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IowaPolitics.com: Session ends early Sunday morning without passage of labor bills or federal deductibility changes
4/26/2009

By Lynn Campbell and Andrew Duffelmeyer
IowaPolitics.com

Iowa lawmakers spent the final hours of the 2009 session early Sunday morning hashing out final details of the state’s more than $6 billion budget after passage earlier of sweeping sex-offender legislation and a $765 million plan to bond for infrastructure. The House adjourned at 5:04 a.m. Sunday; the Senate adjourned at 5:55 a.m.

“We had to make many tough decisions this year,” said Senate President Jack Kibbie, D-Emmetsburg.  “And in the end, we balanced the state budget without raising taxes, spent less money than we did last year, and put $400 million in the state’s rainy day fund.”

House Speaker Pat Murphy, D-Dubuque, also touted the passage of a budget that doesn't raise taxes.

“At the end of the day, we a passed a fiscally responsible budget and we did so without raising taxes,” Murphy said. “But I think one of the things that we will most be remembered for is making our communities stronger, smarter and safer in a bipartisan effort ... to do a really tough thing, which was to change a law that wasn’t working so that we could make sure that our families and our children were safer.”

Listen to speeches by Murphy and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy: http://www.iowapolitics.com/1009/090426speeches.mp3

House Minority Leader Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, said Republicans and Democrats worked together to write a disaster relief package, but much of the cooperation ended there.

“I’m not convinced this House of Representatives listened throughout this session,” Paulsen said. “Seventy-one percent of Iowans opposed the massive and unprecedented borrowing proposal we passed in the last two days. ... On tax day, thousands gathered right outside this building saying, 'enough is enough, cut back.' Yet, you voted for the largest amount of spending in the history of our state.”

Read Paulsen's prepared remarks: http://www.iowapolitics.com/index.Iml?Article=156683

Senate Minority Leader Paul McKinley, R-Chariton, said majority Democrats lost touch with the people of Iowa.

"Before you leave this building today, do you want to go home without beginning the process of giving the people of Iowa a chance to vote on a marriage amendment?" McKinley asked in his prepared remarks. "Ignoring the voices of the Iowans we are here to represent is a troubling trend that certainly needs to end."

Read McKinley's prepared remarks: http://www.iowapolitics.com/index.Iml?Article=156687

But Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said the session will bring economic gains to benefit all of Iowa.

“What will this session do for Iowans? It will put people back to work and give the Iowa economy a big shot in the arm,” Gronstal said.  “Communities across the state will quickly see an increase in jobs, stepped up flood recovery, and long-term economic improvements.”

Key to the state budget for fiscal year 2010 is the spending of about $680 million of Iowa’s $831.6 million share of federal stimulus money for Medicaid, education and government stabilization. The money should lessen the pain of budget cuts averaging about 12 percent across state government, and decrease the number of layoffs.

“This does allow us through the use of the federal stimulus to support Medicaid, K-12 education, community college education and regents and move those back to about the net 2009 funding level,” said Sen. Bob Dvorsky, D-Coralville. “Hopefully we don’t have layoffs of teachers and others working in education and also health care.”

A last-minute agreement between Gov. Chet Culver and Democratic leaders plugged about $30 million more in stimulus money than originally intended by lawmakers into Iowa’s budget next year, including $13.1 million for instructional support for education, $2 million to school districts for professional development, $2.5 million for child and family services and over $1 million more for corrections at Fort Madison.

“We’re actually required by the federal law, by the federal recovery money, to do everything in our power to reduce or limit layoffs,” Culver said. “That’s the purpose of the stimulus.”

Listen to Gov. Chet Culver's news conference: http://www.iowapolitics.com/1009/090425culver.mp3

In the end, four labor bills and one that would have eliminated federal deductibility, all of which prompted considerable controversy and opposition this session, failed to make the cut as lawmakers apparently fell short of the votes needed for passage. House Speaker Pat Murphy said earlier in the evening that if he found the 51st vote needed, he would have still taken the bills up before adjournment.

“I’m happy there’s a small victory in the middle of a bus wreck. Iowa taxpayers were protected tonight. And that’s good. They aren’t going to be forced to pay a tax on a tax, they aren’t looking at hundreds of millions of dollars in tax increases,” said Ed Failor Jr., president of Iowans for Tax Relief. “Unfortunately, I think it’s probably like Jason in the Friday the 13th movies. I think you can probably count for him to somehow rise from the bottom of the lake again next year, and that makes me nervous.”

