Iowa Tourists Arrested for Doing Nothing
A tourism gimmick in the southeast Iowa town of Kalona is giving new meaning to the phrase three hots and a cot.
Last week the town’s Chamber of Commerce and Washington County sheriff pulled over people with out-of-state license plates and offered them an all-expense paid visit — including free meals and a night’s lodging just as if they were really being arrested — to the town of 2,300, about 20 miles southwest of Iowa City.
Thousands of vehicles pass through the county on U.S. Highway 218 each day, and last Thursday chamber member Larry Moeller and Sheriff Jerry Dunbar set out to find a tourist to "arrest."