Highlights

0:00 House breaks law by failing to set an allowable growth number (Rep. Sharon Steckman, Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, House Democratic Leader Kevin McCarthy)

3:28 Working families income tax cut (Sen. Joe Bolkcom, Gronstal)

7:36 –9:40 House Republican residential property tax increase (Gronstal)

Gronstal says plan would shift $310 million in property taxes to homeowners (Des Moines Register)

“That is the biggest tax shift in the history of the state; a $310 million increase to residential property in the state.

Senate panel OKs $26 million tax cut for 260,000 lower-income Iowa families (Des Moines Register)

“Hundreds of millions of dollars in corporate tax cuts are being pushed by various powerful special interests,” Bolkcom said. In comparison, the Senate bill will help families and will assist small businesses when the money is spent on food, gasoline, car repairs and medical bills in Iowa, he said.

Thursday Senate Democrats recently invited Julie Heck of Pleasantville — a single mother of three — to speak at a statehouse news conference (and then to the Senate Ways and Means Committee) to tout the tax break that’s geared toward low-income Iowans.

(Afterwards, Julie spoke to the entire Senate Ways and Means Committee. A week later, on Wednesday, February 8, the working families tax cut was unanimously approved by the Senate Ways and Means Committee.)

“In recent years the E.I.T.C. refund has helped me put a downpayment on a car so that I had reliable transportation to get to school and work,” Heck said.

According to the Iowa Child and Family Policy Center, 37 percent of Iowa children live in a household that gets a tax refund through the Earned Income Tax Credit. Senator Bolkcom intends to propose nearly doubling the state Earned Income Tax Credit and a bill to accomplish that is on this week’s Senate Ways and Means Committee agenda.

“Until we get this passed, that long list of special interest tax treatments and tax policy ahead of us is going to be on the shelf,” Bolkcom said. (Radio Iowa)

Transcript of Senator Qirmbach’s Remarks:

We are recommending a 4% increase for the school year beginning in the fall of 2013, the 2013-2014 school year.
As I think most members are aware, the allowable growth procedure that has normally and historically been followed sets the allowable per-pupil expenditure 18 months in advance – roughly a year-and-a-half in advance – so that we can give our school systems (our superintendents, our principals and staff) adequate time to plan for hiring of teachers and ordering of textbooks and scheduling of programs. We give them a year-and-a-half’s notice as to how much they are going to be allowed to spend. I think that is an absolutely crucial and fundamental factor in allowing them to do efficient and effective planning, to stabilize the school systems’ budgets, and to allow for orderly personnel decisions. This is very important.
Last year, the Senate wanted to allow a 2% increase for the current fiscal year. However, after negotiations with the House, the figure was chosen as 0%. The 0% in allowable growth is unprecedented in the nearly 40-year history of the current school financing program. It has never been the case prior that we have done so little to help advance education in this state.
The 4% that we are recommending for two years from now, then, in part is to make up for the ‘0’ this year. Now, we did agree last year to allow for 2% allowable growth for the fiscal year beginning this coming July, and I’m pleased that the Governor’s budget has recommended funding for that amount. But we need to make up for the ‘0.’ The school districts – their costs continue to go up. With inflation running at about 2% a year in recent years, a 0% for the current year really is a 2% cut in what we call ‘real dollars.’ And so, I believe that 4% allowable growth is both necessary for our schools and is something that is affordable.
Again, I would like to thank the members of the Education Committee for their unanimous, bipartisan support for this bill, and I would move its adoption.

Transcript of Senator Hogg’s Remarks:

I just want to underscore the importance of this bill that we’re on for categorical growth. If you look at the data in the State of Education report, you continue to see progress in fourth grade reading proficiency in our state. There are more than 1,000 kids who are proficient today in reading who, at the rates we had before class size reduction dollars were adopted, were not proficient at the rates that existed then.
And to me, that’s a small price to pay to have more than 1,000 fourth graders in our state who are proficient in reading. This is essential. We need 4%. 4% is, as Senator Hammerlink pointed out, is the minimum amount we need for our kids. If you want to have world-class schools, you’ve got to be willing to pay for it. I’m willing to pay for it. I think this is a great bill, and I appreciate Senator Quirmbach bringing it forward.

(Video)

Senator Joe Bolkcom, chair of the tax-writing Ways & Means Committee, leads the effort for a commercial prop tax cut.

“Last year, as chair of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, my job was to cut taxes on working Iowa families.  I’m talking about EITC, the Earned Income Tax Credit.

“This is Iowa’s version of the federal earned income tax credit, the tax cut which was first signed into law by President Ronald Reagan.  This is a pro-family, pro-economic growth, pro-work tax cut.  It helps working families with children making less than $45,000 a year.

