Tax relief ranks high among Republican priorities

DES MOINES - A key Senate Republican said Thursday he expects the new Republican legislative majority to push a major reform to simplify and reduce state income taxes during the 2017 legislative session.

Sen. Jack Whitver, R-Ankeny - he's be installed as the new Senate president when the 87th General Assembly convenes Jan. 9 - told a Des Moines business forum tax reform would be a top priority, along with balancing and streamlining the state budget and improving Iowa's water quality. He said the majority Senate Republicans plan to focus on jobs, growth and reform next session.

'I believe one of the messages from this campaign is that Iowans feel that they are overtaxed,” Whitver told a meeting of the Greater Des Moines Partnership, which has simplifying and reducing Iowa corporate and personal income taxes as one of the organization's priorities.

'We will have a bill to address individual income tax this year,” Whitver said. 'We're going to have a situation where we can have a win-win where we can put more money in the pocket of hardworking Iowans while also growing our state. We'll have that bill. What it will look like we don't know yet. We're still working on the details.”

After the forum, Whitver said the state faces a challenging budget year, so incoming majority Republicans plan to look for cases where money can be saved to make room for tax relief. At this time, he said, it's uncertain whether taxes can be cut immediately or phased down over a period of years.

'There are going to have to be areas of our budget that we're going to have to reduce to find those savings. We're looking through all of that right now,” he said.

'We're going to have a balanced budget, so for reducing taxes we might have to find at least some short-term savings, because ultimately reducing taxes is going to grow our economy, it's going to bring more taxes in. It always has when done right.”

Also on Thursday, Republicans - with an incoming 59-41 edge in the Iowa House - held a closed-door caucus to discuss 2017 priorities. House Speaker Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake, said those will focus on water quality, education, budget issues and tax reform, with a particular focus on making Iowa's personal and corporate income taxes more competitive.

'We're very interested in looking at taxes,” Upmeyer said. 'This is a tough year when you've got declining revenue and yet we don't want to ignore the opportunity. We're going to look, we're going to study, we're going to see what's possible.”

The House speaker said she expects Republican lawmakers and Gov. Terry Branstad to agree to a fiscal 2018 state aid funding level for K-12 schools within the session's first 30 days.

She added that she expects Republicans will change the forward-funding law so state aid for schools does not have to be set 18 months in advance before the Legislature and governor have a good fix on available revenue.

Rep. Jo Oldson, D-Des Moines, said lawmakers face a balancing test every session to fund priorities and address tax issues - which she cautioned is 'not so easy to do,” given Iowa's federal deductibility law makes rates seem uncompetitive.

'It's a tricky piece to talk about reform without affecting programs,” she added. 'It will be hard. We will have some tough, tough decisions to make.”

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