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Representative Ro Foege
Report from the Iowa Legislature
April 4, 2004
Budget Debate
Last week the Iowa Senate passed the Omnibus budget bill. The bill is over 200 pages and contains the entire state budget. The past practice has been to have the budget come to the Legislature as separate components, with each major department of state government in an individualized bill. The education spending is usually in one bill, prisons, correctional systems and courts in another bill, and health and human services in yet another bill.
The Iowa House will be considering this huge bill this week, now that it has been sent over from the Senate. I know of at least three areas of grave concern.
The first major concern is that education funding is grossly inadequate. This will be the third straight year of under-funding what everyone claims to be Iowa’s number one priority, education. We all know that revenues are tight. That is why the Governor proposed modest increases in funding for our K-12 schools. Republicans rejected even these reasonable amounts, leaving schools faced with no other choice than to increase class sizes, eliminate courses and lay off teachers.
The second concern is that this budget ignores the need for economic growth. Iowa must attract new businesses and new jobs to our state. Without them, revenues will continue to fall short. The majority party provides no stable source for economic development programs and no additional funding for our current economic growth initiatives.
The third major problem with the bill is that it would shift an additional burden to property taxpayers. When Republicans under-fund education or cut promised aid to local governments, they push the burden onto property taxpayers. Like schools, cities then face terrible choices. Cities will, once again, face the dilemma of laying off police and firefighters, or raising fees and property taxes.
Many of my colleagues and I believe the decisions made by the majority party in the Senate are wrong. We plan to present alternatives in a fiscally responsible way when the budget debate begins next week in the House. We will continue to work with the majority party in the House in seeking better solutions to our budgeting problems than presented to us by the Senate.
At the beginning of the current legislative session in January, I wrote in this column that my priorities of the session should be guided by these parameters:
- No more cuts to public schools or health care programs for children and seniors.
- No more cuts to programs that provide support and services to vulnerable children in the child welfare and juvenile justice system or special education programs.
- No more shifting the state’s budget problems onto the backs of city and county property taxpayers.
By next week we should know whether the majority party will consider any of the reasonable alternatives we will offer. I will report to you on the outcome of this critical budget debate.
I appreciate hearing from constituents. If you cannot visit the Capitol, you can write me at the State Capitol, Des Moines, IA 50319; call me at 515/281-3221 or now that the e-mail system is working again, contact me
at
ro.foege@legis.state.ia.us.
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