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Here's what's on Iowa lawmakers' agenda in the final weeks of the legislative session
AEA bills, tax policy, school safety still to come this year
Caleb McCullough, Gazette-Lee Des Moines Bureau
Mar. 15, 2024 7:01 pm
DES MOINES — After a key deadline passed this week in the Iowa Legislature, narrowing the bills eligible for consideration, lawmakers are turning their attention to a smaller pool of legislation and beginning the work on tax and budget policy.
This week was the second “funnel week” at the Capitol, where House bills needed to pass out of a Senate committee, and vice versa, in order to remain “alive” for the rest of the session. Leaders have other tools to keep bills alive that have not met that requirement, though.
While several high profile bills died in committee this week, many others remain alive and will get more consideration in the coming weeks. Bills to reorganize the state’s boards and commissions, change election deadlines and regulate consumable hemp products are all among the bills that remain eligible for consideration.
Friday marked the end of the session's 10th week. April 16 is the 100th day and the target end date for the session, though the session often goes longer than anticipated.
Area education agencies
The biggest piece of unfinished business on lawmakers’ agenda is the proposal to overhaul the state’s area education agencies, which provide special education support to school districts around the state.
Gov. Kim Reynolds proposed the bill at the beginning of the legislative session, but it has taken a winding path through the lawmaking process as it has met resistance even from lawmakers within her own party.
Reynolds’ initial proposal called for school districts to receive their full state and federal special education dollars, rather than that funding being sent to the AEAs. The schools would then have the option to contract with the AEAs or a third party to provide education support for students with disabilities.
The bill also would have directed funding for other education services that currently goes to the AEAs to school districts, and cut a property tax stream that funds the AEAs’ media services. The bill also would have increased salaries for beginning and veteran teachers.
After tabling Reynolds’ proposal, House Republicans wrote their own plan to change the AEAs’ structure and oversight, keep AEAs as the sole provider of special education support and phase in changes over a few years.
House lawmakers passed that bill in February, but the Senate did not take it up for consideration.
The Senate has passed an amended version of Reynolds’ proposal out of a committee but has not yet taken a floor vote on the bill. Lawmakers will need to bridge the significant gap between the two proposals in order to send a bill to Reynolds’ desk to be signed into law.
House Speaker Pat Grassley, R-New Hartford, told reporters on Thursday that he has been having regular conversations with Senate leaders and the governor on the proposals.
“Right now we’re having good conversations,” he said. “We feel pretty strongly that whatever we do with AEAs, we've been very clear in the House we wanted to continue to provide certainty for special ed, parents, and students and school districts.”
Iowa Senate Majority Leader Jack Whtiver, a Republican from Grimes, said his members have had a variety of concerns about the bill, but that he believes Senate Republicans are close to coming to a consensus.
“Our bill is vastly different than the governor's original bill, it's vastly different than the House, and so that's what makes it a little bit harder,” he said. “We’ve got to get our own bill off the floor, hopefully soon, to really start that conversation to see where it ends.”
Reynolds’ office on Friday shared a Des Moines Register op-ed by two school superintendents arguing for changes to the AEA system. Reynolds has pointed to national test scores lagging behind other states to argue the AEA system is in need of reform.
“The system must provide transparency and accountability to school districts, those closest to our students, and drive consistency across the AEA regions to improve services for students with disabilities,” Reynolds said when the House passed its bill. “That’s what I’ve heard from over 100 school districts as I’ve traveled the state, and I look forward to more conversations as the legislation moves forward.”
Democrats have repeatedly called for Republican lawmakers to slow the proposal down and form a task force to study the issue before making any major changes to the system.
The proposal is complicated by the need for lawmakers to pass a bill setting the K-12 school funding level for the coming school year, which lawmakers have not yet done despite being required by law to pass it in February. The House has passed a bill to increase school funding by 3 percent, but the Senate has not passed any school funding proposal.
Legislative leaders said those two issues are dependent on one another and must be decided on together. Both Grassley and Whitver said they hoped to get the funding passed soon. School districts were required to submit their draft budget statements to their county auditor on Friday despite not receiving concrete funding amounts from the Legislature.
“The failure to deal with this means that many of us may see an increase in our property taxes in our local communities, because the state has failed to provide the funding that schools need in order to put their budget together in a very responsible way,” said Senate Minority Leader Pam Jochum, D-Dubuque this week.
Tax policy
Republican leaders have said further cutting Iowa’s income tax is a top goal for this session, and lawmakers have started the work on that this year.
Reynolds proposed a tax bill this year that would, among other things, set Iowa’s individual income tax for this year at a flat 3.65 percent and lower it to 3.5 percent in 2025. Reynolds signed a bill in 2022 setting the state’s individual income tax on the path to a flat 3.9 percent by 2026.
Republican lawmakers have put forward multiple tax proposals this year, including a proposed constitutional amendment that would require a flat income tax and require a two-thirds vote by the Legislature to increase taxes. Whitver said he wants to accelerate the existing income tax cuts.
“We have a real opportunity to expedite some of the cuts that we made the last couple of years, whether that's bringing it to the start of 2024 and expedite those cuts to the beginning of this year, or if we start them next year, there's a chance to expedite the cuts we've made,” Whitver said.
Democrats have argued that Republicans’ recent tax cuts have disproportionately benefited the wealthy and haven’t done enough to help low-income Iowans. Jochum said last week that Republicans should not cut taxes if it will shift the burden for services to property taxes and sales tax.
Lawmakers also will need to craft a budget for the upcoming fiscal year before gaveling out of session. State officials projected on Friday that the revenue lawmakers have at their disposal will largely stay the same between this year and next year, increasing by only 0.7 percent.
Democrats said this week they want to see the state put more money toward schools, housing and environmental protection.
“As we go through the process, we're going to be looking to see, how do these budgets reflect the state's priorities?” said House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst. “Not the priorities of the Republican governor, the Republican majority, but the priorities of our state.”
School safety
Two major proposals that are still alive after the funnel deal with improving school safety, including a proposal to create a licensing process for school staff to carry guns on campus.
The proposals came in the wake of a shooting at Perry High School in January that left 11-year-old Ahmir Jollif and the school’s principal, Dan Marburger, dead.
House File 2586, which the House passed, would create a new permitting process that requires training before a school staff member can carry a gun on campus, if a school chooses to allow it. Lawmakers hope the bill will ease concerns from insurance companies about insuring schools with armed staff.
Another bill would create a grant program that schools can use to purchase guns and training for armed staff. That bill would also provide money for emergency communications, create new building standards and create a pilot program for gun-detection software at schools.
Both bills are through the House and eligible for consideration in the Senate.
“There’s already things in law to allow for those same safety measures to happen, and so whether we need to make changes or not, that’s what our committee will decide over the next few weeks,” Whitver said.