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Sioux City Food Pantry Could End Service, Former Gov. Branstad Court Case Begins, 4:32

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A Sioux City food pantry that serves more than 5,000 people a month is being evicted because the building it operates from has been sold.

The Midtown Family Community Center houses the food pantry, a free Saturday meal, and a 4-H program.  Boys and Girls Home Inc. owns the building and had allowed the community center to use the building rent-free. But the building was sold last month. Boys and Girls Home is moving its programs to a centralized campus at the site of the former Indian Hills shopping center.

The grant funding the center receives provides only food for the pantry and Saturday meal. Officials are looking for another neighborhood space to reopen.

A trial is underway in a discrimination case against the state and former Iowa governor Terry Branstad. Branstad is accused of demanding that Worker’s Compensation Commissioner Chris Godfrey resign before his term ended because he is gay.

Attorney Frank Harty represents the state and Branstad. He said in an opening statement that the governor did not know Godfrey was gay at the time. Harty says Godfrey was asked to leave because business leaders were unhappy with his decisions on work injuries.

Godfrey’s pay was reduced to the minimum for his position in 2011. He was the only department leader to have his pay cut in Branstad’s time as governor.

A statewide trade group representing commercial, industrial and public works construction contractors says it has established a $5 million endowment that will fund programs to attract people to construction trade jobs.

Master Builders of Iowa has created a nonprofit board that will each year fund projects that introduce students and adults to the building trades and help attract them to training programs to be a carpenter, electrician, welder or plumber.

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