But Failor, whose group spent more than $250,000 on an ad campaign to fight the elimination of federal deductibility, contended that the state still has a spending problem, the largest general fund budget ever approved by the Iowa Legislature and the state is taking nearly a $1 billion in debt.

Listen to an interview with Failor: http://www.iowapolitics.com/1009/large/090426failor.mp3

Meanwhile, John Gilliland of the Association of Business and Industry said early Sunday morning that he thinks the reason none of the four major labor bills proposed this year -- prevailing wage, choice of doctor, fair share and scope of collective bargaining -- passed is because they were too extreme to garner the necessary support, even from a Democratic-controlled legislature.

“Labor unions have supported these measures for many years,” Gilliland said. “At different times they get more attraction than others based on the makeup of the legislature. We expect them to be back next year. This is labor’s big agenda and so I expect them to continue to push for these measures.”

ABI has been forced to be on the defensive this session, Gilliland said, but they would like to be on the offensive in the future. “We’re going to continue to try to push for more proactive things that can make Iowa’s climate better and more attractive, and that comes through tax policy, regulatory policy and those kinds of things that make companies want to grow and expand and create more jobs in Iowa,” he said.

Adjournment of the Iowa Legislature came on the 105th day of the session, five days in advance of the May 1st, the 110th day set out by law. Leaders pledged before the session that they would cut the session short this year as a way to save the state money in a year of budget cuts. Lawmakers stopped receiving per diem last Tuesday but worked into the wee hours of the morning both Friday and Saturday nights to adjourn this weekend.

One of the final bills to be approved this year was Senate File 478, the sweeping “standings” budget bill, which appropriated $159.2 million from the general fund and $305.5 million from other funds for fiscal year 2010, funds property tax credits and includes the salaries and compensation of state employees. A last-minute amendment added $12.1 million in spending.

House Republican attempts early Sunday morning to tack on amendments that would say that life begins at conception, that marriages in Iowa would not be recognized in other states, and to give everyone the right to carry weapons without a permit were ruled non-germane to the bill. A vote to suspend the rules and debate the “right to carry” issue anyway failed on a 49-49 vote.

Rep. Scott Raecker, R-Urbandale, made an attempt to avoid layoffs by reopening collective bargaining negotiations and making all Iowa state government workers take a pay cut of between 2 to 10 percent to save the state $72.5 million, but his amendment was rejected 43-49.

“It causes a breaking of a contract and we’ve seen the effects of what happened to that 15 years ago when a collective bargaining agreement was broken and taken to court and cost the state several million dollars to get out of,” said Rep. Jo Oldson, D-Des Moines.

House members also voted to strike from the bill language that would have created a $100,000 job to oversee puppy mills in the state and increase from $80 to $100 the fee to operate a commercial kennel, to get a dealer’s license and to get a commercial breeder’s license.

That change brought legislative action to a standstill for hours early Sunday morning, just when it looked like adjournment was near. House and Senate Democrats caucused to hash out their differences on the standings bill, and just before 5 a.m. an agreement was announced that included an interim study on puppy mills and an increase in deer license fees for nonresidents.

Iowa lawmakers began their marathon push to adjourn on Friday morning and worked almost continuously around-the-clock for the 48 hours that followed, breaking only for 5 ½ hours early Saturday morning.

Friday brought final legislative passage of Senate File 340, intended to improve Iowa's controversial law that prevents sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of schools and day cares, and bring Iowa closer into compliance with the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act.

The bill will classify sex offenders into three tiers and prohibit sex offenders from working, loitering or being present within 300 feet of "exclusionary zones," or areas where children frequent such as schools, child care centers, playgrounds, arcades, pools and fairs. The 2,000-foot law would apply only to sex offenders who have committed the worst offenses against children.

Then Saturday, the Iowa Legislature put the final touches on a three-part, $765 million plan to bond for infrastructure, dubbed “I-JOBS” and championed by Culver as a way to speed up Iowa’s recovery after last year’s floods and create thousands of jobs.

A good sign came at about 11:30 p.m. Saturday when Eric Bakker, senior administrative assistant to Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, walked into the House wearing a bright yellow and green suit. Applause broke out in the House, as the colorful suit is apparently a sign that adjournment was near.


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