Capitol Notebook: Iowa Capitol ethics committee issues public reprimand of lobby group

DES MOINES — A lobbyist group was issued an official reprimand by the Iowa House Ethics Committee on Wednesday after a state lawmaker objected to a claim posted about her on the group’s website.

Rep. Samantha Fett, R-Carlisle, filed a complaint against the lobbyist group calling itself Bitches Get Stuff Done after it listed her former occupation as a stripper on a profile posted on the group’s website.

Fett cited a section of the Iowa Legislature’s joint rules governing lobbyists that prohibits lobbyists from taking any action “intended to negatively affect the economic interests of a member” as the basis for her complaint.

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The group, which says it is “answering the call for resistance” following President Donald Trump’s re-election in November, posted profiles of Iowa House and Senate Republicans that include their occupations, addresses and phone numbers.

Heather Ryan, one of the group’s founders, said the group got a tip from someone claiming that Fett formerly worked as a stripper. Ryan said she was not aware of the Legislature’s ethics and rules for lobbyists when prompted by the committee.

“We did research on every single person, and that includes where they live, their prior professions, their phone number, how to get a hold of them, primarily so that people could get a hold of their legislators, who oftentimes dodge and dive their constituents,” Ryan said. “I got a tip from a constituent that said that was her former profession.”

Fett, who works as a marketing communications director for a company, rebuked the claim and said her intent in filing the complaint was to hold the group accountable for not adhering to lobbyist ethics and rules.

“This group of people are registered lobbyists, and when you do register as a lobbyist, you agree to operate at a higher level of professionalism under rules,” Fett said. “This was a rumor on an occupation that clearly isn’t true, that was published and promoted as a way to harm.”

The committee, consisting of three Republican members and three Democratic members, unanimously voted to issue the reprimand.

Reynolds’ child care and preschool proposal passes Senate

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Gov. Kim Reynolds’ proposal to help preschool providers and child care centers partner to provide full-day care passed the Iowa Senate on Wednesday.

Reynolds’ proposal, which she unveiled in January during her Condition of the State address to the Iowa Legislature, would create a $16 million grant program to provide three-year grants of up to $100,000 to preschool providers — typically school districts — and child care providers to provide wraparound services for working families.

Funds could be used to defray the cost of transportation to bring children from school to child care, or vice versa. They also could pay for a preschool teacher at a local child care center, or for child care staff at a preschool.

The grants would use a combination of existing Early Childhood Iowa funding and federal wraparound child care funds. The bill also would shift roughly $3.6 million in existing state grant funds used to assist child development programs and school districts serve at-risk children ages 3 to 5 to focus specifically on preschool grants.

The bill was amended during Senate debate to push out some deadlines to give early childhood facilities — at their request — more time to prepare for the law’s changes.

The bill, Senate File 445, passed the Senate on a party-line, 33-14 vote with all Republicans supporting and all Democrats opposing. The bill is on the House’s debate calendar for Thursday.

Unanimous approval for pediatric hospice bill

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A state license for pediatric palliative care would be created under legislation that earned unanimous approval Wednesday by the Iowa Senate.

The proposal previously was approved unanimously by the Iowa House.

House File 933 would create a pediatric palliative care license to establish residential care facilities for those under 21 with chronic and life-threatening illnesses who are expected to have shortened life expectancy.

The bill is called “Mason’s Law” in honor of a 7-year-old Grinnell boy who required hospice care at the end of his five-year battle with cancer. Mason Sieck died in 2021, and his mother, Shanna, hopes to build the first pediatric hospice care center in Iowa.

There are only three pediatric palliative care centers in the United States: in California, Arizona and Minnesota, where Mason Sieck was treated.

Under an amendment added Wednesday during Senate debate, the new state license would be created within the state’s residential care facility category. Because the bill was amended in the Senate, it must return to the House for approval there before going to Gov. Kim Reynolds for her consideration.

Open records bill headed to governor

A proposal to require training on open records and meetings laws for locally elected officials and increase penalties for violations is headed to Gov. Kim Reynolds’ desk.

The Iowa House passed the bill, House File 706, on an 83-10 vote. Having passed the Senate last week on a 34-13 vote, the bill heads to Reynolds for her consideration.

The bill was drafted in response to frustrations by local government bodies in the wake of a 2023 downtown building collapse in Davenport. The bill would increase the penalties for violations of state open records and meetings laws from between $100 to $500 to between $500 to $2,500. It also would require newly elected or appointed public officials to complete a one-hour training course on the state law.

It was the second House vote on the bill, which was amended in the Senate to exempt Iowa Capitol security camera footage and identification card access system data from the state’s open records law.

House OKs ban on ticket bots

Iowa concertgoers and sports fans may have an easier time securing tickets to events after the House sent legislation banning the use of ticket bots Wednesday to Gov. Kim Reynolds’ desk for approval.

Senate File 146, passed unanimously by the Senate in February, would prohibit a person from creating or using a bot to purchase tickets or circumvent electronic cues or presale codes. Bots are automated software programs that perform repetitive tasks over a network.

Similar legislation dubbed “Taylor Swift bills” came up across the country when fans were either kicked out of the online ticket cue or were resold the tickets for way above their face value when purchasing tickets for Swift’s Eras tour in 2023 and 2024.

The Iowa Attorney General may bring civil action for using bots to get tickets, which could come with a civil penalty of up to $10,000.

Iowa House advances slate of tax exemptions, credits

Members of the Iowa House passed a number of bills Wednesday lifting sales taxes from household items and creating tax credits for child care and radon mitigation.

Lawmakers advanced House File 1019 and House File 1021, which would lift the sales tax on toilet paper and dietary supplements, which include vitamins, minerals and amino acids, citing the need to lower everyday costs for Iowans.

House File 1027, which was also advanced, would create a radon mitigation system tax credit for up to $1,000, which would apply retroactively to Jan. 1 for tax years beginning on or after that date. Radon is a naturally occurring gas that is a leading cause of lung cancer. Iowa has the fastest-growing rate of new cancers and ranks second-highest in cancer rates compared with other states, according to the Iowa Cancer Registry.

House File 1020 would lift the income threshold off the Iowa Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit, a refundable credit calculated as a percentage of the federal Child and Dependent Care Credit, currently capped at household incomes of $90,000.

Gazette-Lee Des Moines Bureau

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