Soil, water are unfinished businesss

The end of any Iowa legislative session brings a flurry of list-making. Winners and losers. Alive and dead. Accomplishments and failures.

But when it comes to considering unfinished legislative business, as the 2015 session ends, we're taking a longer view.

Over the past several sessions, lawmakers have shown the ability to do some heavy lifting, despite their partisan differences. In the session now ending, they forged a bipartisan coalition to pass a gas tax increase and provide much-needed roadbuilding dollars.

A couple of years ago, they approved a long-awaited reduction in commercial property taxes, created a teacher training initiative and expanded Medicaid. Before that, they pushed to remake Iowa's mental health system.

We may not like or support everything lawmakers did. But when it comes to roads, property taxes, education, health care and mental health, lawmakers proved they can still address major issues facing the state.

Missing from that list is a major effort to protect the state's environment, to preserve its valuable land, and water for future generations.

In a state embarking on a massive, voluntary, effort to reduce fertilizer runoff into waterways, with an estimated price tag of over $1 billion, precious little is being spent to help farmers meet the new standards. Money erased by Gov. Terry Branstad's wrongheaded veto last year is not being replaced.

The state's Resource Enhancement and Protection program, or REAP, is underfunded yet again, slicing dollars that could have gone to dozens of local protection and recreation projects statewide. In the battle for resources against all the priorities listed above, Iowa's environment once again fell far down the list.

That's got to change. The problems facing Iowa from its disappearing topsoil to its impaired waterways is every bit as massive as any of the other big issues lawmakers have faced in recent years. And as daunting as the price tag seems, the cost of inaction will be infinitely higher.

It's time to find solutions and resources. It's time to seriously consider a sales tax increase to fund the constitutional natural resources trust fund created by voters in 2010. It's time to meet farmers halfway with dollars to adopt smart practices.

It's time for our lawmakers and governor to acknowledge that our soil, water and air are as important as pavement and business growth. It's time to act. It's past time.

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