Iowa Legislature back in business at the Statehouse

DES MOINES - Iowa's split-control Legislature hailed the start of a new session Monday by installing the House's first female speaker and laying the groundwork for another potentially divisive debate over school funding that Gov. Terry Branstad says should grow by $145 million for K-12 schools next year.

Clear Lake Republican Linda Upmeyer made history when she was sworn in as the first female speaker of the Iowa House, replacing Rep. Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, who is serving out his last year as a state representative. Rep. Chris Hagenow, R-Windsor Heights, took Upmeyer's place as House majority floor leader.

'It is humbling to be the first woman to preside over this prestigious chamber. It is exciting that we are making history, in a room that has experienced so much of it,” said Upmeyer, whose late father, Delwyn Stromer of Garner, previously served as a House speaker as well.

'I hope my election as speaker shows all young women and Iowans who come from diverse backgrounds that opportunities abound,” she told her colleagues during her opening-day remarks. 'For a long time, we have told children they can be whatever they want when they grow up. Today, better than ever, we are showing them that is a reality.”

The reality that 2016 is an election year was also evident in the Capitol Monday, as legislative Democrats called for increased funding for Iowa schools beyond Branstad's opening bid of 2.45 percent growth and more oversight of the governor's planned switch to deliver Medicaid services via privately managed care, while Republicans called for spending even less than the governor envisions in fiscal 2017.

'Our focus this year must be bringing more workers and their families into Iowa's middle class. Iowans are counting on us,” said Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs. 'One, we should expand educational opportunities, and two, we should strengthen the health care safety net all Iowa families count on.”

During his weekly news conference, Branstad said he will seek $145 million in increased funding for K-12 schools that would cover teacher leadership reforms, reading initiatives and 2.45 percent growth in supplemental state aid to schools when he unveils his fiscal 2017 budget plan during Tuesday's Condition of the State address. The school aid increase is the same level the governor proposed last session.

'It's a very tight budget,” Branstad told reporters, noting that many budget areas will face status-quo funding or cuts to provide needed increases for education and health care even with Medicaid managed care savings. 'I think we've put together a reasonable and very significant commitment. Most of the new money is going to K-12 public education.”

However, Gronstal greeted the governor's 2.45 percent school funding growth level by saying 'we thought that number was inadequate last year, we think that number is inadequate this year,” while Upmeyer said House Republicans believe the $81 million increase that a 2 percent rise would provide is adequate given their calculation of $153 million in new state revenue available for spending this session.

'That's real money,” Upmeyer told reporters, noting that any extra money to fund Medicaid and to cover past commitments made to property tax reductions and education reforms would have to come from that $153 million pool of money.

During her opening-day remarks, Senate President Pam Jochum, D-Dubuque, urged her colleagues to focus on a forward-looking session, but also noted 'there's unfinished business” after Branstad vetoed $55.7 million in one-time K-12 school funding last July, moved ahead with privatizing Iowa's Medicaid system and closed two mental health institutes.

'As hard as it may be to resist at times, let's make a pledge to remain focused on governing for the next 100 days and leave the campaigning for the remaining 202 days,” Jochum said, but later noted that 'the issues that linger are trust, transparency, the checks and balance of power, and the rule of law.”

For his part, Senate Minority Leader Bill Dix, a Shell Rock Republican who told a GOP prayer breakfast Monday he believes 2016 will be the year his party reclaims control of the Iowa Senate, urged fiscal constraint to curb state spending this year. He noted that slowing revenue growth indicate lawmakers are 'in the eye” of a 'financial storm” gripping the state.

Branstad said he hoped the split-control Legislature - where Republicans hold a 57-43 edge in the House and Democrats control the Senate 26-24 - could reach an early resolution on education funding, so school administrators can better plan for next year's budgets 'and not spend the whole session fighting over it.”