“When you cut taxes for these working families, the money won’t be spent on yachts, third homes or stashed in Swiss Bank Accounts.  Cut taxes for working Iowa families and they will use it to buy things from local Iowa businesses: things like milk, gas, pay for rent, fix their car, put food on the table.

“So, anyway, last year I felt ‘confident Iowa lawmakers will OK tax cut.’

“I was confident when this working family tax cut unanimously passed the House and Senate, but the Governor vetoed it.

“I was confident when we passed the working family tax cut a second time, but the Governor vetoed it again.

“Here’s what I’m confident about this year:

“This year I’m confident that no tax cut will pass the Senate Ways and Means Committee before the working families tax cut is passed for the third time by the Senate, is passed for the third time by the House, and finally signed into law by Governor Branstad.”

To watch a video of Senator Bolkcom on the senate floor go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkl3mG-zIJs&feature=youtu.be

Statement from Senator Joe Bolkcom

“TIF is an important tool used by Iowa’s local leaders create jobs, encourage business growth, and grow Iowa’s economy.

“TIF allows a city or county to freeze the property taxes on a site at pre-development levels for a certain period of time.  Any increase or “increment” in taxes can be used to fund development within the TIF district.

“As a result of the freeze, local taxing agencies, such as school districts and the county, do not receive any incremental tax revenue until the TIF district expires.

“TIF has done a lot of good across Iowa. It also has been used in some questionable ways.

“Senate Democrats are working with both Republican and Democratic legislators to approve TIF reforms.  Our shared goal is to better support efforts to create Iowa jobs.

“In the Senate, Senator Steve Sodders, the chair of the Economic Growth Committee, is developing legislation.  If approved by the Economic Growth Committee, that legislation will then go to the Senate Ways and Means Committee.  The members of the House Ways and Means Committee are also working on legislation.

“The legislators I’m working with, both Republican and Democratic, take the issue of TIF reform very seriously.  After all, TIF funds statewide total more than a quarter of a billion dollars.”

(VIDEO) Bolkcom and Representative Tom Sands, (R-Wapello) hosted a public TIF meeting on Jan. 4 in Coralville.  Here’s a direct link to Senator Bolkcom’s introduction to TIF and to the entire presentation.

Recent News Clips on TIF

New development has Iowa cities’ debt piling up—Des Moines Register

11:51 PM, Jan. 19, 2012

City officials spent about $350 million in tax dollars in 2010 paying off or acquiring new long-term debt under the state’s tax increment financing law, according to the most recent data available from the state’s nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency. “I think there is an opportunity to finally do something about this,” said Sen. Joe Bolkcom, D-Iowa City, who has been researching new legislative changes.

Residents speak out at forum on TIF practices—Iowa City Press-Citizen

7:06 PM, Jan. 21, 2012

Iowa City resident Tom Carsner said he has no issue paying taxes, but he doesn’t like it when he has no say in the process. “I’m subsidizing Coralville $80 a year to take a business out of my town and put it in Coralville,” he said, referring to the Von Maur deal. “I don’t agree with that.”

Tax increment financing getting legislative scrutiny—The Gazette

3:10 PM, Jan. 17, 2012

Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, said he has heard growing concerns expressed about TIF abuses that should be addressed. “We don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water, but there is some bath water out there that’s getting a little nasty and we ought to deal with it this year,” he said.

Lawmaker: TIF bill is ‘complex’—Des Moines Register

7:02 AM, Jan. 21, 2012

Sands and Iowa City Democrat Joe Bolkcom, who is chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, have said they plan to make TIF reform a priority this session. “This takes a fairly comprehensive look, and they take a fairly heavy hand,” Bolkcom said of the House bill. “We want to make sure that we don’t change (TIF) in a way that it becomes ineffective.”

On January 18, 2012, Dan Tallon of Iowa City (left), an Iowa National Guard infantry specialist who returned from Afghanistan this summer, and David Johnson of Iowa City, a clerk in the Registrar's Office at the University of Iowa, watched as the Senate approved Senate File 2007, an additional investment in college tuition assistance for returning soldiers like Tallon.

Republicans and Democrats in the Iowa Senate voted unanimously on Wednesday, January 18 to ensure that state tuition help for Iowa’s returning soldiers would not be cut almost in half.

Senate File 2007, sponsored by Senator Brian Schoenjahn of Arlington, would benefit soldiers at Iowa’s universities up to $1,300 per semester in additional aid - if the Iowa House also approves the legislation and Governor Branstad signs it.

Last month, the Iowa National Guard reported that dollars budgeted available for its tuition assistance program would fall short of the increased demand.  In fact, the average grant could have fallen from 90 percent to 50 percent of tuition.

