Cedar Rapids...

We are in Des Moines... 5 hours from Madison. We come yearly to visit friends. We took a short detour through Cedar Rapids on our way. Piles of garbage, it smells, boarded up places of business, streets closed. Very, very sad. I can see that progress is being made but so much more needs to be done. We drove through a neighborhood right on the river and it felt like a ghost town. No one living there, lawns high and unmowed, appliances in the front yard, piles of garbage at the street.

I worked in the Higley Building above. To the left is probably a 15 story building, the tallest in downtown. Apparently the current of the rushing water has twisted that building and it may need to be torn down.