It takesabout $80,000 to fully support just one Honor Flight. $30,000 of that is paid for by the Guardians that accompany the veterans and that leaves just $50,000 to sponsor a flight.

The Edward W. Knapper VFW Post 6174 is hoping that through the residents, various organizations, and businesses in the Eldridge and North Scott area that we can raise that amount to be able to say that we, as a community have fully funded one Honor Flight.

The post has opened an account at DuTrac Credit Union in Eldridge that will receive deposits from the community. If one is depositing a check, it needs to be made out to either VFW Post 6174 (with notation to HONOR FLIGHT) or it can be made out to Honor Flight of the Quad Cities, as they have established a local account as well.

Honor Flight of the Quad Cities is a non-profit 501(C)3 organization. Your donation is tax deductible.  For background information: http://www.honorflightqc.com/

We are looking for donations both large and small. From pocket change to memorials, all donations are welcome.

We are looking for any fundraising source that may be out there; classroom projects, neighborhood donations, sewing circles, book clubs, Sunday School collections, service organizations, and collectors clubs are all possibilities.

We will have containers placed at various businesses around town. We urge anyone that wishes to have a container placed in their place of business to call Duane Miller at 285-8613 and he will get one there for you. This would be a great way to honor any veteran; whether it be your brother, sister, spouse, parent, grandparent, or classmate.

Our ultimate goal is to get all WWII veterans out to Washington DC to see their memorial. The number of WWII vets is diminishing every day. Korean Vets are now eligible and hopefully Honor Flights will continue long enough to be able to include Vietnam Vets as well.

The local VFW is passing along 100% of all donations. We have no administration fees to deduct from your generosity. What we take from this project is the satisfaction of getting more veterans recognized for their service to our country.

Please contact Duane Miller for any additional information you may need.

Former Des Moines School Board Director and 2010 gubernatorial candidate Jonathan Narcisse and his wife, Kerin Narcisse will be guests on "The Katie Show's" annual "Unforgettable Weddings" show to air February 14th - Valentine's Day.

"The Katie Show" hosted by Katie Couric will feature a segment with three couples and their "unforgettable weddings" including a couple's wedding caught in a sandstorm, a couple's wedding ending with the entire wedding party falling into water after the pier crashed during photos, and the Narcisses who were married in a hot air balloon in San Diego prior to the balloon crashing.

After watching the videos and hearing from the newlyweds the all bride audience will select America's most unforgettable wedding.

Jonathan Narcisse served on the Des Moines School Board from 2007-2009 and has been a longtime education and government reform advocate. He finished third out of six candidates in the 2010 gubernatorial contest behind Governor Terry Branstad and Governor Chet Culver earning support in all 99 counties and nearly every Iowa precinct. Narcisse is also Editor-in-Chief of the Iowa Bystander Newspaper founded in 1894.

Kerin (Lang) Narcisse is an Iowa native and graduate of Humboldt High School. She is an ordained Presbyterian Pastor and educator. She has been a resident of San Diego, California and has served the last decade as a Chaplain with San Diego Hospice. She also served as a Pastor in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and will join Iowa Health System next month as a Hospice Chaplain.

It was always Kerin's dream to get married in a hot air balloon. 

After the friends reconnected late November the six week romance ended with the couple taking their vows in a hot air balloon overlooking the pacific ocean, the sun setting with clouds as their witness.

Following the ceremony the landing went bad with the balloon just missing traffic, buzzing homes and trees, hitting a tree, missing powerlines and the powergrid by about six feet prior to crashing to the earth where they bounced twice and were then dragged into a steel fence and giant thorn bushes. The balloon covered a house and the basket came to rest on a cliff.

Kerin suffered a concussion and the wedding party suffered minor injuries but the near death experience could have been much worse.

Mark Carlile, a resident who observed the crash and assisted the wedding party, alerted the local media. The couple was interviewed at their wedding dinner by local media and within hours video and story went viral being featured on every major news network in the U.S. and media throughout the world.

Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa today made the following comment on the Internal Revenue Service's annual whistleblower report to Congress and the agency's response to Grassley's letter expressing concern about problems implementing new incentives for whistleblowers to come forward on tax fraud.  Grassley authored the 2006 whistleblower improvements.

"The report shows a drop in whistleblowers coming forward.   That's alarming.  Instead of rushing to raise new revenue through tax increases, as the President wants, the government should work with whistleblowers to collect taxes that are due under current tax levels.  I'm concerned that the delay in awards and the way the IRS treats whistleblowers might be contributing to the drop in whistleblower cases.   Unfortunately, the regulations proposed in December are likely to further contribute to a drop-off in whistleblowers coming forward.  The IRS has made some progress in processing and tracking claims, but whistleblowers are still left in the dark for years.  The IRS needs to do a lot more to give whistleblowers the confidence they need to take the risk of coming forward to expose tax fraud."