The Revenue Estimating Conference met on Thursday, March 19, and made their revenue prediction. They lowered their December 2014 prediction of $200 million by $19 to $20 million and that means the state will have about $180 million of new money to spend. The House has appropriated $100 million to K-12 schools and this leaves $80 million to fund the rest of the budget.
The Senate Majority Party has taken the position that the Legislature needs to enact a 4 percent school funding increase now, regardless of the current revenue numbers then figure out how to fund it later.
What has happened to schools over the last 10 years? The numbers clearly show that K-12 staff is not under attack. In the last 10 years, student enrollment has gone down 1.3 percent, the number of full time teachers has gone up 2.4 percent, school employment has gone up 4.3 percent and the number of administrators has gone up 3 percent. Teacher salaries over the 10-year period have gone up 36.6 percent.
I have had constituents ask me why the legislative parties can’t work together and not have contentious legislature debating. This past two weeks we debated 55 bills. Thirty seven bills passed with 90 or more votes, five bills passed on party line votes and the remaining 13 bills passed with at least two to 31 votes from the minority party.
HJR 8 was a bill passed on a party line vote. It was a joint resolution requesting the proposal of an amendment to the Constitution of the United States imposing fiscal spending restraints and limiting the power of the federal government.
HF 352 passed on a partisan vote that would require budget requests from state agencies to use a zero base approach.
HF 506 was a party line vote that would require absentee votes to be counted only if they were in the auditor’s office by the close of Election Day.
HF 286 was a bill that related to the direct deposit of employee wages.
HF 549, a bill that was debated for nine hours that related to collective bargaining arbitration proceedings involving teachers employed by school districts and area education agencies which include permitting the arbitrator to choose in-between the final offers of the two parties.
Several cities in Iowa have banned sledding and other activities on public property for fear of lawsuits. HF 570 passed on a 93-0 vote that aims to change that and allow municipalities to open public property to recreational activities without fear of frivolous lawsuits. Under current law, municipalities have limited liability protection when certain activities are conducted on public property. These activities have a normal risk of injury and the law limits the liability of the city if negligence was not involved in the accident. These activities include skateboarding, in-line skating, bicycling, unicycling and scootering, river rafting, canoeing or kayaking. The current list did not include normal activities like sledding or tubing. HF 570 strikes the list and replaces it with the phrase “recreational activities” to ensure activities enjoyed by Iowans are included. The bill now moves to the Senate.