The cost of legal representation provided by private attorneys with special expertise so far in fiscal 2012 – which has six weeks remaining – is the highest in at least a decade and already has exceeded the previous two years when the Executive Council authorized $680,271 for outside counsel in fiscal 2010 and $1.21 million last fiscal year, according to council records.

“The bulk of these cases deal with legal matters where our office simply does not have the expertise or the resources to handle,” said Eric Tabor, chief of staff within the Iowa Attorney General’s Office. “We have a lot of very talented lawyers, a lot of expertise, we just don’t have expertise in everything, and it wouldn’t be efficient for an AG’s office to have experts in copyright and immigration and those types of things.”

Roughly half of the outside legal fees paid this fiscal year went to two firms representing Iowa in ongoing litigation stemming from the 1998 tobacco settlement agreement, Tabor said. The latest arbitration case deals with a 2003 issue whether states did enough to make sure the smaller tobacco companies were paying into an escrow account as required – an issue where $40 million to $50 million is at stake for Iowa, he said.

About 27 percent of the $1.49 million in outside legal costs have come from the state’s general fund, Tabor noted. The rest come from special accounts or sources related to the legal action.

“It’s a lot of money,” said State Treasurer Michael Fitzgerald, a council member.

“The unfortunate thing about it is these things can’t be predicted. It’s clear there’s a pattern this is tending to get larger,” he said. “The higher expense is probably going to continue for awhile.”

Three of the largest outlays in fiscal 2012 were paid for private attorneys hired to represent Branstad against litigation brought against him as governor.

However, Branstad spokesman Tim Albrecht noted the governor’s office was responsible for 11 percent of the total legal bills for the current fiscal year.

“The state of Iowa is a large, $6.2 billion enterprise tasked with dutifully watching over taxpayer dollars,” Albrecht said. “Unfortunately, at times, as with any large enterprise, outside legal counsel is needed. Outside counsel is retained in order to defend taxpayers and their dollars. It is important to note that the state of Iowa did not choose this legal action and instead was forced to defend itself and defend taxpayer dollars.”

The Iowa Executive Council — a five-member panel made up of the governor, secretary of state, state treasurer, state auditor and secretary of agriculture – voted in January to hire Des Moines attorney George LaMarca as outside counsel for $325 an hour to represent Branstad and members of his administration for alleged discrimination, extortion, harassment and defamation in a lawsuit brought by Iowa Workers’ Compensation Commissioner Chris Godfrey.

At the time, Albrecht said the Attorney General’s Office typically would represent the state but, because someone in that office may be called as a witness, the use of outside counsel is the appropriate response in this situation. To date, the council has authorized nearly $89,300 to LaMarca’s law firm.

The council also voted last September to hire Des Moines attorney Richard Sapp at up to $275 an hour to defend the governor against a lawsuit brought by five Democratic state legislators and the president of the largest state employees’ union challenging his item veto of legislation designed to help keep Iowa Workforce Development offices open. The Iowa Supreme Court eventually ruled against Branstad in that case that tallied $84,330 in legal fees.

The council also authorized $60,354 in legal fees for a lawsuit brought against the governor by the Central Iowa Construction Trades Council over a project labor agreement. The state also has paid former Iowa Attorney General Lawrence Scalise and another lawyer more than $99,000 to probe allegations of improper contributions to former Gov. Chet Culver’s re-election campaign from Fort Dodge casino interests.

The two attorneys were assigned to look into allegations that casino backers passed money through a third party to the Culver campaign. The council hired Scalise last year at a negotiated rate of $80 an hour as a special prosecutor to look into the allegations after Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller concluded his office had an appearance of a conflict of interest because a former division head managed the Culver-Judge re-election campaign.

Other funds paid for outside counsel involved mortgage industry practices as part of a national settlement, litigation related to bonding and Iowa’s Fund of Funds program, federal gaming issues, court collections, second injury fund claims, telecommunications law, Medicaid funding issues and an employment termination case involving the state Board of Regents, according to council records.

Comments: (515) 243-7220; rod.boshart@sourcemedia.net

Fiscal year Total outside legal counsel cost

2012 (to date) $1,483,209

2011 $1,210,485

2010 $ 680,217

2009 $1,428,146

2008 $1,014,682

2007 $1,338,787

2006 $1,169,878

2005 $ 223,349

2004 $ 510,504

2003 $ 97,404

Source: Iowa Executive Council

“A prairie fire of debt is sweeping across Iowa and our nation and every day we fail to act we feed that fire with our own lack of resolve,” Romney told an overflow crowd of more than 200 Iowans during a campaign event at the Hotel Fort Des Moines. “This is not a Democratic or Republican problem. That fire could care less if you have a donkey or an elephant in your front lawn, it’s still coming for your house.”

Romney, a former Massachusetts governor making his first appearance in Iowa since he essentially nailed down his party’s 2012 presidential nomination, conceded there is plenty of blame to go around for both political parties since the onset of recessionary problems in 2008. However, he noted that “America’s Nightmare Mortgage” of national debt has grown by more than $5 trillion under Obama’s watch to a staggering $15.7 trillion in government debt and unfunded liabilities with no sign of a solution – equating to more than $520,000 per household.

“Rather than put out the spending fire, he has fed the fire” with government spending and borrowing, he said.

“President Obama started his days in office with the trillion-dollar stimulus package – the biggest, most careless one-time expenditure by the federal government in history,” Romney added. “And remember this: the stimulus wasn’t just wasted – it was borrowed and wasted. We still owe the money, we’re still paying interest on it, and it’ll be that way long after this presidency ends in January.”

Romney also attributed financial uncertainty that American businesses are facing to the passage of the “Obamacare” revamp of health-care and insurance provisions that he said still carries an unknown price tag that is stifling U.S. economic growth and responsible for “the most tepid recovery” in modern history.

“Employers aren’t hiring, entrepreneurs are worried, all because of a massive, European-style entitlement that Americans didn’t want and can’t afford,” he said.

“Today America faces a financial crisis of debt and spending that threatens what it means to be an American,” Romney said. “Here in the heartland, you know in your hearts that it’s wrong. We can’t spend another four years talking about solving a problem that we only make worse every day. When the men and women who settled the Iowa prairie saw a fire in the distance, they didn’t look around for someone else to save them or go back to sleep hoping the wind might blow another direction. They knew their fate was in their hands and so it is today.”

If elected this November, Romney said he would offer a different approach to “lead us out of this spending and borrowing inferno” once he was sworn in as president in January 2013.

Romney said his experience in private-sector business, as governor of Massachusetts and as leader of the committee that organized the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City taught him to hold every department and agency to a simple test: If something can be done better and more efficiently outside of government, “then that’s where it belongs.”

“Wherever we have the option of returning functions back to the states, to local governments, or, better still, to the private sector, that’s what we will do,” he said. “We will make the federal government simpler, smaller, smarter – and, by the way, more in keeping with the vision of the Framers of our Constitution.”

By contrast, Romney called Obama “an old-school liberal” who has a “static big-government mindset” replete with limits and regulations that thwart creativity, innovation and expansion.

“What President Obama is doing is not bold. It’s old,” he told his receptive audience. “Disappointment is the key in which the President’s re-election is being played. Americans will not settle for four more years of the same melancholy song. We can and we must do better.”

However, a group of Obama supporters gathered at a site near Romney’s speech venue Tuesday to bash Romney’s record as head of Bain Capital where the philosophy was to “put profits ahead of people,” criticize his support for policies that could hurt elderly Iowans’ access to Social Security and Medicare benefits, and potentially make the debt work via proposed tax policy changes that could reduce federal revenue.

“Mitt’s record in business isn’t one of growing companies and creating jobs, it’s one of broken promises and the shattered dreams of thousands of Americans,” said Ken Sagar, president of the Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO. “In a career of buying and selling companies, Romney’s pattern was to reap quick profits for himself and his investors at the expense of workers and communities. Sometimes it meant sending American jobs overseas. Other times, it meant cutting wages and benefits.”

Midge Slater with Iowa Alliance for Retired Americans worried about the future of Social Security and Medicare under a Romney administration, while Morgan Miller, a recent University of Iowa graduate, said she was concerned interest on her student loan debt would spike under GOP leadership.

“Romney is the last person who should be lecturing Americans about debt and reckless spending. Mitt Romney has no credibility on controlling debt given his $5 trillion tax plan that would blow a hole in the budget, his private-sector record of piling debt on companies and his public sector record of running up debt on constituents,” said Michael Hunt, communications director with the Iowa Democratic Party. “Once again, the Romney rhetoric does not match the Romney record.”

To counter the six paid commercials the Obama campaign already has posted in Iowa – among the key swing states in the 2012 presidential campaign – the Romney campaign released a Web video entitled “A few of the 23 million” that featured Iowans talking about how they have suffered under Obama economic policies since 2009. According to the video, there are 23 million Americans out of work, underemployed or who have given up on looking for work and the three featured Iowans were chosen to put “stories behind the statistics.”

Outside Romney’s speech venue, a small band of protesters chanted “Tax the rich; jail the bankers” and waved placards with messages like “Romney: king of vulture capitalism” and “corporations are not people.”

“We are evaluating future options, and at this time it’s premature to speak in detail about those plans,” said Tina Potthoff, media relations manager for MidAmerican Energy. She said the company likely will hold internal meetings to decide how to proceed.

MidAmerican has been exploring a new technology using small modular units, which officials said are cheaper than larger reactors but produce less energy. The utility has projected the cost of building the proposed nuclear facility at between $1 billion and $2 billion.

The Republican-led Iowa House approved a measure during the 2011 session that would create a regulatory framework for a small-scale nuclear energy project by MidAmerican Energy. However, the issue stalled in the Iowa Senate after opponents argued the proposed financing arrangement would place costs on ratepayers — even if a nuclear power plant is never built — rather than investors. Other concerns that were raised included the safety of nuclear power and the disposal of nuclear waste.

The 84th Iowa General Assembly adjourned its 2012 session last week with the nuclear energy bill still sitting on the Senate debate calendar after Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, chose not to bring the measure before the full Senate for consideration.

The outcome was hailed as a victory by opponents of nuclear energy.

“Despite moneyed interests pushing for a bill to fund new nuclear plants in the state on the backs of ratepayers in Iowa, the Legislature did the right thing and turned a blind eye to the legislation while wrapping up this session,” said Sonia Ashe, an advocate with the Iowa Public Interest Research Group (Iowa PIRG).

Gaining legislative support and Gov. Terry Branstad’s signature would be one step in a process that would require approval a proposed rate structure by the Iowa Utilities Board. MidAmerican also would be required to apply for federal and state permits for a new plant. Getting a federal license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission likely would cost millions of dollars and take at least four years.

Iowa Governor Terry Branstad addresses the Linn Eagles at the Cedar Rapids Country Club on Friday, Jan. 13, 2011, in Cedar Rapids. Branstad and Reynolds are bringing the Condition of the State address to communities across Iowa in a statewide tour. (Liz Martin/The Gazette)

DES MOINES — Gov. Terry Branstad told reporters Monday he will “never give up” on efforts to cut commercial property taxes and to limit the growth of taxes for residential and agricultural property owners.

The governor also said he believed belt-tightening efforts that he and the Legislature undertook during the past two sessions will make it possible for the state to cut taxes and raise teacher pay as part of an aggressive education overhaul next year.

“I think we can do both,” Branstad said his weekly news conference. “I think we can reform and improve education and I think we can also reduce the tax burden and make Iowa more competitive.”

He credited the split-control Legislature for taking small, modest steps in reforming Iowa’s education system. Those include moving to annual teacher evaluations; competency tests for new teacher applicants; and bolstering reading programs in the early grades. The latter offers the possibility of retaining students who are lagging in reading skills, if their parents choose to hold them back rather than enrolling them in a special summer enrichment program.

For the 2013 legislative session, Branstad said he will have task forces formulating a bold agenda that will be funded by a mix of new money and an effort to redirect existing resources more effectively.

“I’m disappointed they didn’t do something more bold,” Branstad said. “We accept the modest first step that’s been made, but we want to do a lot more and we believe that Iowans are ready to do a lot more. We just think the General Assembly is listening to those who fear change too much.”

Overall, the governor gave the 2012 Legislature high marks for a productive session, but he lambasted lawmakers — especially Democrats who lead the Senate — for failing to address the No. 1 priority of providing property tax relief and reform.

“I’m not satisfied the Legislature failed to deliver property tax relief. I’ve made it clear that I view this to be unacceptable,” he said. “I have a message to the property owners of Iowa: We will never give up on this issue. We understand your taxes are too high and unsustainable and that politicians have promised but failed to deliver for decades. We’re committed to fixing this problem. You deserve nothing less.”

