DES MOINES – Iowa lawmakers approved a sweeping reform package Wednesday which changes the way thousands of teachers across the state will be paid, promoted and evaluated. The bill – approved unanimously in the House and 40-10 in the Senate – now goes to the governor for his signature. It also marks the end of [...]

DES MOINES – Gov. Terry Branstad signaled Tuesday that he believes the issue of expanding health care coverage for low-income Iowans is too complicated to fix now and he favors calling lawmakers back into special session later this year once a bipartisan accord can be forged in the split-control Legislature. “We have a lot of [...]

During 25 years in the Air Force, Ken Rizer was a jet fighter pilot and a base commander responsible for 60,000 people and a $250 million budget. Now the retired Air Force colonel wants to serve again – in the Iowa House. Rizer, a senior vice president for operations at Goodwill of the Heartland since [...]

DES MOINES — The Iowa Senate passed its version of education reform on a party-line vote last night, setting the stage for hard negotiations with House Republicans and Gov. Terry Branstad’s administration. The vote capped off several hours of debate that devolved into some sniping and berating between a couple of senators over statistical definitions [...]

The National Federation for the Blind of Iowa on Tuesday reiterated the group’s strong disagreement with a plan that would merge some services for Iowa’s deaf and blind children at regional sites around the state and consolidate administrative functions of the two systems. Representatives of the group have discussed their opposition in public forums in [...]

DES MOINES – A legislative panel on Friday recommended that up to $20 million in state transition money to be approved early in the upcoming session to cover Medicaid and mental health costs through June 30 even before they tackle expanding needs in the fiscal 2014 state spending plan. County officials told members of the [...]

DES MOINES – Iowa voters are sending a record-tying number of women to the state Legislature next week. The 25 women elected to the Iowa House and the 10 women who will serve in the Iowa Senate ties the record of 35 female legislators that was set in the 2009 session. “Overall, 2012 turned out [...]

DES MOINES — The late Chicago Cubs legend Ron Santo used to rally long-suffering but die-hard fans with a battle cry of “This is the year.” Likewise, proponents of revamping Iowa’s property tax system to reduce commercial rates and slow growth for other property classes are bringing the same hope-springs-eternal attitude to the 2013 legislative [...]

CEDAR RAPIDS – A pair of Cedar Rapids lawmakers are exploring the possibility of running for governor in 2014. However, it appears unlikely there will be an intra-city race for the Democratic nomination because one of them is encouraging the other to run. Sen. Rob Hogg and Rep. Tyler Olson both confirm speculation they are [...]

DES MOINES — Public-sector collective bargaining probably is experiencing the most upheaval and attacks it’s seen in four decades with Iowa increasingly joining the fray, experts on labor-management relations say. And, the pressure is likely to intensify, they warn, as state budgets get squeezed by cutbacks in federal money and rising costs associated with pension, [...]