Editorials: Hogs over humans

It’s easier to house hogs than humans in rural Iowa. You can put up a confinement just about anywhere you want. If the neighbor finds swine a nuisance, good luck making your court claim pay out. The legislature and courts made sure that hogs would be immune from discrimination but not execution. Corporations are free to house their hogs as they will.

Gary Worthan, the former Republican state representative, still worries. The Storm Lake farmer thinks hog houses are more important than human houses. That was his argument to the Buena Vista County Board of Supervisors: Don’t allow Jim Bauer to develop housing along Old 71 between Storm Lake and Truesdale because it would get in the way of the hogs.

One of our most pressing needs is more housing for humans because of all the pork that needs to be cut and boxed up in Storm Lake by people. The town is full up. If you want to buy a home along Business 71, knowing full well that you could be surrounded by livestock, go for it. There is nothing illegal about it. It will not affect hog confinements one bit.

The houses may be built. Bauer asks for a zoning change that Worthan resists. We need more housing for humans than we do for hogs right now. The county would benefit from the increased tax revenue. We all benefit from more housing stock in the market. The best way to fight inflation is with supply. We need more houses. The more housing that develops along the corridor, the better it will be for Truesdale. When people lived here, there was a school in Truesdale — in our lifetimes. We played ballgames there.

Then the hogs moved indoors and were bought by the consolidators. Worthan takes up their cause. Humans get in the way of livestock. We are a commodity state. Here we have a chance to build community for people. The county should do what is necessary to make the houses sprout. If that means a zoning change for Bauer, so be it. People should be free to build a home where the buffalo once roamed before we laid in the hogs.

Education builds

It is our job to rubberneck on your behalf. We drive or walk through the Buena Vista University campus every day to monitor progress: those apartments will look splendid, my gosh how fast Smith Hall gave way, and that little house next to the tennis courts, and now the Siebens Fieldhouse great lawn is fenced off in preparation for imminent improvements — all funded by generous donors. Quite the busy beavers.

Enrollment crept up again, not by much but it is a great vital sign in this era of declining population in our rural four-state region. Other private colleges would kill for BVU’s fall report. Finding strength in its motto, Education for Service, the university saw gains in graduate programs in teaching. Things are heading the right direction.

A shakeout is ahead in the next three to five years for small private colleges. Buena Vista is positioned to succeed by paying attention to what the market demands, and through the continued generosity of donors. President Brian Lenzmeier stresses that it is easy to increase enrollment. It is much harder to increase paid enrollment. The trustees, administration, faculty and staff have the community’s gratitude for their stewardship of Buena Vista.

HIGHER EDUCATION IS GOOD BUSINESS for Storm Lake and Iowa. We hope that Gov. Reynolds got some sense of it during the dedication for Iowa Central Community College’s new campus in Storm Lake. Students are trained for all sorts of jobs, from nursing to welding, that urgently need to be filled in-state. Gov. Reynolds was good to come, but local voters agreed to tax their property for Iowa Central. The legislature has not been so generous to community colleges.

We should invest more in Buena Vista and Iowa Central. Beavers are teachers, Tritons are nurses. We need more support for the Regents universities, too. When we increase tuition, the students can’t afford to stay in Iowa to service the debt. These institutions are crucial to filling jobs that keep the economy whole. Education has a cost. We continue to cut income taxes and divert funds to vouchers and corporate charter schools when we should be keeping an eye on the ball: stronger higher education in Iowa that attracts and keeps young talent. Education should be our top industry. It could be if Reynolds can take a lesson from Storm Lake.