Also, House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, said he expects GOP legislative candidates will hit the 2012 campaign trail with a pledge to provide at least $390 million in income and property tax relief in next year’s legislative session. “Absolutely, I think tax relief will be part of it,” he said. “We believe that money is owed back to them. It’s their money to begin with.”

Both Paulsen and Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, expressed disappointment they couldn’t resolve differences on how to deliver commercial property tax relief before the Legislature adjourned its 122-day, overtime session on Wednesday. But they said there were other positive, bipartisan agreements that that were significant in the areas of redesigning the state’s delivery system for mental-health services and starting a major reform of Iowa’s education system to bolster student achievement. They made their comments during and after Friday’s taping of Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Press” show.

Earlier this week, Gov. Terry Branstad said he would consider calling a special legislative session to pass a comprehensive property tax relief package if a satisfactory compromise could be worked out with assurances the votes would be there to provide more equity and relief for owners of commercial and industrial property. The governor indicated that the House bill was “basically the framework” he preferred, but he added there might some “tweaks” that could be made that could still keep the overall package acceptable to him.

Gronstal said sticking points to resolution continue to center around limits that would be put on local governments and a guarantee that up to $140 million in state “backfill” annually would be provided to reimburse cities and counties for tax revenue they would stand to lose when commercial property tax rates were phased down so tax burdens were shifted to homeowners.

“We are completely open to working with the governor,” said Gronstal, who also cautioned it is too early to talk about a special session. “We’ve got room to talk.”

Paulsen said there continues to be pressure to “get it done soon,” but he also conceded partisan differences remain that impede resolution.

“This is something that would be good for Iowans, it would be good for Iowa’s economy, and we’ll continue to see if we can bridge that gap,” he told reporters after the IPTV taping. “ There’s a gap there right now.”

Gronstal agreed with that assessment, but added: “I would say the gap is nowhere near what it was a year ago. We came a long ways. We moved towards them. We have a plan that in every respect is closer to what the governor proposed last year and we didn’t get a single Republican vote for it. I think that’s fairly telling that this was more a political issue than a policy issue.”

A mourning dove rests on one of Sue Mahoney's feeders in her backyard in Springfield, Ill., in this 1997 file photo. (AP)

UPDATE: Gov. Terry Branstad fired a shot at his executive-branch agencies while issuing a “historic” order Friday rescinding a ban on lead ammunition by dove hunters, saying he would not let them trump actions of elected officials by using “administrative fiat” to set rules that go beyond a law’s intended effect.

“We need to make sure that we stop this practice of agencies going beyond what’s been delegated to them and their responsibility,” Branstad said during a Statehouse ceremony where he signed an executive order clearing the way for hunters to use lead shot during Iowa’s 70-day dove-hunting season that opens Sept. 1. “We’re going to be very zealous in protecting the rights of the citizens of this state to have the laws decided by the Legislature, not by administrative fiat.”

Branstad said the state Natural Resources Commission “clearly” exceeded its authority when it made the decision last July to ban lead shot. He said the Iowa House had rejected that idea and the commission’s sole rule-making responsibility was to establish a new dove-hunting season.

“Today I’m exercising my legal power as governor to rescind the ban on traditional shot by executive order,” he said. “We retain the part of the rule that sets the season and rescinding the part that exceeds the authority of this administrative agency.”

The Legislature had an opportunity to rescind the ban during its 2012 regular session, but the Iowa Senate adjourned Wednesday without considering a House-passed resolution overturning the NRC action so Branstad stepped in to remove the prohibition. He said a majority of senators opposed the ban but the issue did not come up for a vote before the 84th General Assembly ended its 2012 work this week.

Marty Ryan, a legislative lobbyist with Fawkes-Lee & Ryan that represents the Lead is Poison Coalition, said the governor’s swift action after the Legislature adjourned without nullifying the lead shot ban rule was unexpected because state law allows the Natural Resources Commission to establish “the method of take” for hunting activities. He said the governor’s action also represented a decision to “pick and choose” what parts of the administrative rule he wanted to nullify, given that the commission also exceeded legislative intent by adding Eurasian collared doves to rules for a law that only authorized the hunting of mourning doves in Iowa.

“It’s terrible that he has a focus on something like this when we have hungry Iowans, we have all kinds of problems in this state, and he caters to a band of hunters,” Ryan added.

Opponents of the bill believe the lead-shot pellets contaminate the environment for other animals and pose a health risk to eagles, while hunting groups say steel shot costs more and doesn’t work as well as lead shot.

“If you’re walking across a field pheasant hunting and a dove comes over you, you don’t have time to change shot,” said Sen. Dick Dearden, D-Des Moines, a hunting enthusiasts who joined other legislators and sportsmen decked out in orange apparel to watch the governor take what Branstad called “historic” action.

Dearden said the push against ban is more of an “anti-hunting” effort by opponents who think that “if we can make it more and more difficult for hunters, there’s going to be less and less hunters.” However, proponents of the lead shot ban have cited environmental concerns about lead and noted that it already has been removed from gasoline, paint and toys due to health concerns.

Dearden said he was not sure why Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, chose not to take up the nullification resolution in the Senate, but he was “happy with the result, not necessarily the process” after Friday’s outcome.

“If it wasn’t for Sen. Gronstal, we wouldn’t have a dove bill right now. We would not be hunting mourning doves in Iowa if it wasn’t for him,” Dearden noted.

Branstad said he could have taken the action last year but he chose to let the Legislature address it during the 2012 session. When the Senate did not act, the governor used a provision of the Iowa Code that allows him to rescind an adopted rule by executive order within 70 days of the rule becoming effective.

The Iowa chapter of the Sierra Club filed a lawsuit challenging a legislative committee in the dispute over the use of lead shot for Iowa dove hunting, but Branstad -– who is an attorney — said he and his legal advisor believe his action Friday makes that “a moot case. I think this action basically ends it.”

Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad (left) and and Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds lead a town hall meeting in Buchanon County on Monday, May 7, 2012, at the Independence Public Library. (Liz Martin/The Gazette)

Gov. Terry Branstad said Thursday he would consider calling a special legislative session to pass a comprehensive property tax relief package if a satisfactory compromise could be worked out with assurances the votes would be there to pass it once lawmakers returned to the Capitol.

Branstad, Republicans who control the House and Democrats who lead the Senate all expressed disappointment and frustration Wednesday that the regular 122-day session ended without an agreement on everyone’s top priority to provide more equity and relief for owners of commercial and industrial property.

Lawmakers left town with a lot of political finger-pointing taking place over who was to blame for a second session of inactivity on the property tax relief effort, but leaders of both parties and Branstad indicated there still could be hope for resolution this year if a deal can be worked out that might bring them back for a special session.

“If the Senate leadership comes to me and says they have support to pass the bipartisan compromise that passed the House, I’m willing to bring them back,” Branstad told reporters Thursday. “But I want assurance that they have the votes to do it. I don’t want to call them back unless we feel confident they have the votes and that they’re going to come in and do it.

“Otherwise, if we call them back and it costs the taxpayers money and we wouldn’t get something done — I’ve seen that happen before, too,” he said. “If the Senate decides they want to get serious about this and they come to me and tell me they have the votes to pass permanent, property tax relief along the lines that we’ve been discussing, I’m willing to call them back to do it.”

Branstad indicated that the bill that passed the House on a bipartisan 71-26 was “basically the framework” that he would accept, but he added there might some “tweaks” that could be made that could still keep the overall package acceptable to him.

Senate Democratic Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said sticking points to resolution centered around limits that would be put on local governments and guaranteeing up to $140 million in state “backfill” annually to help them deal with lost revenue when commercial property taxes were phased down.

“I want it reimbursed permanently, otherwise the Legislature can choose in a few years not to fund it,” Gronstal said. Without that guarantee and the state under funds its commitment to local governments, the result would be a direct tax shift to residential property owners – which he said would be an unacceptable outcome.

Branstad said he was concerned that Senate Democrats appeared interested in protecting local governments, while he and legislative Republicans place their priority on protecting taxpayers.

“The Senate, well, they couldn’t even pass their own proposal, so they just seem don’t to have the commitment to property tax relief that Iowans are looking for,” Branstad told reporters Thursday. “I think that tells us we need a new, Republican majority in the Senate to get this done.”

Gronstal said he became concerned in recent days that the GOP approach had shifted away from trying to find a policy compromise in favor of a 2012 election strategy. When the property tax issue came up for debate in the Senate, majority Democrats lacked the votes to pass their preferred approach and minority Republicans fell short of getting support for the House-passed plan.

“I think they chose at the start of this week – instead of trying to pursue a historic opportunity to get a $350 million, 25 percent reduction in commercial property taxes, I think they decide it’s better to use it as a political issue than get something accomplished. I think that’s the judgment they made,” he said.

Branstad said any deal reached to bring lawmakers back for a special session vote would have to mirror the “framework” negotiators tentatively agreed to in April.

“Stay tuned. We’re researching that,” Branstad told reporters Thursday.

“We’re going to look into what can be done about that,” the governor said, noting that he has assigned his legal adviser, Brenna Findley, to explore what options might be available. He was hopeful there would be an avenue whereby the way could be cleared for hunters to use lead shot this fall, but he noted “they just adjourned last night and we’re trying to figure out what didn’t get done.”

Democratic state Sen. Rob Hogg, a Cedar Rapids lawyer who was pleased senators left town Wednesday without nullifying a ban on the use of lead shot adopted by the Natural Resources Commission last July, said he doubted Branstad could use an executive order to void the NRC rule now that lawmakers have decided to let it stand.

“I think he should leave that rule in place, but obviously if he wants to try to convince the Natural Resources Commission to try to change the rule, he’s free to do that,” Hogg said. However, he noted the governor had indicated he believed the elected Legislature, not an appointed commission, should make the decision and lawmakers exercised their authority by validating the status quo.

“The commission made the decision that it was important to protect the health and safety of people and animals and the environment, and they saw this was a moment in time where the amount of lead in our environment might increase significantly,” he said. “The data shows that dove hunting involves a lot more ammunition than other forms of hunting, and so they made the determination that that was a hazard to our environment. I don’t think he really wants to roll back environmental protections, especially when there’s such a viable alternative which is the steel shot which is just generally available in the marketplace now.”

The Iowa House voted 73-27 during the just-completed session to torpedo the NRC’s ban on lead shot after the Legislature’s Administrative Rules Review Committee concluded that commission overstepped its authority and went beyond legislative intent in enacting the ban. However, the Senate adjourned without taking a vote on the resolution seeking to nullify the rule that was set last year for the first dove hunting season since 1918, but implementation was delayed.

In March, the Iowa chapter of environmental group Sierra Club filed a lawsuit challenging a legislative committee in the dispute over the use of lead shot for Iowa dove hunting, contending the Legislature’s Administrative Rules Review Committee is unconstitutional and that it overstepped the separation of powers in the state constitution when it delayed implementation of the lead shot ban.

During the 2011 session, the Iowa Legislature passed a bill, which was signed by Branstad, permitting the hunting of mourning doves. The law allowed the commission to establish the rules around how the hunting would be permitted. The commission banned lead shot, which angered some lawmakers.

Opponents of the bill believe the pellets contaminate the environment for other animals, while hunting groups say steel shot costs more and doesn’t work as well as lead shot.

Last month Branstad filed an amicus brief in support of the legislative rules committee’s role in ensuring that regulations are reflective of legislative action and not overly burdensome. A statement his office issued then indicated the governor believes the determination of whether hunters should be forced to stop using traditional lead shot is the role of the Legislature, not the unelected commission.

A lone worker walks on the ground floor of the Statehouse rotunda, Friday, Jan. 8, 2010, in Des Moines, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

DES MOINES – Iowa lawmakers adjourned their 2012 session today without resolving differences over commercial property tax relief.

The Iowa Senate passed a “sine die” adjournment resolution at 5:23 p.m. and the Iowa House followed with adjournment at 6:13 p.m.

Lawmakers spent the session’s 122 day putting the finishing touches on a $6.244 billion budget for fiscal 2013 and a redesign of Iowa’s county-based mental health system.

Leaders of the House and Senate met with Gov. Terry Branstad during the afternoon in hopes of finding compromise on a plan to reduce commercial property taxes while limiting growth for other property classes and providing state “backfill” money to cushion the potential loss of revenue to local governments. However, those talks failed to produce a resolution to an issue that the governor and both Republicans and Democrats in the split-control Legislature had identified as they top priority for the 2012 session.

