The U.S. Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, is looking at closing two federal offices in Sioux City.
According to the DOGE website, the two options that could be pursued are closing the Internal Revenue Service office and the U.S. Attorney’s Office, which are in the largest city in Northwest Iowa.
DOGE officials are estimating the combined savings of $144,000 from the closure of the IRS branch and US Attorney’s Office. Those offices contain many workers who have salaries greatly in excess of those amounts, and what will happen with those employees is not specified.
Last week, the Associated Press reported the federal government planned to lay off about 7,000 IRS workers.
Officials with the U.S. Attorney’s Office on Friday would not comment on the potential closure.
*Additionally, frozen federal funds, suspended grants and budget uncertainty are impacting nonprofit organizations across Iowa, including some focused on air and water quality.
Sarah Green, the executive director of the Iowa Environmental Council, said the coalition budgeted for half a million dollars from federal grants for 2025.
One Iowa program that will be suspended was part of a federal Environmental Protection Agency program to help underserved communities navigate federal resources and to manage funding to address environmental pollution.
Also impacted is the Practical Farmers of Iowa group, via the freeze on the USDA’s Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities, which supported more than 800,000 acres planted with cover crops.
Green says the Iowa Environmental Council is developing contingency plans to continue the work they started last year. She emphasizes that local foundations and other funding sources cannot fill in all the gaps left behind by the federal government.
*In other news, four Iowa community colleges, including two in Northwest Iowa, are getting large grants from the Iowa Department of Education.
Nearly $4 million combined will go to the colleges through the state’s Career Academy Incentive Fund, which has the goal of creating more pathways for students to have postsecondary success.
Western Iowa Tech Community College received $1 million. That money will be used at its Denison campus to add career academies for health sciences, welding technology, and heating, ventilation and air conditioning. That is expected to begin in fall 2026.
Northwest Iowa Community College will use the $1 million to establish a new 7,000-square-foot regional career academy in the town of Marcus, which will serve students from several high schools.
Also concerning Sioux City colleges, all four will be distributing a combined $300,000 in scholarship to students.
The Missouri River Historical Development group has announced that money will go for scholarships to at least 600 students.
Students can receive up to $5,000 scholarships at Western Iowa Tech, Morningside University, Briar Cliff University, and St. Luke’s College, which is a nursing school. The student recipients must have graduated from high schools in Woodbury County.
*In other news, Treyla Lee, of Sioux City,has received a lifetime achievement award from the Iowa Legislative Black Caucus.
Lee, who is a member of the Sioux City School Board, was one of three honorees in an event Thursday at the Iowa Capitol. She was one of three people selected, as it was said that Lee is a “champion of equity and community empowerment.”
The other two people who got awards were Waterloo Mayor Quentin Hart and Betty Andrews, an advocate for social justice. The Iowa Legislative Black Caucus was created in 2018.
*Additionally, a legislative push to place the Oceti Sakowin Essential Understandings, or OSEUs, in every South Dakota school has been defeated.
After a concerted push to mandate the program in the state, the proposal was trounced on the state Senate floor on a vote of 7-28 this week.
Much of the opposition came from lawmakers concerned with potential changes to education and the qualification of educators to teach the lessons.
Republican state Senator Tamara Grove said it was hard to see the defeat. Grove said she believes in the value of Oceti Sakowin Essential Understandings, and their power to improve state-tribal relations.
Grove said, “a big part of the divide in the state of South Dakota is because we don’t understand each other."
Grove said she is now working on a non-legislative push, via the Department of Education, to incorporate the OSEUs into schooling.