On Wednesday, several senators, including Schoenjahn, met with Dan Tallon, a recently returned soldier from Afghanistan who is in his third year at the University of Iowa.

“I’m all for helping Iowa’s returning soldiers attend Iowa colleges,” said Schoenjahn.  “They will gain new skills and it will help reduce Iowa’s skilled worker shortage.  We can do right by our returning soldiers and help build a stronger Iowa economy at the same time.”

Iowa legislators join state legislators nationally
to defend health care gains; Call on Governor Branstad
to stand up for Iowa families

(Video) (What Iowans will lose)

(DES MOINES) Iowa legislators are among more than 500 state legislators from all 50 states who have filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court supporting the constitutionality of the health law, arguing that “the minimum coverage provision of the Affordable Care Act is a valid exercise of Congress’s Commerce Clause and Necessary and Proper Clause powers.”

“Iowa has been named the best state in the nation when it comes to children’s health care.  Yet there are still 300,000 uninsured Iowans.  Skyrocketing health insurance rates continue to hamper job creation in Iowa and make Iowa households financially insecure,” said State Senator Jack Hatch of Des Moines, the past chair of the national Working Group of State Legislators for Health Reform.  “Iowa’s health care crisis will not be solved without a strong federal effort to increase competition, control costs, improve quality, and insure every American.”

Iowa Governor Terry Branstad earlier joined 25 Republican governors and attorneys general to file a lawsuit seeking to overturn the Affordable Care Act on constitutional grounds.

“If the lawsuit Governor Branstad is part of takes away all the new health benefits Iowans already have received and will receive thanks to health reform, that will expose his effort to make Iowa the healthiest state empty political posturing,” said Hatch.  “Governor, if you care about uninsured Iowans, about the rising health care costs choking Iowa’s economy, and about the strain on Iowa family budgets, you will withdraw from the short-term, blindly partisan effort to use the Supreme Court to deny urgently needed health care from Iowans.”

Senator Joe Bolkcom of Iowa City, the chair to national Progressive States Network, which helped organized the national effort by state legislators, detailed what Iowans stand to lose if the federal health reform law is overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“Insurance companies will be free to deny coverage to children with pre-existing conditions, young adults will no longer be covered under their parents’ insurance.  Iowa seniors will lose free preventative care services, the rebate for prescription drugs and donut hole discount on brand-name drugs, which saves them an average of 569 a year,” said Bolkcom. “The patient bill of rights that eliminated a host of insurance company abuses will be eliminated.”

The Amicus Brief strongly defending the Affordable Care Act in the challenge currently before the Supreme Court. The brief will be filed this Friday and was prepared and filed in conjunction with the Constitutional Accountability Center (CAC).

“The idea that the federal government does not have the power to address a national problem such as the health care crisis has no basis in the Constitution’s text and history,” argue the legislators in the text of the brief.

CAC Chief Counsel Elizabeth Wydra said, “Because the Affordable Care Act is supported by the Constitution’s text and history – as well as Supreme Court precedent going back to the Founding era – challenges to health care reform have a lot more to do with politics than they do the Constitution. After losing in Congress, conservatives are simply looking for courts to give them a judicial do-over. Fortunately, judges across the ideological spectrum – including those appointed by Chairs George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan – have upheld the Act as constitutional, and we are confident the Supreme Court will agree.”

“Almost two years after the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, and as a pivotal year kicks off, this brief is an incredible statement of support for health law from the states,” added Progressive States Network Executive Director Ann Pratt. “It’s also a sign of how responsible state lawmakers all across the nation are coming together in 2012 to turn the tide from political gamesmanship and attacks to working to protect the gains already made for the health security of families under the Affordable Care Act: one million young adults now newly covered, four million seniors who have received help affording prescription drugs, and a patients’ bill of rights that puts an end to many insurance industry abuses.”

A summary of the Amicus Brief text is available at: http://www.progressivestates.org/ACAamicus The full text, accompanied by a full list of signers will be available via the above URL on Thursday, January 12th.

Progressive States Network (http://www.progressivestates.org) is a non-partisan, non-profit organization dedicated to supporting the work of progressive state legislators around the country and to the passage of state legislation that delivers on issues the issues that matter to working families: strong wage standards and workplace freedom, balancing work and family responsibilities, health care for all, smart growth and clean energy, tax and budget reform, clean and fair elections, and technology investments to bridge the digital divide.

Constitutional Accountability Center (http://www.theusconstitution.org) is a think tank, public interest law firm, and action center dedicated to fulfilling the progressive promise of the Constitution’s text and history.