“The only option is if the governor wants to call a special session,” said Sen. Brad Zaun, minority whip of the Senate GOP miniority.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said the property tax negotiations got caught up in partisan politics and results in lawmakers walking away from a proposal that left $350 million in potential property tax relief “on the table.”

“I’m willing to continue to work with him and continue to work with the House and look for common ground and if we can find some I’ll continue to have meetings with him. If we can find some, he can call us back into special session,” Gronstal said in an interview.

House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, said it was “regrettable” that majority House Republicans and majority Senate Democrats couldn’t come together on an agreement to cut business taxes. He pledged to continue to work to find common ground during the interim and pledged that Republicans would be back next year with a proposal to cut Iowans’ taxes by $390 million – using the $90 million in a new taxpayer trust account and the state’s projected $300 million ending balance.

Branstad thanked the 84th General Assembly for considering his administration’s priorities and for adopting a significant number of them.

“However, the 2012 session may be remembered as much for what failed to be accomplished as for what actually was accomplished,” the governor said in a statement. “Despite the best efforts of my office and a bipartisan majority in the Iowa House, the inability of Senate Democrats to adopt serious property tax reform has put Iowa taxpayers in jeopardy of seeing significant property tax increases in the coming year.

“The Senate failed to support legislation based on the framework I believe was agreed to as a roadmap to finding a compromise between my office, the House, and the Senate.  They failed to pass a meaningful step forward in our goal to make Iowa’s tax system more competitive or assist with our critically needed job creation goals,” he added. “As a result, Iowa taxpayers face yet another year with property taxes that are scheduled to grow nearly $2 billion over the next eight years.  This is absolutely unacceptable and Iowa voters will have an opportunity to resolve this impasse in November.”

Gronstal said it appeared the property tax impasse was driven more by partisan than policy considerations.

“I think they made the decision last week let’s play politics with this instead of trying to get this done. I think that’s abundantly clear,” he said.

In his prepared closing remarks, Gronstal noted that he opened the second year of the 84^th General Assembly on Jan. 2 by setting a goal of a “short, productive session.”

“I got it half right,” he said. The majority leader listed a number of accomplishments for the 2012 session but he also conceded “We could have done more.”

Senate GOP Leader Jerry Behn of Boone, who missed much of the session’s final week due to a health problem, issued a closing statement lamenting the lack of action to improve the state’s business climate.

“Did we provide the measurable results that Iowa taxpayers deserve this session?” Behn said in his statement. “In most cases, we did not. When it comes to job creation, property tax relief, world-class education and government rule and regulation reform, this Legislature failed to make the necessary strides that hardworking Iowans deserved.”

Senate President Jack Kibbie, D-Emmetsburg, who is retiring after a long legislative career, said he was disappointed that the property tax compromise couldn’t pass on a bipartisan basis. He noted that the Statehouse has become “a very partisan climate and it’s getting more partisan and that disappoints me.”

Majority Democrats first rejected by a 21-26 vote a more expansive version of the bill that had earlier passed the Republican-controlled House.

Sens. Rob Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids, and Jack Hatch, D-Des Moines, later joined Senate Republicans in voting down, by a 24-23 margin, a $350 million plan offered by Senate Democrats.

“They sunk their own bill,” said Sen. Randy Feenstra, R-Hull, who led the effort to win support for the House-passed bill. He criticized Democrats for walking away from an approach that won bipartisan support in the House by a 71-26 vote.

Before the floor debate, Hatch said he was concerned that the $350 million in relief would unduly hurt cities, counties and school districts with lost revenue. Hogg, meanwhile, said state government already is failing to meet its financial obligations without siphoning off revenue to lower business taxes. He said Cedar Rapids businesses’ biggest losses could be attributed to the Floods of 2008, not property tax burdens, and the current trend of paring back key government services was doing more to hurt the state’s growth and employment prospects.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said it appeared GOP senators were playing politics, nixing a $350 million package this year after voting 46-4 for a $200 million deal last session.

“I’m mystified,” said Gronstal, who said negotiators no longer have a legislative “vehicle” to work from. “We’ll assess. We’ll look for the opportunity to find common ground on this. This is not a good signal.”

Gov. Terry Branstad — in Decorah for a town meeting Tuesday — earlier spoke about the property tax reform, saying that “if the Senate Democrats fail to take it up or pass it, I think the onus is going to be on them for failing to do what they promised they were going to do and we’re going to hold them accountable.”

Education reform on way to Branstad

Also Tuesday, lawmakers sent Gov. Terry Branstad an education reform package that seeks to bolster student reading skills in early grades and allows high school students who demonstrate competency to advance.

The Senate passed the bill by a vote of 31-15, and the House voted 87-9 for passage.

“This bill has been like a cat with nine lives. It was close to death many times,” said Rep. Royd Chambers, R-Sheldon, co-leader of a 10-member House-Senate conference committee that negotiated the legislation.

Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, the other conference committee co-chairman, praised the panel for finding “appropriate” compromises. He declined to speculate whether it would meet Branstad’s standard for “bold” reform, telling reporters: “I don’t like the word bold. That implies a certain macho swagger. I would prefer to do smart and effective reform and I think that is what this is.”

Branstad praised lawmakers for their work this session, calling it “an important first step,” but said there was “much work left to be done to give all students a globally competitive education. That requires a great teacher in every classroom, a great principal leading every building, high academic standards and strong matching assessments.”

Under the third-grade retention compromise, the parents of a student not proficient in reading based on a test, portfolio or alternative assessment at the end of third grade would have the choice of enrolling the student in an intensive summer reading program to keep advancing. If the parents did not exercise that option, the child would be held back to repeat the third grade.

The program — contingent on funding by the state — would not be implemented until the end of the 2016-17 school year and would apply to students entering kindergarten in the 2013-14 school year.

“I think that’s a good compromise and it puts the onus back on the parent a little bit to make sure that they’re involved in their child’s education,” Chambers said.

Quirmbach said he was disappointed there was not adequate funding in the bill to fund early literacy support in fiscal 2013, making overall funding for education reform a major focus of the Legislature next year.

The standings appropriations bill this year includes $2 million for the reform effort — a level far short of the $17 million Branstad requested.

Rep. Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City, called the compromise “a good start” for much broader work that will have to come in subsequent years.

“We’re making lots of progress on lots of bills,” said Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs. “We’re finding common ground between the two sides, between the House and the Senate. We’re making good progress.”

So much so that House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, said he expects the 2012 session to adjourn later today. Democrats who control the Senate were less optimistic, however.

Negotiators are close to agreements on bills dealing with education reform and mental health redesign, leaders in both chambers say. Those issues likely will see floor debate in the coming hours.

Less clear is the status of the property tax reform measure. The GOP-led House passed its version 71-26 last night but the Senate Ways and Means Committee is working off the Senate’s plan – much of which was incorporated in the House bill that included provisions that go beyond what Senate Democrats have endorsed.

“We sent the bill over to the Senate last night. My hope is that they will send it to the governor,” Paulsen told reporters today. “My hope is that — if they were going to change it that, we could talk about that ahead of time and maybe come to some agreement.

“But, I can tell you that my understanding of the framework of the agreement – that bill conforms to it. Each one — the Senate, the House, the governor — has pieces in there, so unless we’re going to add some more relief to it or something along those lines, we’re not very interested in backing up,” he added. “I see no reason why we can’t get that done today.”

Gronstal said lawmakers have reached that point in the session where they need to focus on policy, not politics.

“The approach now shouldn’t be exchanging versions. But, if that’s the game, we’ll certainly play in the field. But I don’t think that’s particularly productive at the moment. I think it’s more about people looking for common ground, having those discussions and see if there’s some there,” Gronstal told reporters. “The leaders should look for common ground on this issue and grab what’s available.”

Today marks the 121^st day of a session that began with an April 17 target date for adjournment.

The 2012 session’s 20th day of overtime saw compromises spring up in House-Senate conference committees as the split-control General Assembly began to assemble major pieces of next year’s spending plan and worked toward compromise on major property tax and education reform initiatives. Agreements forged on seven of nine budget bills raised hopes that the session’s 18th week could be its last.

“I think so,” Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said of the prospects for finishing by midweek. “There’s always a wrench that could fall into the gears.”

The House and Senate voted to send Gov. Terry Branstad budget compromises for education, economic development, infrastructure, the judicial branch and the administration/regulation.

A conference committee wrestling with education funding finalized an $858 million package that would provide an extra $23 million for regent institutions and boost overall funding by 5.8 percent. Under the agreement, which won Senate approval on a 28-19 vote and 90-5 support in the House, the University of Iowa would receive a $6.68 million increase, the University of Northern Iowa would get an extra $6.38 million and Iowa State University would receive a $5.2 million boost.

“We didn’t get everything we asked for, but it’s a significant increase,” said Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames. He said community colleges also did “very well,” receiving a $13.5 million boost in general aid and a $3 million increase for work force training/development programs.

The Senate also voted 29-18 to approve a capitals and infrastructure budget that includes $5 million over the next two fiscal years to rebuild the dam at Lake Delhi in Delaware County. That bill was awaiting House action.

Both chambers passed an economic development budget bill that would provide $15 million for business development incentives financed by excess money in the state’s economic emergency fund. It also earmarked $3.2 million for a regent innovation fund and provided money to keep satellite work force development offices open in Decorah, Fort Madison, Iowa City and Webster City, though the $37.7 million general fund appropriation did not reopen any of the 36 offices closed during this fiscal year.

Sen. Bob Dvorsky, D-Coralville, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said Republicans and Democrats had agreed on spending levels in seven of the nine fiscal 2013 budget bills, with only health and human services and the standings appropriations bills being negotiated.

“We’re moving forward,” he said. “There’s always little glitches here and there.”

STEM areas include science, technology, engineering and math, and Branstad used the Science Center of Iowa on Monday as a backdrop to highlight the selection of six regional network hubs that will promote STEM education and economic development across Iowa. He was joined by Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds and Ben Allen, president of the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls and the co-chairman of the Governor’s STEM Advisory Council – while selected a review panel that recommended six of 13 Iowa institutions and organizations that applied to serve as regional STEM network hubs.

The six hubs that will physically house the coordinating centers and their network hub managers included Iowa Lakes Community College in Estherville, the northwest Iowa hub; Iowa State University in Ames, the north-central Iowa hub; the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls, the northeast hub; Southwestern Community College in Creston; the southwest hub; Drake University in Des Moines, the south-central hub; and the University of Iowa/Kirkwood Community College, the southeastern hub.

“These six regional STEM network hubs will be the driving force offering Iowa youngsters more opportunities to learn about STEM, which will better prepare them to someday consider STEM careers,” Branstad told attendees at Monday’s announcement. “STEM fields are among the fastest-growing, with many jobs that pay well.”

The governor said he hoped the new focus would improve interest and achievement in areas that are critical to the state’s future success both economically and academically. He said Iowa students must show greater proficiency in STEM education areas to ensure that top employers providing high-paying jobs will continue to look to locate in the state.

Monday’s announcement was the first initiative of the 40-member Governor’s STEM Advisory Council, a public-private partnership which Branstad formed last September. The council’s over-arching goal is creating greater student achievement in STEM subjects and a stronger STEM workforce, the governor said. Each STEM network hub will work with business, education institutions, nonprofit groups and others in their region in a way that best fits local needs, interests and resources.

“Iowa is fortunate to have some outstanding STEM education programs, but whether students have access right now depends largely on where they live,” said Reynolds, co-leader of the council. “The hubs will provide these opportunities more equitably around the state. STEM occupations are critical to Iowa’s economic competitiveness because of the direct ties to innovation, productivity and economic growth.”

Nelson said the hubs will be instrumental in efforts to “scale up” exemplary STEM programs and establish the infrastructure required to deliver them “to every corner of the state” by facilitating partnerships and leveraging assets to reclaim local excellence.

“Regional needs in STEM can best be met through local and regional programming that takes advantage of local assets such as partner businesses, county extension, formal and informal education organizations, nonprofits, and more,” Allen said. “Great hope and expectation rides on these regional hubs and their managers to unite those assets for the betterment of STEM education across Iowa.”

Branstad said he was pleased it appeared that House-Senate budget negotiators would provide money for the STEM initiatve at his proposed level, which is needed to meet the goals of bolstering education in all the STEM areas.

The next step will occur May 15 at Drake University where action plan working groups will be detailed for comment from the public. All 13 regional hub applications may be viewed at http://www.iowamathscience.org/regional-stem-hub-applications.

Senate President Jack Kibbie, D-Emmetsburg, said the amendment seeking to ban the devices was not relevant  to a wide-ranging measure dealing with fiscal 2013 standing appropriations, even though he conceded it was “a close call” given that the budget bill dealt with a significant number of funding areas.

