West Burlington, Iowa

News from the Hill…

There seems to be a move to adjournment next week. Farmers are getting anxious to plant their crop, people who take time off from work are needing to get back to work and everyone is ready to move back home. Those with young families want and need their dads/moms back home. Serving in the Legislature has been a great honor and one I have truly enjoyed. But few understand the sacrifices that are made by families as well as those serving. I can’t imagine what it must have been like a hundred years ago when legislators traveled to Des Moines, by horse and buggy or train.

Mental Health Funding…

A few years ago to address some of the mandates coming down from the Federal Government, the State told the Counties they needed to look at more of a regionalism for Mental Health. While some of us may be old enough to remember the old County Home system over time the Federal government has been moving from an institutional care into more of a community care. Regardless of whether that is the right direction to move or not, states and Counties are forced to look for better ways to deliver the services. The system would need to be able to fund as well as sustain the services for an acceptable level of care. But transition is always hard, we humans resist change. However, most would agree that the counties moving to a more region service care from the each county on its own method has been a good move. The county organizations working with other counties in their region are finding efficiencies and still delivering a good level of care. But the funding mechanism of the old system, property taxes, remains to be the only funding source. The total dollar amount that can come from property taxes from each county was capped several years ago. Some counties have grown a great deal in population and others have not may. In fact, some have even decreased in total population. This is upsetting some of the smaller counties inside the region within a larger populated area. So they came to the legislature with their solution, let us raise the property taxes. This is one of my biggest frustrations with too many elected officials. Simply telling tax payers that they need to pay more is not a solution. Raising people’s taxes is merely an action, not a solution to the problem. The odds of an acceptable solution coming forward in the last week of session are slim. Finding a long term sustainable solution moving forward will require a cross section of people working together outside the capitol to come up with several different ideas. That is how the regionalism concept came together. The long-term funding mechanism will be found the same way.

Water Quality…

The bill that sets up additional funding to improve the water quality in Iowa passed the Iowa House this past Monday with 65 voting aye, 33 voting no and 2 absent or not voting. This bill, HF 2451, appropriates an additional 2 million dollars from the general fund and 5 million from the Rebuild Iowa Infrastructure Fund (RIIF) which is gaming dollars. This is in addition to the 26.63 million that is already setup to appropriate in fiscal 2017. This amount is accomplished without raising taxes and would not include the Federal dollars or the private dollars that are spent each year on water quality. We started this bill in the Ways and Means Committee; it then went to the Appropriations Committee before it was debated on the House floor. I voted for this bill, but it needs a better dedicated funding source for the future. The money in the RIIF account is needed for vertical infrastructure needs in the State.

“The taxpayer – that’s someone who works for the federal government but doesn’t have to take the civil service examination” – Ronald Reagan

 For more information on these and other bills: www.legis.iowa.gov

Until next time,

Tom Sands

This weekend’s Legislative Forum:

Saturday, April 16th

9:15-11:00 am   Burlington Public Library, Burlington, IA