Capitol Notebook: Iowa House passes bill making intentional misrepresentation of service animals a crime

DES MOINES — Individuals who intentionally misrepresent a service animal or service-animal-in-training will face a simple misdemeanor without receiving a warning under a bill unanimously passed by the Iowa House Thursday.

Intentional misrepresentation of a service animal is already punishable by a simple misdemeanor in Iowa. Current law includes three elements for charging someone with intentionally misrepresenting a service animal, including receiving a prior warning or not knowing their animal was not a service animal. House File 615 would strike those elements.

A simple misdemeanor is punishable by confinement for up to nine days and a fine of $105 to $855.

The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Christian Hermanson, R-Mason City, said he started working on the legislation after one of his constituents, Terry Reams, a veteran and service animal advocate, came to him and Rep. Shannon Latham, R-Sheffield, with challenges he and others face with misrepresentation of service animals.

Reams and his service dog, Lola, watched from the House balcony as lawmakers passed the bill.

Hermanson said the legislation would strengthen protections for service animals and the individuals who rely on them.

“I want to thank Terry and Lola for their tireless advocacy and for bringing this issue to our attention, and I want to thank this body for recognizing the importance of the legislation passed today,” Hermanson said. “Terry is a relentless advocate, and Lola is, without a doubt, a very good girl.”

Contract indigent defense attorney protections

Contract attorneys appointed to represent those in court who can’t afford legal representation would be provided the same protection against financial liability as public defenders under a bill advanced 91-5 by the Iowa House Thursday.

The Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution requires states to provide attorneys, or public defenders, to those who have been charged with a crime and cannot afford their own.

Like many states, Iowa is experiencing a public defender shortage. It’s an issue commonly brought up by many in the state’s legal field, including Iowa Supreme Court Chief Justice Susan Christensen, who has advocated for public defender pay increases in her past few Condition of the Judiciary addresses to the state legislature.

One way Iowa is addressing the shortage is by filling in public defense gaps by appointing contract attorneys to represent those who cannot afford legal representation.

The sponsor of House File 317, Rep. Brian Lohse, R-Bondurant, argued contract attorneys serving as public defenders should be treated the same for indemnity purposes as a state public defender, expressing concern that not doing so could further shrink the already small indigent defense pool.

“The state, in my opinion, has a moral and legal obligation to identify these attorneys at the same level as attorneys in the state public defender's office, and when faced with a constitutional crisis that we're facing in the area of indigent defense,” Lohse said. “It behooves us to do everything that we can to help incentivize attorneys to participate and avert the crisis that's at hand.”

Rep. Charley Thomson, R-Charles City, opposed the legislation, arguing that adequately funding indigent defense — not providing indemnity for private contract attorneys — is the best solution to addressing the public defender shortage.

“If we're serious about our oaths, we should just do the right thing and fund indigent defense adequately today,” Thomson said.

House lawmakers advance bill to extend biofuel tax incentives

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With uncertainty and lack of final guidance at the federal level on new tax incentives for the next generation of renewable fuels, industry groups encouraged Iowa House lawmakers Thursday to extend state-level incentives to help support production and sales of ethanol and biodiesel in Iowa.

Some Iowa biodiesel plants have shuttered and others are idled after a $1-per-gallon “blenders tax credit” ended Dec. 31. A new clean fuel production tax credit was supposed to replace it in January, but the U.S. Treasury Department has yet to finalize rules on how the mechanics of the incentive work — including how climate-smart agriculture will be incorporated. Currently, the tax credit’s carbon intensity scoring system favors products like imported used cooking oil and animal fats over domestic soybean oil.

The 45Z tax incentive program was part of the Inflation Reduction Act, a 2022 law that included hundreds of billions of dollars in clean energy tax credits, aimed at promoting and supporting the development of the next generation of low-carbon fuels.

Iowa is the nation’s largest biodiesel producer, making 353 million gallons of fuel last year, up from 350 million gallons in 2023, according to the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association.

House Study Bill 237 extends retail dealers’ eligibility for the E15 plus gasoline promotion tax credit through the end of 2030. The tax credit is currently set to expire at the end of this year.

A state law passed in 2022 and signed by Gov. Kim Reynolds requires Iowa gas stations to offer the E15 blend of ethanol in at least one pump by 2026. The law allows smaller stations to apply for an exemption to the requirement, and makes financial assistance available for stations that will need to upgrade their infrastructure to store and provide the E15 ethanol blend.

Marc Beltrame, representing FUELIowa — the trade association for the convenience store industry in the state — said the 9 cent-per-gallon tax credit retailers receive is crucial for marketing the corn-based fuel. As more retail sites develop the infrastructure for E15, the need for the tax credit will abate, “but we're not there yet,” he said.

“There are still hundreds of sites throughout the state, and this E15 credit provides an incentive both to retailers to upgrade, but it also provides relief to consumers,” Beltrame said.

More than half the corn produced in Iowa — and about 40 percent nationwide — is used to produce ethanol.

“Corn fuels Iowa and FUELIowa helps deliver corn-based fuel to consumers,” Beltrame said.

The bill also extends tax credits for other biofuels, including E85 and biodiesel.

Doing so would provide more certainty for retailers who sell biodiesel blends, helping mitigate the impacts of federal policy changes, said Doug Struyk, representing the Iowa Biodiesel Board.

Struyk asked lawmakers to amend the bill to also increase the biodiesel production tax credit from 4 cents to 4.5 cents per gallon. The increase would help plants that have shut down or idled operations to reopen and pay employees as they restart production, he said.

All three members of a subcommittee signed of on advancing the bill for further consideration by the full House tax policy Ways and Means Committee.

Rep. Eric Gjerde, D-Cedar Rapids, offered an amendment that was rejected to extend the tax credits for another 100 years.

“I like the fact that it's homegrown. I like the fact that we are supporting the entire chain from corn growers to producers to retailers to consumers,” Gjerde said. “… We're an agricultural state, and we need to support our industry, we need to support our residents, we need to support our workers.”

High school conference realignment committee pitch passes

A statewide committee would be created by the state’s high school athletics organizations to oversee conference realignment under legislation that passed unanimously in the Iowa House.

Under the bill, the Iowa High School Athletic Association and the Iowa Girls High School Athletics Union would create conference realignment committees to ensure all the state’s public and private high schools are members of conferences for athletic competition for all sports except football.

At least a half-dozen school districts in recent years have been left out of conferences altogether because of conference realignment and an inability to gain acceptance into a new conference. School officials said playing independent athletic schedules creates additional travel and other difficulties for student-athletes.

The proposed legislation is modeled after the process for conference realignment used by Wisconsin’s high school athletics governing body. Iowa Rep. Skyler Wheeler, R-Hull, said during floor debate that the bill will make conference alignment in Iowa easier and fairer.

House File 783 passed the Iowa House on a 95-0 vote. An identical bill, Senate File 446, has also advanced in the Iowa Senate; it is eligible for floor debate there.

Gazette-Lee Des Moines bureau