Sen. Brad Zaun, R-Urbandale, offered the traffic camera ban the bill on Tuesday afternoon.

“This has got to be shut down,” Zaun argued, in supporting a proposal that previously passed the Iowa House but was not debated in the Senate.

Zaun argued that the cameras have become more about revenue than public safety for local governments that contract – mostly with out-of-state companies – to install cameras to enforce speeding or red-light violations. He pointed to an arrangement in the Des Moines suburb of Windsor Heights, where officials plan to install cameras along a segment of Interstate 235 that traversed eight-tenths of a mile within their jurisdiction at an initial cost of $800,000. He noted that the camera installer/operator will receive 58 percent of the $5.1 million projected to be raised during the first year of enforcement.

“This issue has grown out of control,” Zaun said. “It just becomes a racket for these communities.”

Similarly, Kibbie applied his “non-germane” rulings to other proposed amendments that would have attempted to attach “stand your ground” self-defense protection, school start date changes, and authorization for home-schooling parents to teach their kids driver’s education to the “standings” bill – often called a “Christmas tree” measure because it becomes a catch-all for issues that were not included in other budget bills.

“I don’t blame anybody for offering amendments on a bill that’s the last train out of town, and I hope this is the last train out of town,” Kibbie said in giving his reasoning for disallowing the policy proposals from being debated on the Senate floor.

Iowa code requires the state to have 10 percent of adjusted general fund revenue deposited into its cash reserve and economic emergency fund on June 30 of every year. Holly Lyons of the non-partisan Legislative Services Agency said the state is on track to meet that threshold for the first time since fiscal 2008 (see chart).

Lawmakers credited the flood of money in the state’s “rainy day” fund to several factors — the rebounding Iowa economy, GOP-led efforts in the current fiscal year to hold spending levels below the available revenues, and government streamlining efforts started by Democrats during the Culver administration.

“It speaks to good budgeting practices,” said Rep. Scott Raecker, R-Urbandale, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

But Sen. Bob Dvorsky, D-Coralville, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said it also creates confusion for Iowa residents. How, they might wonder, can the state seemingly can be awash in money while the split-control Legislature is at loggerheads over next year’s budget? It’s like being surrounded by water with nothing to drink.

Along with the full reserves, the newly created taxpayers trust account is expected to be fully funded with $60 million when fiscal 2013 opens, and the state is expected to have an ending balance topping $320 million after all the statutory requirements for this fiscal year’s budget are met.

“We have a balanced budget with the lowest number of state employees in decades and the highest percentage surplus since the early ’80s,” said Sen. Jeff Danielson, D-Waterloo, chairman of the Senate State Government Committee and an architect of recent government efficiency measures. “We’ve reduced our overhead significantly in the state of Iowa. That’s why we have one of the best budgets in the country. In part the economy has been good, but we pay attention to our costs and have made real and meaningful changes.”

The rosy financial projections come at a time when leaders of the House and Senate and GOP Gov. Terry Branstad are wrestling with budget differences that are making lawmakers work overtime to reach agreements and adjourn the election-year session (related story, 5A).

House Republicans and Branstad have agreed to hold overall spending for the fiscal year that begins July 1 below the roughly $6.252 billion in projected net state receipts. That’s even though the 99 percent spending limitation law would allow appropriations to top $6.45 billion — a figure that combines estimated tax collections and the previous year’s carry-over ending balance once the reserves are full.

“We’re using a principle that we believe Iowans sent us here for,” Raecker said, “which was to not spend more money in ongoing expenses than the money we’re taking in. We are going to mirror up our ongoing revenues for ongoing expenses.”

In their budget proposals, House Republicans have called for rolling the ending balance into the taxpayer trust account to create a $380 million pool of money to use to provide future tax relief. House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, noted a previously passed House bill seeking to cut state income taxes by 20 percent. That measure was not taken up by the Senate, but he said it might be one option among many for returning that money to taxpayers.

Senate Democrats’ budget plan includes the $60 million for tax relief but does not earmark the ending balance for specific purposes, although Dvorsky said there may be one-time costs in the current fiscal year where some of those funds might be appropriately spent. Lawmakers earlier this session approved a supplemental appropriation to fund prison operations and other programs through June 30.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said he would prefer to use the $60 million to meet a GOP budget demand that the state pick up an extra $27.5 million in property tax credits for local governments in fiscal 2013. Republicans reject that suggestion because they say it would be using a one-time source to pay for an ongoing expense, which would fall outside of their budgeting principles.

“I think the first thing we need to do is to fund the services that people want and demand adequately,” Dvorsky said.

Saul Russo, chief strategist for the nation’s largest Tea Party political action committee, said his Sacramento-based group’s “Restoring the American Dream” bus tour is slated to make stops in Des Moines and Sioux City on Monday. The express bus participants will rally activists at the state Capitol at 11:30 a.m. in Des Moines and then hold a 5:30 p.m. event at Riverside Park in Sioux City.

“Iowa is a key battleground state for the White House along with the U.S. House of Representatives,” Russo said in a statement. “If we are going to change the failed big-government policies coming out of Washington, we need a motivated and engaged conservative electorate to defeat Obama and reinforce the conservative majority in the House. Iowa is key in achieving these goals in 2012.”

Russo said his organization already has endorsed five candidates for the U.S. Senate and one for the U.S. House and he said he expects more endorsements would be announced on this tour.

“Our goal will be rallying activists in support of some of the upcoming primary election battles or for the upcoming general election,” he added. “Each stop aims at engaging voters with candidates and policies that promote pro-growth, free-market solutions to ensure the American dream can be achieved by anyone. The only way to change this current economic path that is leaving us with a weak recovery, at best, is to change the players and policies that got us here. We started in 2010 and that drive will continue through November of 2012.”

Russo said Tea Party Express has hosted more than 300 rallies across the country.

“We’re not that far apart and we need to get this resolved,” Branstad said in an interview. “I think it’s important for them to come back on Monday, get serious and get it done next week. We want to work with them to get it resolved.”

The governor said leaders of the GOP majority in the House and Democratic majority in the Senate have agreed to an overall $6.244 billion level for general fund spending beginning July 1, but details of how those funds will be dispersed in individual budget areas still need to be worked out. House leaders say they’ve agreed to spend significantly more than their initial fiscal 2013 target and won’t go higher, while Senate negotiators say they want to provide adequate resources for education, job training and retraining and other priority areas that are underfunded by Republicans.

Both sides say they continue to advance, but the progress has slowed as they work to close a remaining gap of “tens of millions” of dollars between their competing approaches.

“I don’t think laying down ultimatums is helpful, so I don’t really want to lay down an ultimatum,” said House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha. “But I would say we have moved a long, long ways. We’ve tried to be respectful of Senate Democrats’ priorities, the governor’s priorities, but we have largely given everything. We have nothing left to give I guess.”

For his part, Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said there is $60 million slated to flow into a taxpayer relief fund in fiscal 2013 that could be used to address a GOP demand to provide an extra $27.5 million for property tax credits to local governments – an idea that Republicans say would be using one-time money to finance an ongoing expense in violation of their budget-making principles to avoid past practices that led to state imbalances.

“We’re trying to get a budget that we think reflects what Iowans need,” Gronstal said. “There are strong feelings about the issues that confront our state. We strongly believe we need a world-class community college system that’s there to train workers for the jobs of today and to retrain workers for the jobs of tomorrow. We think that’s very important. We think the House significantly underfunds that effort. We think they’re driving tuitions too high at regent institutions.

“We’re trying to provide additional job-growth opportunities in the state of Iowa. All of the studies indicate that Iowa has a skill shortage more than a job shortage. We have a lot of jobs that go unfilled because we have workers who don’t have the skills,” he added. “So, that’s what we’re fighting for here, and we’re not just going to roll over and play dead. We’re going to keep fighting for those things that we think are important for the future of Iowa.”

On Friday, Branstad said he is concerned this year could become a repeat of last session when the split-control Legislature went 172 days and “drug on and on” before resolving their differences on June 30 to avert the threat of a state government shutdown when the current fiscal year began July 1.

“When you get to the end of the session, there are sometimes compromises that have to be worked out. It’s time to get that done. We’ve already gone a couple weeks over. It should not be delayed further,” the governor said Friday. “They’re not that far apart. They just need to get serious about resolving those things. It’s never easy. That’s the reason why the tough decisions end up getting left to the last. It’s important now that they come back next week, get the job done and stay until they’ve got it done. There’s no reason why it shouldn’t be done next week.”

Branstad said he has set aside time in his daily schedules next week to meet with House and Senate leaders if that will help facilitate a resolution on the budget and the other remaining priority issues and end a session that will be 13 days beyond the adjournment target when lawmakers return to the Capitol on Monday.

Worker memorial services have been scheduled for Friday and Saturday to honor Iowans who were killed, injured or disabled from exposure in the workplace. The events are part of an international day of remembrance that coincides with the anniversary of the United States’ Occupational Safety and Health Act becoming law in 1971. The ages of Iowa victims of workplace accidents ranged from 17 to 78.

“We still regrettably are killing way too many workers,” said Ken Sagar, president of the Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO.

“I don’t know what an acceptable number of people to be killed on the job is,” he said. “I guess my number is zero, but we just can’t seem to get to that number.”

Iowa Workforce Development spokeswoman Kerry Koonce said workforce safety is a shared responsibility.

“It’s a combination of enforcement — doing your regular inspections — and companies using the consultation services that are available to them, which helps them redefine safety issues so they can better address some of the needs, and it requires workers to follow the safety regulations that are laid out by their companies,” she said.

Work-related deaths in Iowa:

2011 – 53 workers

2010 – 51 workers

2009 – 48 workers

2008 – 68 workers

2007 – 48 workers

2006 – 44 workers

Source: Iowa Workforce Development

“The ripple effect is nothing short of amazing,” said Libbey Patton, tourism director for the Clear Lake Area Chamber of Commerce and co-leader of a newly formed Hunting Works for Iowa (www.HuntingWorksForIA.com) partnership of business groups and outdoor enthusiasts. “Hunters bring a lot of money to our town and many others and that results directly in more jobs and more tax revenue at the local level.”

Jim Henter, president of the Iowa Retail Federation, cited estimates from the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation indicating that each year about 251,000 people hunt in Iowa, spending an average of $1,140 per season on trip-related expenses such as lodging, food, gas and gear. That activity results in more than $288 million in yearly spending that translates to $23.4 million in state and local taxes and a $359.5 million ripple effect for Iowa’s economy, he added.

Henter said a broad coalition of local and regional leaders representing Iowa chambers of commerce, convention and visitors bureaus, sporting organizations, small businesses, lodging, and retailers have formed Hunting Works for Iowa to promote the economic partnership between the hunting community and local Iowa economies.

“Hunting is responsible both directly and indirectly for thousands of jobs across Iowa,” Henter said. “By bringing this diverse group of partners together Hunting Works for Iowa will advocate for public policy that supports hunters and shooters and the jobs they create.”

Coalition co-leader Steve Ries, owner of Top Gun Kennel in Central City, said much of the money used to conserve wildlife areas and restore habitat which benefits both game and non-game species comes from hunters. But, in recent years, state Department of Natural Resources (DNR) officials said the number of annual resident hunting licenses has steadily declined over the past decades and harsh winters with heavy snowfall have deteriorated Iowa’s pheasant population.

DNR spokesman Kevin Baskins said the number of resident hunting licenses dropped steadily from 194,000 in 2001 to 160,000 in 2011. Likewise, the number of pheasants harvested by hunters in Iowa slipped from close to 1 million annually to about 250,000 last year.

DNR Director Roger Lande said recent harsh Iowa winters with snowfall amounts topping 30 inches a year cut into Iowa wildlife populations as well as farming practices that have reduced the level of wildlife habitat in parts of the state. He said he was encouraged that the mild winter that just occurred in Iowa would help rebuild wildlife populations but he noted that the trend lines would not change significantly over a single year.

DNR and hunting enthusiasts said more outreach and mentoring is needed to get non-traditional hunters and young people facing many other distractions involved in outdoor-related activities like hunting.

Baskins said leading factors that have contributed to the declining number of hunters include age and health factors, time constraints and loss of access to both public and private land.

Sponsors of the Senate plan said they wanted to curb abuses without impeding an important economic development tool, which they feared would happen under a broader House-passed plan.

Sen. Rick Bertrand, R-Sioux City, trashed the Senate approach as a bureaucratic “deal killer” loaded with “poison pills” that is a “distraction” keeping lawmakers from dealing with the real hurdles to development,such as Iowa’s commercial property, corporate and unemployment taxes.

