Gov. Terry Branstad today is hailing the members of split-control Legislature for their landmark session achievements. The five-term GOP governor says lawmakers succeeded in approving significant property tax relief, transformational education reform, and meaningful health modernization that focuses on quality outcomes for low-income patients while modernizing of the Medicaid system. The governor noted that the [...]

DES MOINES – The Iowa Senate voted 43-6 Wednesday to pass a wide-ranging, historic tax relief package that will benefit all property classes, provide an estimated $120 credit to income taxpayers, and give a break to low-income working families. Supporters called Senate File 295 a long-awaited compromise that will stimulate the economy by helping businesses [...]

DES MOINES – Gov. Terry Branstad and legislative negotiators have hammered out a bipartisan agreement to use federal money to expand health-care coverage to needy Iowans by financing insurance premiums for participants who help manage their costs with healthy choices. The newly named Iowa Health and Wellness Plan contains elements that meets the desires of [...]

The split-control Legislature inched toward adjournment on its 18th day of overtime session Tuesday. House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, said progress on the outstanding issues holding up the session’s end was “excellent” and he told reporters “I think that there’s a very real possibility that we are done tomorrow.” Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

Language in a large appropriations bill approved by the Iowa Senate could give Johnson County more freedom in borrowing money to put toward jail and courthouse improvements. The provision, which faces an uncertain future in the Legislature, would allow Johnson County to borrow up to $1.2 million through a bond issue for a project of [...]

Iowa will be moving into uncharted budgetary waters next month if the split-control Legislature is unable to approve supplemental Medicaid money to finish out the fiscal year due to an impasse over taxpayer funding of abortion procedures, a top state official says. The state’s share of Medicaid funding averages about $3.5 million a day for [...]

DES MOINES — A fairly open-ended, catch-all budget bill has touched off a feeding frenzy among interest groups and lobbyists hoping for one last shot at getting their pet project or idea into state law before the Iowa Legislature’s 2013 session adjourns. The standing appropriations bill, Senate File 452, was formally sent to a House-Senate [...]

DES MOINES – Iowa communities would be able to designate special 25-acre development zones and use a share of sales tax and hotel-motel tax revenues to assist private projects of at least $10 million under legislation that’s getting bipartisan support. House File 641 would establish reinvestment districts designed to spur development of “big ideas,” said [...]