By Dar Danielson (Radio Iowa)

The Iowa Lottery plans to move to some more modern methods of payment for prizes in the new year. Lottery spokesperson Mary Neubauer says paper checks had been the standard.

“It just became obvious pretty quickly that a check, which is the primary form of payment that you will receive, especially if you come to an Iowa Lottery office today, a check just isn’t used as much today, as it once was,” Neubauer says. She says a working group in the organization studied the options and what Lottery customers want.

“People are looking for options that have, first of all, greater speed, and second of all, more convenience,” she says. Neubauer says cash payments won’t go away, but they do plan to start using prepaid debit cards that allow retailers or Lottery offices to load the prize money onto the card.

“So if you go into a store, certainly cash would continue to be an option. But for example, if it’s a store, and it’s late at night, and the store doesn’t have a lot of cash on hand, a lot of times right now that store isn’t able to pay your prize,” Neubauer says. Neubauer says retailers could pay prizes from 20 up to 600 dollars on the cards — while lottery offices could use the prepaid debit cards for prizes from 20 up to five-thousand dollars. They hope to start a pilot project with the debit cards in six months. The other change would allow prizes that have to be redeemed at Iowa Lottery offices to be made through what’s called an ACH payment that goes directly into a person’s bank account.

“So the person wouldn’t get a hardcopy check, they wouldn’t have to cash it, they wouldn’t have to, you know, drive somewhere, or do that electronically, the payment would just be made directly into their account,” Neubauer says. “It’s going to take a little bit more time to put that in place, we’re looking at that probably somewhere in the second half of calendar year 2023, or at the end of fiscal year 2023.” The ACH prize payments could go up to five million dollars. Neubauer says they are only making a couple of changes because they have to be very careful about the security surrounding the prize money.

“There are so many forms of payment available in the marketplace today, especially when it comes to you know, consumers just paying each other money or sending money to each other. But we have to make sure that the security procedures in place and that whatever payment option we would be looking at that it has staying power,” she says. Neubauer says the large jackpots from lotto games would still be paid out by wire transfer, as that is the safest method.

By Matt Kelley (Radio Iowa)

Many Iowans try to combat the bone-chilling cold of winter with space heaters, but they can also bring an increased risk of house fires.

Le Mars Fire and Rescue Chief Dave Schipper says space heaters can provide much-needed warmth to an icy room, however, they can also be very dangerous if they’re misused.

“We want those plugged directly into an outlet and not onto an extension cord, they draw a lot of juice,” Schipper says. “We want at least three feet of clearance around them of combustibles. A couple of the recent fires we’ve had, those space heaters were too close to bedding, blankets, combustible material.”

The more modern space heaters have been manufactured with better safety features, yet they’re not foolproof, especially if you set a load of laundry down next to one. “A lot of the newer ones have safety tip-over switches, meaning, if they get knocked over, they’ll shut themselves off,” he says, “however, even those, if they’re too close to combustibles, will ignite a fire.”

A house fire in Mason City last month that killed four brothers, ranging in age from three to 12, is blamed on an overloaded power strip. Schipper says portable heaters can be a real hazard if they’re left unattended.

“Space heaters should never be running when you’re not around,” he says. “So, whether you have it at home or work or wherever, the only time it should be operating is when you’re with it. Otherwise, those should be shut off.”

The chief strongly recommends smoke and carbon monoxide detectors in all homes.

By O. Kay Henderson (Radio Iowa)

The head of the Food Bank of Iowa says donations from grocery stores and other retailers have decreased and, in the first nine months of the year, her organization’s budget for buying food soared 650%.

“As we go out to procure food, we’re seeing increased prices, a lack of what we need in the marketplace, but then also we have to contract for people to get it to us,” Food Bank of Iowa president and CEO Michelle Book says, “so freight costs have also risen extraordinarily.”

The Food Bank of Iowa is buying more food because the major food retailers and food processors that typically donate food are donating less because their inventory is down.

“People have gotten more comfortable with shelves being cleaned off at the end of the day, there’s just less food to rescue to get back into our food pantry network,” Book says.

A retired Arizona businessman who volunteered at a soup kitchen came up with the food bank concept after a homeless woman told him she found edible food in the garbage behind a grocery store, but had nowhere to store it. Book says the concept is called food rescue.

“Keeping food out of landfills, working with food retailers to take that food that’s not sellable, but edible and putting it back into the system and so we so that via our smaller, frontline partners — our food pantries,” Book says.

The Food Bank of Iowa supplies food pantries in 55 Iowa counties. Book made her comments during a recent appearance on “Iowa Press” on Iowa PBS.