After a sometimes-fiery floor debate, senators voted 26-22 along party lines to establish new yearly reporting requirements for cities, counties and rural improvement zones. A searchable database of that information would have to be online by Dec. 1.

The Legislative Services Agency also would be required to issue an annual report to the General Assembly and governor that would summarize and analyze the data provided by local entities.

Another provision of the bill would require a city to conduct a public hearing and vote on any amendments or modificationsto an adopted urban renewal plan.

Senators also adopted an “anti-piracy” provision that would bar TIF incentives from being used for the relocation of a commercial or industrial enterprise not currently located in the municipality.

That would be waived if the governing body where the business currently resides approves the relocation in writing, or if the governing board where the business plans to relocate can show written proof that the TIF would be in the best interest of the public.

A TIF effectively freezes the property taxes on a site at predevelopment levels and diverts the new taxes, or increment, into a fund often used for the project. Tax-collecting bodies like the city, county and school district do not get the increment during the term of the TIF agreement.

“This bill does not hurt TIF in any way,” Sen. Bill Dotzler, D-Waterloo, said Tuesday of the Senate plan. “TIF basically will function the way it is. But we just want to have accurate reporting, accountability and transparency for it, and make sure the piracy stuff is taken care of at least in a moderate way.”

In a key departure from the House, senators voted to strip out a provision that would have required a portion of TIF proceeds to be returned to counties and school districts after 25 years. The Senate also decided not to place new restrictions on proceeds from wind-energy TIFs in rural areas.

Closer legislative examination of such agreements was sparked this session by Coralville’s use of TIF for the Iowa River Landing commercial project, which last fall landed a Von Maur department store as its retail anchor.

Dotzler said he had “no idea until we got into it” the kind of abuse that was going on with TIF.

“But then, on the other hand, there’s so much good that’s happening because of tax increment financing. It’s kind of like a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde type of thing where it was working great in some areas, but in other areas you’ve got problems.”

Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, offered his “reluctant support” for the Senate plan, but said it did not go far enough.

“We could have done so much more,” said Quirmbach, who urged lawmakers to revisit the issue in the future to “deal more forcefully and directly” with the problems not addressed this session.

Bertrand agreed with Quirmbach, calling the Senate bill a political “paper tiger” that does not accomplish what proponents want, but is viewed by municipalities and developers as the “lesser of two evils” when compared to the House approach, which passed on a vote of 54-43 earlier this month.

Senate File 430 cleared its final hurdle Monday when the Senate agreed to accept some House modifications and ship the bill to Branstad on a 49-0 vote.

“Today, the people won. Mark one up for the public,” said Sen. Pam Jochum, D-Dubuque, who was a House member when she first started working on efforts to beef up enforcement of Iowa’s open meetings and open records laws in 2007.

Under the legislation, the governor will appoint nine members of the new oversight board – representing the news media, government entities and associations, and citizens – subject to confirmation by the Iowa Senate and balanced by political affiliation and gender.

The nine-member panel will have until July 1, 2013, to hire an executive director, who will advise the board that will have the power to hear and mediate disputes between Iowans and government bodies in matters of public meetings and open records and levy fines of up to $2,500 for willful violations. The board’s authority would not extend to the governor’s office, the judicial branch or the Legislature.

Branstad said the public information board will be an important entity to convey accurate information to government officials and citizens on compliance with state open meetings/open records laws and to provide an independent enforcement mechanism for the first time. “That’s something that most other states have and I think we should have in the state of Iowa as well,” the governor said.

Currently, citizen complaints on open meetings and records issues are handled by the state Citizens’ Aide/Ombudsman and the Iowa Attorney General’s Office.

The ombudsman’s office — which handled about 231 public records, meeting and privacy requests last year — can investigate complaints and issue warnings, but has no power to enforce the state’s statute. The attorney general’s office — which received about 100 public meeting and open records requests last year that mostly were handled informally without levying any fines — has the authority to enforce state statute, but its enforcement necessarily involves filing a lawsuit if penalties are going to be assessed to an offender.

Sen. David Johnson, R-Ocheyedan, said provisions of S.F. 430 will ensure that “the public’s right to know” is preserved and protected, while Sen. Daryl Beall, D-Fort Dodge, called Monday’s action “a long time in coming.”

“I’ve never understood people who want to do the public business and then go behind closed doors to conduct it,” Beall told his fellow senators prior to the final vote. “They say that sunshine is the best disinfectant that there is.”

One significant House change adopted by the Senate would keep draft or speculative documents confidential until they are brought before a governmental board for consideration and action.

A fiscal note prepared by the Legislative Services Agency estimated the legislative would carry a general fund cost of about $122,500 plus the cost of the board members’ per diem and travel beginning in the 2014 fiscal year.

Iowa now gets about $6.1 billion a year in federal aid, said David Roederer, director of the state Department of Management. That’s about the same amount as the state revenue that makes up the entire general fund.

During his weekly news conference, Branstad said Iowa and other states “need to be prepared for a significant reduction in federal funding” that likely will not be covered by future state appropriations.

“When you have a federal government that’s racking up more than a trillion-dollar increase in the national debt every year, and 40 percent of the money that they’re spending is borrowed money, we know that that is not sustainable,” he said. “… We’re going to have to find ways to deliver these services in a better and more efficient manner.”

Roederer said Iowa Workforce Development services would be the first affected, followed by education and health and human services.

“Any reductions are going to be significant,” he warned.

The initial impact already is being felt at the job services agency, where Iowa officials recently closed 36 workforce offices and budget negotiators are squabbling over funding to maintain 16 regional unemployment offices and at least three satellite facilities.

Workforce Development officials last week considered a pilot project to end in-person claim assistance at a Des Moines office. The move could have been expanded statewide as a way to save a significant share of the projected $5 million loss in federal money that state officials expect will occur next fiscal year. Branstad said he scrapped that experiment because he believes there needs to “be a human element” in those offices.

At the same time, he noted that Iowans seeking to re-enter or move up in the workforce will need higher skills that include being able to work with technology — such as the computers at workforce development kiosks around the state.

Here’s some of what lawmakers hope to accomplish in the 16th week of the 2012 session:

• Produce the first step in several decades toward equalizing tax rates for commercial and industrial property owners.
• Put in place a transition for moving Iowa’s mental health system from a county-based approach to a regional focus that brings more uniformity to services administered locally.
• Resolve differences between Republicans and Democrats, who share split control of the Legislature, on a fiscal 2013 spending plan that tops $6.2 billion.

Branstad said he has reached a tentative accord with Senate Democrats that is being studied by House Republicans. It would implement over multiple years a hybrid approach with three goals: accomplishing property tax reforms for commercial and industrial classes, limiting growth for residential and agricultural classes, and providing at least $250 million in state reimbursements for local governments.

Likewise, the governor forged a $6.2 billion budget plan with House Republicans that is being considered by Senate Democrats that could lead to adjourning the 2012 session later this week.

“There are still a lot of details to be worked out. It’s going to be a lot of work, but hopefully it can be accomplished,” Branstad said in an interview. “We see a genuine bipartisan commitment to try to resolve these issues and get this done hopefully before the end of (this) week.”

Negotiators say the comprehensive property tax package doesn’t phase down all commercial rates to 60 percent over eight years, as Branstad-led Republicans originally envisioned, but it benefits all property classes.

“I think everybody understands that we’re not all going to get exactly what we want and it may not be as large as what some people want,” said Jeff Boeyink, Branstad’s chief of staff, who has been part of the House-Senate negotiations.

Rep. Tom Sands, R-Wapello, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said House Republicans are analyzing the various components of the property-tax package to make certain they are achieving significant relief this session.

His caucus “will continue to do everything we can to advance the ball down the field,” he said. “There’s a difference in taking a step forward, as small as it may be, and taking a step sideways or backwards.”

House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, said he’s sought property tax reform since being elected in 2002.

“That would be something I’m excited about,” Paulsen said of an agreement. “I’ve worked on property taxes for years and years.”

Boeyink said the first piece that must fall into place, hopefully today, is final agreement among lawmakers and the governor on the big-picture fiscal 2013 spending number. That will clear the way for negotiating details for the various budget pieces, the tax issues, the mental-health redesign and the education reform measures.

Top lawmakers held out hope they could adjourn by the middle of the week but Boeyink was skeptical: “We’re looking at Friday as a best case.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

So far this year, the split-control Legislature has approved 115 enrolled bills and joint resolutions. But that number will grow once the House and Senate finalize work on roughly a dozen fiscal 2013 budget bills and reach expected agreements on property tax reform, mental health redesign, education reform and a short list of other priorities.

Last year, lawmakers worked a 172-day, overtime session that produced 138 enrolled bills and joint resolutions. Observers believe this year will wrap up with a similar output.

In comparison, the 82nd General Assembly passed 322 bills during the 2007 and 2008 sessions.

“In pure numbers, it’s the lightest session we’ve had for several decades,” said Richard Johnson of the nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency, which provides support services and helps lawmakers draft policy measures and appropriation bills. “My recollection is we’ve never been this low since I’ve been here and that’s been 30 years.”

The 73rd General Assembly sent then-Gov. Terry Branstad 602 bills during its 1989 and 1990 sessions. Since then, lawmakers gradually have lowered their legislative output to where the annual bill total has exceeded 200 only three times in the past 11 years.

“When you can reduce the number of bills, that’s probably a good thing,” said Rep. Ralph Watts, R-Adel. “If you put all the code books side by side and you look at the growth of them over the years, you can really relate that — as those books grow, your personal freedom goes down.

“People complain about, ‘well, it’s a do-nothing Legislature.’ My experience in the time I’ve been here is the shorter time we’re here, the better off the people out there are; the less we get involved, the less we meddle in their lives,” Watts added.

Lawmakers say the back-to-back years of below-average legislative output are a result of divided government. Republicans hold a 60-40 edge in the Iowa House and Democrats narrowly control the Iowa Senate with a 26-24 majority.

They also cite:

—-  A ‘go-slow’ concern among constituents looking for stability in unsettled economic and political times.

—-  An agenda that included a number of complicated and time-consuming issues in a year when leaders compressed the session timetable .

—-  A desire to both limit the growth of government and emphasize quality over quantity.

“I don’t think Iowans should judge a legislative session by the number of bills passed. I would think that would be almost a meaningless measure for whether a Legislature has been successful or not. I think it really gets more to the substance of what is being passed,” said Sen. Rob Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids. “I think people want government to continue to be updated. I think people also want us to focus on things that are important to the economy or education.”

Rep. Tom Sands, R-Wapello, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said House Republicans have made a conscious effort to maintain a limited focus, to slow the growth in government and reduce the regulations that go along with administering state laws.

Hogg, vice chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee — an area that traditionally sees a lot of legislative action — said the panel took a limited approach this session to House-passed measures dealing with gun laws and other bills that seemed politically motivated or designed to take advantage of an election-year session.

Committee chairman Sen. Eugene Fraise, D-Fort Madison, said he questioned every measure by asking “if the state of Iowa has survived for more than 160 years without this bill, why do we really need it this year?” as a quality-control standard.

“One of the things I sense — people feel there’s a little turbulence right now. The rhetoric is getting pretty extreme,” Hogg said. “I think people react to that. Let’s not go to these extreme postures. Let’s stabilize, hold together, get Democrats and Republicans to work together. In some sense, that’s a stabilizing influence and it means you don’t need to pass legislation on every subject.”

Jeff Boeyink, Branstad’s chief of staff, said he is optimistic the Legislature will adjourn by Friday. If lawmakers manage to resolve differences over commercial property tax relief, mental-health redesign and education reform, approve a public information board to assure transparency in government, and settle on a “really solid” budget number, “I think we’re going to feel pretty good about this session,” he said.

Iowa House page Sydney Fehr, a North Tama High School senior from Traer, decorates a box Monday that a lawmaker will use to pack up materials when the legislative session ends, probably next week. (James Q. Lynch/The Gazette)

With less than one week left in the 2012 session, lawmakers face a shrinking list of priority bills standing between them and adjournment. Lawmakers’ daily expense money ended on Tuesday’s 100th calendar day and leaders in the split-control Legislature believe they can wrap things up next week.

STATE BUDGET

ISSUE: Finalizing fiscal 2013 general fund spending to finance state government for 12 months beginning July 1

STATUS: Majority Republicans in the House and majority Democrats in the Senate are trying to find middle ground on spending differences that likely will settle near Gov. Terry Branstad’s proposed $6.24 billion funding proposal. Major disagreements center on funding for higher education after lawmakers agreed last session to give a 2 percent per-pupil funding increase to K-12 schools for the 2012-13 school year. Republicans also want to fully fund property tax reimbursements for local governments while Democrats want to cover about $42 million in lost Medicaid and other federal funding for mental health services rather than cutting other budget areas to replace the federal dollars.

