The House and Senate ramped up a well-coordinated effort to begin moving major pieces of “must do” legislation this week. After a somewhat bumpy start to the session in regards to reaching agreement on budget-balancing legislation to cut over $100 million from the current budget, House and Senate leaders (along with the Governor’s office) have come together in a tightly choreographed schedule designed to streamline approval of some BIG issues. K-12 School Funding Completed in Session’s First 30 days This week the General Assembly and Governor wrapped up the school funding debate with House passage of SF 166 on Monday and with the Governor’s signature of the legislation Wednesday. SF 166 increases state spending on K-12 schools in FY18 by $40 million (by far the largest spending increase for any budget line item in the upcoming budget year). State Preemption of Local Ordinances The House Local Government Committee began work on HSB 92, an act that preempts local government’s ability to enact ordinances regarding minimum wage, consumer merchandise, or packaging materials. The legislation was spurred by a number of local governments enacting minimum wage increases in excess of the state minimum wage. |
Many attendees have called CBI's 44th Annual Convention "the best conference with the best speakers in a long time". Were you with us in Okoboji last week? If you skipped it, here's what you missed:
ATM card skimming is on the rise in the nation, and hit home in Iowa last week. Two men have been charged with using skimmer devices to capture bank account information at three locations around Des Moines. A skimmer device fits over the ATM's card reader slot and has its own memory chip to record the information on the card as it is swiped. Skimmers secretly record bank account data when a user inserts an ATM card into the machine. Criminals then can encode the stolen data onto a blank card and use it to access the customer's bank account. Skimmers also come in different colors like the green one used in Des Moines, or in a grayish color that would look similar to an ATM, making it hard to tell it's fake. Original card readers are usually concave in shape (curving inward), while skimmers are more convex (curving outward). The use of keypad overlays placed directly on top of the factory-installed keypad is a relatively new technique that takes the place of a concealed camera. Instead of visually recording users punching in PINs, circuitry inside the phony keypad stores the actual keystrokes. View the gallery below for examples of skimmers and keypads being used to steal account info from ATMs: by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview / Major Events
The 2015 Session of the Iowa General Assembly ended late afternoon on Friday, June 5 (it was the 145th day of the session) when the Iowa Senate voted to concur with the House in passage of HCR 9, a concurrent resolution to provide for adjournment sine die. At 145 days, this session ran 35 days beyond the soft closing date of 110 days and, in recent memory, was eclipsed only by the June 30 end date in 2011 (the very last day of the fiscal year). Decisions Key to Adjournment - Two key decisions paved the way for final action in 2015: 1. School finance: the House and Senate agreed on a total spending amount for K-12 school spending. This had been at a stalemate since late January with Majority Republicans in the House standing firm for an increase of 1.25% and Majority Democrats in the Senate at 4.0% (though, they did offer to split the difference with the House and settle on 2.62%). The final decision was an increase in base spending on K-12 schools at 1.25% (the House-preferred number) with an additional $55 million in one-time spending on K-12 schools that brought the overall increase for the upcoming fiscal year to 2.62% (the Senate had offered a compromise of a 2.62% increase in the base, but settled on this combination of base and one-time money). by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview / Major Events
Week 19 of the Session: Week 3 of Overtime. This week the Iowa Senate did not act on any legislation, as Senate Democrats lacked a member of their caucus and did not possess the 26 votes necessary to pass any bill that would result on a party line vote (and all budget bills in the Senate this year have been adopted on party line votes). The House did convene on Wednesday for a full day of floor work – passing their version of the final piece of the budget (called the Standings bill) and also passing legislation that would legalize the sale and use of fireworks in Iowa, beginning December 1, 2015 (similar, but slightly more limited, to a bill that sits on the Senate calendar). It appears both the House and Senate will return to work on the Tuesday following Memorial Day. However, lacking an overall agreement on key budget issues, it is unlikely either Chamber will be working the entire week (there simply isn’t enough other work to do until the budget targets are successfully negotiated). As described previously there will be no run for adjournment until two key decisions are made. by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Week 18 of the Session: Week 2 of Overtime. The second week of overtime is now complete and most of the “progress” that was accomplished this week was procedural, rather than substantive.
The House and Senate continued work on major budget bills and moved virtually every budget to a conference committee status (meaning both sides are at impasse and each Chamber appoints five members to attempt resolution). Lacking an overall agreement on the total budget number, it is impossible to set the joint target numbers for each individual budget bill. Decisions Key to Adjournment Two key decisions must be made before the House and Senate can make a true run for adjournment: |
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