DES MOINES — The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee took a swipe at an Iowa state senator Monday for her change-of-heart on a statewide fuel tax increase. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Red Oak, is on the national committee’s radar because she’s one of a few Republicans publicly considering a run for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated [...]

DES MOINES – Gov. Terry Branstad told fellow Iowa Executive Council members Monday he is still pushing to get the yearly salaries increased for their positions in 2014, but he’s not optimistic given the legislative reception the proposal received last week. Meanwhile, State Treasurer Mike Fitzgerald, a Democrat, said he was disappointed the proposal to [...]

DES MOINES – The Iowa Executive Council on Monday approved a six-month health insurance coverage plan for about 600 unionized state police officers that calls for a 2.84 percent renewal increase with Wellmark to carry the bargaining unit through until the 2014 enrollment plan takes effect in January. Ed Holland of the state Department of [...]

Key legislators and Gov. Terry Branstad expressed optimism Monday that progress was being made to forge a “hybrid” health care compromise that would merge elements of the governor’s “Healthy Iowa” plan with Senate Democrats’ desire to expand Medicaid to cover low-income, uninsured Iowans. “If we’re going to get something resolved, nobody’s going to get their [...]

The city has a new Sunner Memorial Park to honor Bret Sunner, the 25-year-old Cedar Rapids police officer slain in the line of duty on June 8, 1984. The new memorial park is still close to where it had been and should be — close to the police station on First Street SW. The former [...]

WASHINGTON – The new 2013 version of the federal farm bill will be slimmer than before, and with several notable differences. And it also may hit the ground a lot earlier. In a marked contrast to last year, the House and Senate last week jump-started work on a new farm bill and made considerable progress. [...]

This week’s show features a roundtable discussion on Immigration reform, battered Obama and the slow road to legislative shutdown. This episode features The Gazette’s political reporter James Lynch, Quad City Times political writer Ed Tibbetts, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier political writer Jon Ericson and Iowa Lee Bureau Chief Mike Wiser. The show was produced by The [...]

Funding to expand passenger rail service in eastern Iowa and upgrade rail freight lines in Iowa fell victim to 11th-hour budget wrangling in the Iowa Legislature. House Republican negotiators stripped plans to spend $5.5 million in each of the next two fiscal years for Iowa’s multimodal transportation system from an infrastructure bill that got final [...]

Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Reinert left Cedar Rapids this week to take over the command of a coalition which helps reinforce the Afghan criminal justice system and promote the legitimacy of its government. “Having a court system work – ties people to the government,” said Reinert, who is a Brigadier General in the U.S. Army [...]

DES MOINES – The morning after Iowa legislative leaders unveiled a wide-ranging tax relief plan that was a top priority for lawmakers and the governor, progress toward adjournment slowed to a crawl. “We’re going to move what we have available to us,” Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, said Friday when asked about bringing [...]