PROPERTY TAX REFORM

ISSUE: Reforming property tax system to provide relief to businesses and industries by gradually rolling back rates similar to residential and agricultural property

STATUS: A top priority of both political parties, Republicans and Democrats are seeking to provide at least $250 million in multiyear relief to reduce tax rates for commercial and industrial property owners. Gov. Terry Branstad and legislative Republicans seek to roll back taxes on commercial property from 100 percent of assessed valuation to 60 percent over eight years while providing state “backfill” payments to cities and counties to make up for some of the commercial property tax money they’d lose as a result of the rollback. Democrats favor a state tax credit they say would give four out of five commercial building owners a 40 percent-plus tax cut without shifting the tax burden on to residential property owners. Sen. Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said “I feel relatively good” a resolution is near.

EDUCATION REFORM

ISSUE: Begin multiyear effort to revamp teacher preparation/pay and bolster student achievement

STATUS: A House-Senate conference committee likely will be asked to find middle-ground compromises that will meet Gov. Terry Branstad’s expectations. House Republicans want to require more student testing, hold back third-graders who cannot demonstrate reading proficiency, tighten restrictions on online education and create a series of end-of-course exams in high school. Senate Democrats want to continue the focus on reading and small-class sizes in early grades so teachers can help struggling students catch up; expand core classes to include art, music and technology; promote more teacher-to-teacher collaboration and classroom coaching; and expand online course offering and learning resources.

MENTAL HEALTH REDESIGN

ISSUE: Revamp county-based system with statewide focus

STATUS: Lawmakers are moving ahead with plans to redesign Iowa’s county-based mental-health system into a statewide effort in which services would be administered regionally and delivered locally. A key sticking point in bipartisan efforts was removed when House Republicans agreed to reinstate county property tax levies slated to sunset by July 2013 that generate about $125 million annually for mental-health services. Diferences remain on funding issues. Negotiators say they are close to an agreement.

OTHER ISSUES

• Efforts to ban traffic enforcement cameras and raise the state’s gasoline tax got considerable attention this year but stalled on their legislative journeys
• A measure seeking to create a regulatory framework for a small-scale nuclear energy project by MidAmerican Energy remains eligible for Senate debate,
• Work is still under way to revise tax increment financing (TIF) authority that cities and counties can use for economic development and urban renewal projects.
• A carry-over 2011 issue to establish a public information board to enforce open meetings/open records law is getting an 11th-hour look in both chambers.

“It was our goal not to damage this tool,” Sen. Bill Dotzler, D-Waterloo, told members of the Senate Ways and Means Committee. The panel voted 11-3 to send an amended version of the bill to the full Senate. It strips a House provision that would require a portion of TIF proceeds to be returned to counties and school districts after 25 years.

Dotzler said the Senate approach establishes new yearly reporting requirements for cities, counties and rural improvement zones. It calls for a searchable database of that information to be accessible online by Dec. 1. The Legislative Services Agency also would be required to issue an annual report to the General Assembly and governor that would summarize and analyze the data provided by local entities.

Another provision would require a city to conduct a public hearing and a public vote on any amendments or modifications made to an adopted urban renewal plan. Senators also adopted an “anti-piracy” provision that would bar TIF incentives from being used for the relocation of a commercial or industrial enterprise not currently located in the municipality. That would be waived if the governing body where the business currently resides approves the relocation in writing, or if the governing board where the business plans to relocate can show written proof that the TIF would be in the best interest of the public.

A TIF effectively freezes the property taxes on a site at predevelopment levels and diverts the new taxes, or increment, into a fund often used for the project. Tax-collecting bodies like the city, county and school district do not get the increment during the term of the TIF agreement.

Closer legislative examination of such agreements was sparked this session by Coralville’s use of TIF for the Iowa River Landing commercial project, which last fall landed a Von Maur department store as its retail anchor.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said legislative leaders and Gov. Terry Branstad have settled on an overall general fund spending level that is close to the $6.24 billion proposal the governor outlined in January. Still unresolved, however, is whether additional spending will be authorized from sources considered outside of the general fund or whether that money will have to come from within the overall general-fund number, negotiators indicated.

“We came down significantly,” Gronstal said.

When talks began House Republicans had proposed an overall budget of $6.06 billion, Branstad favored a $6.24 billion spending level and Senate Democrats were seeking up to $6.33 billion to fund state government for the 12-month period that commences on July 1.

“The budget differences continue to narrow, and all parties continue to negotiate toward an agreed-to number,” said Branstad spokesman Tim Albrecht. “We are pleased with the progress we are making and are confident we will come to an agreement on a balanced budget that spends less than we take in and is sustainable for the future.”

Once top lawmakers and the governor have finalized the size of the fiscal 2013 state budget pie, House-Senate conference committee members will be given spending targets they will use to carve up the available funds.

Tuesday marked the 2012 session’s 100th calendar day – the benchmark when legislators’ daily expense ends and a traditional harbinger that adjournment will not be far off. Some lawmakers have not ruled out the possibility of wrapping up this year’s session by week’s end but leaders say it’s more likely final adjournment will arrive some time next week.

Along with a budget agreement, other priorities that have not been resolved include revamping the property tax system to cut rates for commercial and industrial classes while minimizing impacts on other property classes and local government entities; redesigning Iowa’s county-based mental health system into a regional network; and beginning the process of reforming Iowa’s educational system.

Vaudt said Monday it appears switching the Lottery to a state authority in September 2003 had a “significant” benefit for lottery employees but less so for the state, and he cautioned against granting too much independence to other state entities, such as the Economic Development Authority, to operate under different financial accountability standards than most state departments and agencies.

Lottery officials countered that they operate a free-standing enterprise like a private business that receives no direct state funding while turning a profit that has generated more than $1 billion in deposits to the state treasury since its inception in 1985. Gov. Terry Branstad — who noted the Lottery’s authority status was put in place after he left office in 1999 — also registered his vote of confidence for the leaders of the state-run gaming enterprise, calling their performances “exemplary.”

In his 44-page audit covering eight fiscal years issued Monday, Vaudt said key Iowa Lottery officials received significantly larger salary increases and higher overall salaries than their counterparts in other state entities once it was converted to an authority.

Vaudt, in an interview, said it was “impossible to know” if the pay increases were excessive because the Iowa Lottery Board “inappropriately delegated the compensation review to lottery officials who would be financially impacted by the results of the review” – a delegation which “caused flawed compensation review results and inadequately justified key personnel salaries.” Because of that, he said, it appeared the board failed to properly exercise its fiduciary responsibilities in determining and approving appropriate key personnel salaries.

After the Iowa Lottery became an authority not subject to some fiscal requirements of state agencies, Vaudt said the salaries of top Lottery officials significantly outpaced pay increases in other comparable state entities.

“In addition, a majority of state department directors included in the review did not receive any salary increases in fiscal years 2004 and 2005 while Iowa Lottery salaries increased substantially,” Vaudt’s report indicated. “A majority of the state division directors included in the review recognized salary increases ranging from 6.12 percent to 13.38 percent. During this two-year period, the prior Iowa Lottery CEO’s salary increased 68.55 percent and other key personnel received salary increases ranging from 13.86 percent to 27.55 percent.”

Lottery officials issued a response to the audit Monday, noting that current Lottery CEO Terry Rich is paid $180,377 – an annual salary set by the governor – and that yearly pay for other top lottery officials ranged from $130,915 to $53,997. Rich noted that the lottery’s core products continue to register record sales and the authority has handled challenging circumstances in recent months which “clearly demonstrates the expertise of the professional, knowledgeable management team at the Iowa Lottery.”

“Here’s the bottom line: Any business has to be concerned about budgeting and spending, and, it would be one thing if lottery sales and proceeds had gone down since the lottery became an authority,” Lottery spokesman Mary Neubauer said in a statement. “But our numbers are up – way up. That kind of success doesn’t happen by itself. It takes a strong team to get there that is able to make good business decisions quickly, something the authority status has allowed the lottery to do.”

Former Iowa Lottery CEO Edward Stanek, in an email response, disputed many of Vaudt’s claims and noted “the Iowa Lottery is an entrepreneurial enterprise that is in the entertainment business unlike the rest of the executive branch of state government. The report clearly shows a fundamental lack of business understanding on the part of the auditor’s office and an apparent disregard by that office for accuracy and thoroughness.”

Stanek and lottery officials expressed disappointment that Vaudt did not interview board members or Stanek regarding his report, but the auditor said that would not have changed the data or the conclusions of his study.

In his audit, Vaudt noted the Iowa Lottery has generated more yearly revenues, but he said the experience has been similar in other states and the upturn did not related directly to shifting the operation from a state agency to an authority.

Looking at U.S. Census data for fiscal 2007, Vaudt said the Iowa Lottery’s per-capital sales were 58.5 percent lower than the national average and its administrative costs were 10.2 percent higher than the national average.

Vaudt recommended the Legislature establish controls over compensation practices of all state authorities, including the Iowa Lottery, to ensure authority status does not result in salaries which are not based on employee responsibilities, experience and other valid documented considerations. He also advised lawmakers to determine if it is necessary to maintain key lottery positions and to conduct a comparison of all state authority salaries with pay levels at other state agencies “to identify any other salary anomalies.”

The state auditor also recommended the Lottery Board conduct an independent review of compensation practices for states of similar size and demographics to determine if current salaries for top Iowa officials are appropriate.

Tim Albrecht, Branstad’s communications director, said the governor planned to review the audit findings and “make adjustments if necessary.” However, he noted the governor continues to support Rich and his lottery team “as they continue to successfully and effectively execute” the lottery’s core functions and perform at “an extremely successful level.”

Comments: (515) 243-7220; rod.boshart@sourcemedia.net

State Sen. Pat Ward. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

State Sen. Pat Ward, R-Clive, an assistant minority leader, issued a statement Monday saying she and her husband were hospitalized for medical treatment of injuries they suffered during an accident that occurred while they were picking up storm debris at their Clive residence last weekend.

Ward said she sustained a “minor compression fracture in my lower back that will not require surgery,” while her husband, John, fractured several ribs and was diagnosed with a partially collapsed lung.

“We are both doing well, are in good spirits and we both look forward to being released from the hospital later today or tomorrow. I am excited about returning to my work in the Senate either tomorrow or later this week,” Ward said in a statement. “My husband, John, and I want to extend or sincerest appreciation for all of the many kind thoughts and prayers extended our way as well as the wonderful care we have received from Mercy Hospital.”

The state budget bill that deals with the politically volatile issue of Medicaid-funded “medically necessary” abortions for low-income women performed at the University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics in Iowa City likely will trigger renewed scrutiny on that policy, and a new push to prioritize public funds to health care entities in a way that abortion opponents hope will steer money for women’s health and family planning away from agencies like Planned Parenthood.

“I personally have a fair degree of optimism that some babies’ lives will be saved when the dust settles on this bill,” said Chuck Hurley of The Family Leader, a conservative activist group that put out an email message to its members to support an amendment to the fiscal 2013 health and human services budget bill by a group of House Republicans that would “put a stop to your dollars going to abortionists.”

Hurley said his group is trying to counter a “deluge” of emails from Planned Parenthood activists and others opposing amendments filed by Reps. Annette Sweeney, R-Alden, and Tom Shaw, R-Laurens, to House File 2435 that would effectively “defund” Planned Parenthood of state tax dollar reimbursement by redirecting money for providing birth control and reproductive health exams to poor women to comprehensive, full-service medical service providers similar to policies adopted in nine other states.

Rep. Dave Heaton, R-Mount Pleasant, co-leader of the House-Senate health and human services budget subcommittee, said the 60-member GOP House majority is still discussing the topics. He noted the issue is not directly related to funding for abortions but he said efforts in other states to give preference to hospitals, family practice clinics or other agencies that do not engage in abortion procedures have raised federal funding concerns.

However, the divisions within the Iowa House prompted Democrats who hold a 26-24 majority in the Iowa Senate on Tuesday to move a different version — Senate Study Bill 3201 – of the HHS budget through the Senate Appropriations Committee that did not address abortion funding provisions that were resolved last session as part of a two-year budget that already has been signed by Gov. Terry Branstad. The committee approved the measure 13-8 and Sen. Jack Hatch, D-Des Moines, the other subcommittee co-chairman, said the Senate will insist on an open system of providing voluntary service options for low-income women.

“That’s their paranoia. Not ours,” Hatch said of House proposals to restrict family planning and family counseling money as part of a national agenda to defund Planned Parenthood.

