Branstad on the stump in Hiawatha makes Iowa sound a bit like Wisconsin

HIAWATHA - Gov. Terry Branstad brought his “Jobs for Iowa” tour to Hiawatha City Hall late Wednesday afternoon where a largely enthusiastic crowd of about 125 packed into a basement meeting room to listen.

Branstad made his case for lowering commercial property taxes, eliminating unnecessary regulation on business and creating a new public-private partnership to bring jobs to Iowa and open markets for Iowa's products abroad.

At one point, he said he had mailed out 700 letters to Illinois companies asking them to relocate to Iowa.

In 20-minute, question-and-answer session, the governor eagerly took on a critic's question about his call for no allowable growth in school budgets for the next year to make his case that his predecessor, Chet Culver, left him with a state budget in a “huge mess.”

Branstad blamed Culver for agreeing to a union proposal on a new contract without a counter proposal, saying it cost taxpayers an extra $414 million in wage increases and benefits. He added that Culver violated an etiquette that has been honored over the years in which the outgoing governor leaves the next contract negotiation to the incoming governor who must live with the contract consequences. He said it isn't fair to Iowa taxpayers, for instance, that 87 percent of state employees pay nothing for health insurance that costs taxpayers between $12,000 and $17,000 a year per state employee.

“I'd love to sit down with the unions,” Branstad said. “But they say, ‘Hey, we got our deal, the heck with you.'”

One questioner asked if he could reasonably discuss contract issues with union members, and he said he would without “threats.”

“I'm the least threatening person you'd ever meet,” the governor said, moving from the podium into the front of the audience.

“I give credit to the unions,” he said. “They've done a great job. They have got a great deal. They have been great advocates. The problem is no one represented management. Management is supposed to represent the taxpayers, and I feel that's the role I've been elected to (play). And I'm going to try my very level best to do it and do it in a fair and evenhanded way.”