like that painting,…

Former presidential candidate and US Sen. Bernie Sanders will stop in Iowa this week to show solidarity with workers who have been on strike for over a month. Sanders will hold a town hall in Burlington at 3:30 p.m. Friday with United Auto Workers Local 807, which represents striking workers at CNH Industrial. The town…

They had me at “one of the most photographed dams in the Midwest” (obviously!). Beeds Lake State Park in Hampton is among the smaller state parks in Iowa. It contains precisely one, 1.79-mile “easy” trail, as rated by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR.) But that trail is all you need. I’ve never gotten…