Hatch said abortion-related issues have the potential agenda this year to grind legislative work on resolving budget differences to a halt temporarily, but he said an equally formidable hurdle is the roughly $65 million difference between the House’s $1.563 billion spending level versus the Senate’s $1.628 billion fiscal 2013 proposal.

Rep. Scott Raecker, R-Urbandale, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said the dollar differences are a major hang-up but he added the House likely will also have another debate on abortion funding, which he noted is not unusual. “Every health and human service budget that I’ve been involved with has had a debate on those issues in the House. It’s no surprise. The Republican caucus is a pro-life caucus. It’s an issue of concern,” he said.

Hurley said he hopes House Republicans will stand firm for both good fiscal and social policy to save the lives of babies and women. He also held out hope that pro-life Democrats in the Senate, some who are retiring after this year, will vote their convictions and that Branstad would make good on a 2010 campaign promise Branstad in 2010 to “try to move money away from abortionists in Iowa and supporting a policy that would “defund” Planned Parenthood.

“I think it will come down to how tight of a political grip does Planned Parenthood have with the blood money that they’ve given to Senate Democratic campaigns? That really to me is the bottom line question – how strong is that grip and conversely how strong are Gov. Branstad’s and the House Republicans’ convictions,” Hurley said in an interview.

Jill June, president and chief executive officer of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, said the changes House Republicans are considering would violate federal law and threaten Medicaid funding for Iowa.

“These short-sighted legislators are willing to rise at least $2.2 billion in federal Medicaid funds to the state of Iowa because of their views against Planned Parenthood,” June said in a statement. “In an effort to force their ideological views into Iowa law, they will take away much-needed health care from thousands of Iowans — including birth control, Pap smears and cancer screenings. For many women, the health care provided by Planned Parenthood is their only affordable option.”

First grader Cole Simons (center left) and second grader Katelyn Ray (center right) are walked to their classrooms by Katelyn's grandmother, Judy Ray of Cedar Rapids (left), walking with Zoey Simons, and Jennifer Wilson of Perry, walking with Taylor Ray, at Prairie Ridge Elementary School in Cedar Rapids in August 2011. (Liz Martin/The Gazette)

DES MOINES — Gov. Terry Branstad indicated Monday that he may intervene in a school start date controversy if the Legislature fails to address concerns by Iowa tourism officials that school districts are routinely granted state waivers to begin classes before Sept. 1.

A measure is working its way through the Iowa House that proposes to change Iowa’s school start date law by limiting the authority of the Iowa Department of Education to grant a school district’s waiver request to commence classes before Sept. 1 to a date no earlier than the fourth Monday of August. The bill also requires the department to charge school districts a waiver application fee of $100 that proponents say would help cover staff time needed to critically evaluate waiver requests.

Backers say the bill is intended to be a compromise between the tourism/hospitality industry and education groups because it does not eliminate the waiver process, but rather gives school districts a choice in the matter and provides money for state education department to commit resources to evaluate waiver requests instead of just automatically approving them. However, language in the study bill stipulates that proceeds from the $100 fee would be deposited in the state’s general fund, not flow directly to the education department.

Changing the school start date law has won Senate approval on several occasions in past sessions only to stall in the House. However, House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, has indicated he believes the current bill likely would muster the required 51 votes for passage this year.

On Monday, Branstad said early school starts hurt Iowa’s economy and cost jobs because families are unable to take vacations in August, a key share of Iowa’s tourism season that includes the popular Iowa State Fair. The governor said that neighboring states of Wisconsin and Minnesota do not allow schools to start before Sept. 1 and that he may advise the state’s education department to take a more critical eye toward granting local school district waivers if lawmakers choose not to change the status quo approach.

“If the Legislature fails to act, I think that might be something that we would seriously look at,” the governor told reporters at his weekly news conference Monday.

Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, floor manager of the bill, called the measure a wide-ranging reform effort that would raise academic standards, help educators improve and employ innovation to bolster student achievement while building on Iowa’s strong tradition of excellence in education.

“We have in fact some very, very good schools — with very hardworking teachers, with strong community support, with good kids — that have produced remarkable students and a remarkable record of achievement throughout the state’s history,” he said before senators voted 26-24 to ship the measure to the House and an expected path to conference committee.

The GOP-led House previously passed an education reform package that would require more student testing, seeks expansion of charters schools and keeps in place a controversial third-grade retention program.

The House also rejected key components in Branstad’s reform recommendations by eliminating requirements that prospective teachers have and maintain a 3.0 grade-point average and placing new restrictions on who can take online classes before sending the Iowa Senate one of the session’s must-do priorities for further consideration.

For their part, Senate Democrats said their approach would continue the focus on reading and small-class sizes in early grades so teachers can help struggling students catch up. They also support competency-based provisions that allow students to progress at their own pace; favor expanding core classes to include art, music and technology; promote more teacher-to-teacher collaboration and classroom coaching; and seek to expand online course offering and learning resources under appropriation teacher supervision while limiting some of the abuses of the new technology, Quirmbach said.

The Senate bill keeps the controversial third-grade retention component of the early grade statewide reading program, but it requires that schools look at other grades than reading scores and involve parents in the conversation before students are retained. It also adds a kindergarten-readiness test but does not include the House provisions for end-of-course exams or Gov. Terry Branstad’s call for a college-entrance exam, such as the ACT.

Sen. Shawn Hamerlinck, R-Dixon, said the Senate bill did nothing to address inequities in Iowa’s education system and fell short of the ultimatum goal of creating world-class schools by rejecting ideas offered by the GOP minority.

“We can do better and many of our schools are under performing,” he said.

The GOP governor told his weekly news conference he has had “some positive and fruitful” discussions with Democrats who are in charge of the Iowa Senate that have made him optimistic an accord can be reached that will provide permanent relief for all property classes, but especially commercial and industrial property owners. At the same time, he noted that no details have been worked out on a compromise that remains a major obstacle to adjourning the split-control Legislature for this year.

Commercial and industrial property is taxed at 100 percent of its market value. Branstad would like to see that lowered incrementally over eight years to 60 percent and he would like to cap yearly increases at 2 percent for residential and agricultural properties up to a future maximum of 60 percent as well.

As a token of his good faith, the governor has indicated he will accept a Senate-passed plan to increase the earned income tax credit for working families, a proposal he vetoed twice last year.

Sen. Joe Bolkcom, D-Iowa City, chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said he welcomed Branstad’s acceptance of the earned income tax credit increase but said that was “catch-up” for other tax cuts the Legislature sent him that favored businesses and other taxpayers which were signed into law. “We’ve passed more tax cuts than he has,” Bolkcom said.

Democrats have offered a targeted property tax cut aimed at small and Main Street businesses that would guard against shifting the tax burden to residential classes and would put up $250 million in state “backfill” money to protect local governments against a loss of revenue due to commercial property tax relief.

Branstad and House Republicans do not favor delivering relief via a state tax credit as Democrats propose, noting the state has a poor track record of fully funding such commitments. A major disagreement in the fiscal 2013 state budget is House Republicans’ insistence on providing an extra $55 million from the state general fund to fully fund current property tax credits — such as the homestead tax credit — to local governments for the next fiscal year that begins July 1.

A traffic camera at First Avenue and 10th Street NE is among seven installed at Cedar Rapids intersections since 2010. (Matt Nelson/The Gazette)

DES MOINES — A House-passed bill to ban traffic enforcement cameras likely will end the 2012 legislative session parked along the road to adjournment.

Senate President Jack Kibbie, D-Emmetsburg, has assigned the bill to the Senate Transportation Committee, which chairman Sen. Tom Rielly, D-Oskaloosa, said is not scheduled to meet again this year. Rielly, a former mayor, said he viewed the issue as a local decision for communities seeking to improve the safety of their roadways and intersections.

Kibbie said that likely means the bill’s chances for seeing Senate action are “pretty slim.”

The bill was preserved for debate as a House Appropriations Committee bill before winning approval by a 58-42 vote of the full House on Tuesday. Kibbie, however, said he did not consider the measure to be a budget issue because it deals with the transportation chapter of the Iowa Code and the Senate Appropriations Committee “has got plenty to do without working on that bill.”

Sen. Bob Dvorsky, D-Coralville, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, predicted the traffic camera bill “wouldn’t fare very well” if it came to his panel, agreeing with Rielly that it was a “home rule issue.”

Sen. Brad Zaun, R-Urbandale, a leading proponent of the camera ban, said he hoped to keep the proposal alive by attaching it as an amendment to another bill. But that likely would face challenges under Senate rules.

Zaun said he was “very optimistic” an amendment would survive a challenge, but he also acknowledged there is an effort under way “to try to kill” the proposal that may be too formidable to overcome.

“I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to get something done, but realistically that’s probably not likely this year,” he said.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said the bill’s fate rests at the committee level, but he added “I think it’s unlikely it comes up. I think it’s probably effectively funneled but I don’t know that.”

Gov. Terry Branstad has said he would sign legislation to ban traffic-monitoring devices if the split-control Legislature sent him a bill this session.

Senate File 2230, which cleared a Senate subcommittee on Wednesday, would require the state insurance commissioner to establish a health insurance and cost containment bureau within the insurance division that would be responsible for creating methodologies to hold health carriers accountable for the fair treatment of health care providers and developing affordability standards for health insurance geared toward improved accessibility, quality and affordability of care.

The bureau would be assisted by a new 14-member advisory board comprised of seven voting members appointed by the governor and subject to Senate confirmation that represent small business, consumers, insurance and health-care providers, and a health care actuary or an economist with expertise in health insurance. Non-voting members would include the insurance commissioner of insurance, the directors of state human services and public health agencies and four legislators.

Proponents said the expanded data collection would bring more transparency to often complicated and disjointed medical charges and enable oversees to compare costs, frequencies and variances in medical procedures around Iowa. Currently, Iowa hospitals collect some cost data but a representative of the Iowa Hospital Association told the three-member subcommittee that the effort is limited by federal restrictions to certain health-care records.

“This would be the most significant proposal that we would have to drive down costs for consumers in the short run,” said Sen. Jack Hatch, D-Des Moines, who noted that 10 states currently have database collection programs – three that are voluntarily operated. He said the cost of Iowa’s government-based effort initially would land between $500,000 to $2 million and be paid for by a combination of state and federal funding sources and fees paid by insurance carriers.

“I think it is a pretty thorough and comprehensive approach to containing costs,” Hatch said.

Sen. Matt McCoy, D-Des Moines, chairman of the subcommittee that approved the measure on a 2-1 vote, said health care expenses are an area for government and private business that is “without a budget” due to the unpredictability of costs and the difficulty in tracking medical-related information.

“Right now we don’t have any transparency in the system. Until we know that, how can we manage the cost?” McCoy said.

Sen. Roby Smith, R-Davenport, the only subcommittee who declined to support the measure, said he was concerned that Hatch was unable to predict whether the new oversight process would reduce insurance premiums for consumers. He also said the proposed legislation emerged late in the session on a fast track in the Senate and likely would face an uphill battle in the GOP-led House if it manages to win Senate approval before the Legislature adjourns later this month.

No one spoke against the bill during Wednesday’s subcommittee meeting, but the Federation of Iowa Insurers was registered in opposition to Senate File 2230.

In this Sunday, Nov. 20, 2011 photo, a cigarette is made using a machine in New York. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

State lawmakers are looking at legislation designed to tax roll-your-own cigarette machines that allow Iowans to produce their own tobacco products at about half the price of buying their smokes retail.

Sen. Pam Jochum, D-Dubuque, said owners of roll-your-machines that cost about $35,000 have set up store fronts where customers can purchase loose tobacco and tubes with or without filters and then temporarily rent the machine to produce up to 200 rolled cigarettes in about 10 minutes. She said the products are assessed state sales tax but not cigarette or excise taxes like similar manufactured cigarettes.

“We are closing a technical tax loophole that has allowed these roll your owns to escape or evade taxation,” said Jochum, floor manager of Senate File 2328 – a wide-ranging bill offered by the state Department of Revenue that seeks a number of changes that includes treating cigarette rollers as vending machines and increasing the tax on store-rolled smokes. The tax change sought by the state revenue department would not apply to hand-rolled cigarettes that consumers who purchase loose tobacco might make at work or home.

Jochum said she views the issue as one of tax equity in requiring owners of roll-your-own machines to pay the same tax that cigarette makers pay.

However, Jeffrey Burd, an Ohio attorney representing a company with roll-your-own machines in Iowa, said the situation in Iowa is a “very unholy alliance” of anti-smoking advocates and big tobacco manufacturers, distributors and retailers working together to snuff out a budding business.

“They don’t want to level the playing field, they want to demolish the playing field,” said Burd, who contended that people who roll their own cigarettes pay tobacco tax at a rate of 50 percent of the wholesale price of the tobacco and the idea that a loophole exists in Iowa’s law “is a myth.” He said the provisions in S.F. 2328, which could be debated as soon as Wednesday, would put small businesspeople who purchased roll-your-own machines out of business.

“This bill would treat some people who roll their own cigarettes differently than others,” Burd said. He noted that similar efforts have been tried in at least 26 states, with a few succeeding but most have failed.

Jochum said proponents try to portray the roll-your-own operations as mom and pop shops but generally the businesses are operated by out-of-state owners who have placed machines in Dubuque, Marion, Davenport and Burlington. With five machines currently known in Iowa and at least six more on order, the Dubuque Democrat said she hopes lawmakers get in front on the taxation issue to avoid a repeat of the TouchPlay fiasco where businesses who purchased state lottery devices were hurt when the Legislature pulled the plug on the program.

“Our concern is a lot of innocent people will purchase (roll-your-own machines) only to have the state say you can’t do it,” she said. “We’re trying to address it early on before this blossoms into something very large.”

In this July 14, 2004, photo, people enjoy the Field of Dreams baseball field in rural Dyersville, Iowa. (AP Photo/Dubuque Telegraph Herald, Dave Kettering)

DES MOINES – Legislation offering a sales tax rebate to a company planning a $38 million investment in the Field of Dreams near Dyersville reached home plate with the Iowa Senate Tuesday.

Senators voted 34-14 to approve Senate File 2329, a measure designed to provide a tax rebate of up to $16.5 million to the owners of the sprawling Eastern Iowa cornfields made famous by the movie “Field of Dreams” who want to preserve the site’s baseball legacy.

The company, Go the Distance Baseball LLC, plans to develop the 193-acre site near Dyersville as a $38.4 million baseball and softball complex. The prospective buyers plan to purchase the farmhouse and baseball field featured in the 1989 film, along with surrounding land, as a site to build the “All-Star Ballpark Heaven,” a complex of 24 baseball and softball diamonds, an indoor training facility and lodging that would draw teams from all around to compete in major tournaments.

“This is about fun and family,” said Sen. Tom Hancock, D-Epworth.

S.F. 2329 authorizes the Iowa Department of Revenue to rebate sales tax collected by retailers on purchases made at a baseball and softball tournament facility and movie site. The bill’s language is crafted to apply only to the Dyersville project, stating that construction on the facility must commence not later than one year following the enactment of the bill and the cost of the construction must be at least $38 million.

The rebate of sales tax only applies to the sales tax collected on transactions occurring on or after Jan. 1, 2014, and before Jan. 1, 2024, and shall only be paid from the baseball and softball tournament facility and movie site sales tax rebate fund created in the bill. Backers said the provisions are similar to an incentive package the General Assembly approved for the Iowa Speedway in Newton.

The project is projected to create 506 jobs and generate $47 million in economic activity via tourism spending at restaurants, hotels and other spinoff retail activity. During Tuesday’s Senate debate, Sen. Bill Dotzler, D-Waterloo, the bill’s floor manager, pegged the full-time jobs at 1,200 connected to a project he said “hit one out of the park.”

Sen. Mark Chelgren, R-Ottumwa, unsuccessfully offered an amendment to prohibit the owners from seeking other state grants, noting that taxpayer money would be financing up to 43 percent of the initial investment and the arrangement was improperly being called a rebate because that implies taxpayers would be getting money back when they’re not. He also noted that the movie character, Ray Kinsella, invested his own money after he heard a voice tell him to “build it and they will come.”

“He didn’t do it with taxpayer money. He didn’t do it with a bailout. He did it with his own money,” Chelgren said.

The bill now goes to the House for consideration.

In other action, senators voted 48-0 to provide a tax credit designed to promote more donations to emergency food banks.

Senate File 2327, which would take effect next Jan. 1, establishes a farm-to-food donation tax credit against individual or corporate income taxes that could be claimed by the taxpayer who produces the food. Under the program administered by the state Department of Revenue, a taxpayer may claim a tax credit for 10 percent of the value of donated commodities up to $5,000. The bill requires that the commodities be suitable for human consumption and be donated to Iowa food banks or other Iowa emergency feeding organizations.

Also, senators voted 48-0 to authorize income tax check-offs for the child abuse prevention program fund, and for the combined veterans trust fund and volunteer fire fighter preparedness fund retroactively to last Jan. 1 under Senate File 2325. The Iowa Code limits to four the number of income tax check-offs that can appear on the income tax return, with the check-offs for the fish and wildlife fund and the Iowa State Fair fund to continue.

And finally, the Senate voted 48-0 to send Gov. Terry Branstad a bill (Senate File 2208) which provides that arrest warrants issued in Iowa would not be considered confidential once a defendant has made an initial appearance in court. Senators accepted a House change that would allow courts to order warrants to remain confidential.

Comments: (515) 243-7220; rod.boshart@sourcemedia.net

Anthony Carroll, AARP Iowa associate state director for advocacy, told a Statehouse news conference that MidAmerican’s paid newspaper advertisement last week misrepresented and “lied about our position” on House File 561 – a bill that would allow MidAmerican Energy to seek permission from state regulators to move forward with a proposed nuclear power plant estimated to cost up to $2 billion to build.

Under the House-passed measure currently eligible for Senate debate, the Iowa Utilities Board would not be required to follow traditional rate rules or the usual cost recovery methods in deciding issues pertaining to the permitting, licensing, and building of MidAmerican’s proposal to construct a nuclear-powered facility using new modular technology.

“The (MidAmerican) ads stated that AARP is an opponent of nuclear power. That is an outright lie, just the beginning of a new campaign by MidAmerican to fool Iowans into favoring H.F. 561. Iowans deserve better than to be fooled,” he said. Carroll contended the MidAmerican ad offered a “false portrayal” of AARP’s position in an attempt to hide the truth and shift the focus away from what the proposed legislation actually does.

“AARP is fighting for a better deal for ratepayers and customers who bear all the costs and risks. MidAmerican is fighting for their shareholders,” he added. “Our focus is about getting this bill defeated. If it has to move forward, putting in some common sense consumer protections.”

Carroll pointed to an analysis by the Iowa Utilities Board’s staff that concluded H.F. 561 shifted the risk from MidAmerican to its ratepayers and created “undesirable incentives” to keep costs low and minimize risk. He noted that AARP did not oppose 2010 legislation that earmarked $15 million in ratepayer money to study the feasibility of a nuclear option, but now customers deserve to know the results of that study and how the money was spent.

“The question of whether to build a new nuclear power plant is in Mid-American’s hands. It’s critical to know that they can build a new plant without House File 561,” Carroll said. “The question for Iowa lawmakers is whether to shift the nearly $1 billion to multi-billions in costs and risks associated with building new plants from the company to its customers. That is what AARP opposes.”

Ann Thelen, MidAmerican Energy’s director of communications & media relations, said her company felt compelled to place the ad to clarify for Iowans what the proposed legislation will and will not do.

“The bill does not allow MidAmerican Energy to raise customers’ rates,” she said in a statement, “and, if passed by the Iowa Legislature, the bill does not make MidAmerican Energy customers prepay for a nuclear power plant.

“This bill has the strongest consumer protections of any enacted nuclear legislation and imposes caps on spending,” Thelen added. “AARP says they don’t oppose nuclear power; however, by opposing all of the tools to keep nuclear as an option for Iowans, that are essentially opposing nuclear power generation.”

The MidAmerican spokeswoman also noted that the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Friday approved the next round of reactors in South Carolina, a state which has similar legislation in place.

“Despite what the AARP said this morning, as the current law stands, small modular nuclear reactors are not included in Iowa’s ratemaking principles. It would not be prudent for MidAmerican Energy to pursue this type of technology or even consider it without revisions to the current law,” Thelen added.

Last month, AARP leaders said they plan to inform their 378,000 Iowa members on how state legislators vote on the nuclear energy bill, because they worry the bill will put consumers on the hook for MidAmerican Energy’s planned nuclear power plant even if the facility never gets built.

Because of the importance the issue carries for Iowa seniors, AARP leaders designated the issue a “key vote,” meaning they plan to inform members of the influential voting bloc how state senators and House members vote this session heading into the 2012 election season, when all 100 House seats and 26 Senate seats will be contested in the post-reapportionment election.

Leaders of the split-control Legislature enter what they hope will be the final two weeks of the 2012 session with virtually all the priority issues unresolved. Those items are linked to budget decisions, because major efforts to revamp property taxes, education and mental health service delivery have immediate and long-term cost implications for the overall state budget.

“We’re moving toward the end, but obviously there’s still more work to do,” said House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, who expected that most budget bills would be moved to House-Senate conference committees this week. There, tough bargaining will likely be needed to close a gap of $200 million to $300 million between the levels proposed by majority House Republicans and majority Senate Democrats. In between is Gov. Terry Branstad’s $6.244 billion spending plan.

“We’re going to get everything teed up here and we’re going figure out what the top number is and then we’re going to get it done,” said Paulsen. He said his caucus has proposed a 1 percent increase in spending for the fiscal year that begins July 1, while Branstad’s plan calls for more than 3 percent and Senate Democrats are seeking around 5 percent.

“We are closer to the governor than we are to the House Republicans,” said Sen. Bob Dvorsky, D-Coralville, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. “… Even at our level, it’s still a pretty modest budget — and the governor’s is less than ours, and theirs is draconian.”

Unlike Paulsen and Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, who expected the General Assembly could end its 2012 session work by the end of next week, Dvorsky said, “My guess would be that three weeks would be more realistic.”

The Republican-controlled House passed legislation in February that would require more student testing and seeks to expand charter schools. The bill also included a controversial third-grade retention program.

But the House also rejected components of Branstad’s reform recommendations. A requirement that prospective teachers have and maintain a 3.0 GPA was eliminated. Restrictions on online classes also were added to the bill.

Democrats who hold a 26-24 edge in the Senate are expected to pass their modifications to the legislation this week.

Sen. Brian Schoenjahn, D-Arlington, co-chairman of the Senate Education Budget Subcommittee and vice chairman of the Senate Education Committee, said finding middle ground among the competing reform approaches will come down to “what’s doable, what’s sustainable and what works.”

Much of the Senate debate will focus on early reading emphasis and small class sizes, Schoenjahn said. He added that other issues expected to receive attention are an expansion of core classes to include arts, music and technology, making more time available for classroom coaching to improve teachers’ skills, and the use of online learning resources.

Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, chairman of the Senate Education Committee who will be floor manager of the education reform bill, said there’s broad support for competency-based education and for expanding the topics covered by the core curriculum. He also said there’s strong support for early-grade reading and getting students help early.

However, Quirmbach noted “some controversy over retention decisions” that would end social promotion for students struggling to read after finishing third grade.

Quirmbach also noted “a lot of heartburn” over two Iowa school districts that have announced plans to open online academies this fall.

Clayton Ridge Community School District and CAM Community School District have contracted with private online education providers. Under their plans, students from across the state would be able to enroll in the academies and have their lessons delivered over the Internet. The private companies receive the students’ state aid as payment, less an administrative fee of 3 percent or 3.5 percent that goes to the host district.

Quirmbach expressed concern that virtual academies in Colorado have been marred by high dropout rates and low achievement levels.

“That’s not a direction we want to go,” he said.

A major obstacle to agreement between the House and Senate will be financing, Schoenjahn noted. He said Senate Democrats won’t accept a House Republican proposal to shift money from existing programs. The reforms are expected to cost at least $17 million.

“I think if House Republicans really want to follow through on their governor’s proposal, I think they’re going to have to put some money on the table,” Quirmbach said. “There are some things in the bill that we can do that don’t cost any money, but if you really want to intervene and help early childhood or early grade reading, you’ve got to put some resources into that. That’s one of the top priorities of our caucus to be sure.”

Rep. Greg Forristall, R-Macedonia, chairman of the House Education Committee, said the prospects are good for lawmakers to be able to deliver some version of education reform to Branstad’s desk this month. But he said it was still too early to say definitely what that package might look like, and as to how and at what level it would be funded.

“There is some portion of ed reform that has a pretty good shot,” said House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha. “There is a handful of things we’re in agreement on. I think there are pieces of consequence that I’m hoping we can get done.”

Jason Glass, director of the State Department of Education, said last week that he remains “optimistic and encouraged that we will have a significant education reform bill this session.”

Schoenjahn shared that optimism, although he noted that “in the Senate, we’re in agreement with several of the governor’s reforms. I think he’s got more of a reach with some folks in the House than he has with the Senate, it would appear.”