Capitol Notebook: Raw milk sales bill headed to Gov. Kim Reynolds’ desk

Legislation that would allow dairy farms in Iowa to sell raw milk to consumers is headed to Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds for her signature.

Senate File 315 passed in the Iowa House last week and passed in the Iowa Senate on Monday, 37-13, with all but three Democrats opposed.

Critics of the bill expressed concern that the proposal could endanger Iowans because the consumption of unpasteurized milk could lead to bacterial outbreaks.

The Iowa Farm Bureau Federation, Iowa State Dairy Association, Iowa Public Health Association, Iowa Veterinary Medical Association, Iowa Grocery Industry Association and others are registered against the bill. The only group registered in support of the legislation is Americans for Prosperity, the libertarian conservative political advocacy group backed by billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, the owners of Koch Industries.

Rep. Bobby Kaufmann, R-Wilton, floor manager of the bill in the House, said that anyone who has concerns about raw milk can simply avoid consuming it.

"We're simply adding this to the list of foods that people can get without Jiminy Cricket, the government, sitting on their shoulder, and whispering what's best for their families," Kaufmann said, adding that people have been "consuming fresh milk, free of government regulation" for thousands of years.

If the bill is signed into law by Reynolds, producers could sell raw milk and related products from their farms, but not at farmers markets or restaurants. Containers must have labels saying contents were not subject to state inspections or public health regulations that require pasteurization and grading.

It also requires record keeping and regulations regarding the administration of antibiotics and bacteria testing. Producers would be required test animals for bacteria once a month. The bill prevents the sale of raw milk if it exceeds the recognized bacteria count limit, including using raw milk as an ingredient.

Rep. Megan Srinivas, an infectious disease physician and a Democrat from Des Moines, said the testing focuses mostly on animals, not the milk they produce. Srinivas said that there are many other ways bacteria could be introduced in the milking process, from handling to storage to collection.

Panel advances tax amendment

Raising income taxes would require a two-thirds vote of the House and Senate under a proposed constitutional amendment Senate Republicans advanced on Tuesday.

Senate Study Bill 1207 is intended to protect Iowa taxpayers and create a high threshold to increase the income tax, Sen. Dan Dawson, the chair of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said. The requirement would apply to both individual and corporate income tax. The bill passed the committee along party lines.

Democrats said the proposal is irresponsible, saying it would hamstring lawmakers’ ability to react to changing economic trends and strip lawmakers of the role that voters vest in them to decide tax policy.

Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law a sweeping tax reform package last year that will lower Iowa’s top income tax rate until all Iowa taxpayers pay a flat 3.9 percent tax rate. Reynolds and other Republicans have expressed intent to eventually eliminate the income tax entirely.

The proposed amendment would also enshrine the taxpayer relief fund — a state fund that finances tax cuts — in the constitution, making it harder to eliminate.

As a constitutional amendment, the proposal would need to be passed by this general assembly, and then again by the next assembly after the 2024 election. After that, it would go on the ballot in a subsequent election for a popular vote.

Bird sues administration over cybersecurity

Republican Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird joined a multistate lawsuit challenging the Biden administration over new requirements for public water facilities to boost their cybersecurity.

Bird, in a news release, called the rules “burdensome” and would impose “significant costs on Iowans in small and rural public water systems.”

The new regulation requires state governments to audit the cybersecurity practices of public water systems and force water systems to add security measures if existing ones are deemed insufficient.

The FBI, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Security Agency have warned about ongoing, malicious ransomware attacks on computer networks of water and wastewater facilities from California to Maine. That includes attempts to compromise system integrity that “threatens the ability of (water and wastewater) facilities to provide clean, potable water to, and effectively manage the wastewater of, their communities.”

Bird said the new rule would force water systems serving between 25 and 3,300 people to upgrade their cybersecurity systems and face large costs.

“At a time of soaring inflation, where it’s hard enough to make ends meet, the federal government insists on making Iowans’ water bills more costly,” Bird said in a statement.

Iowa joined Arkansas and Missouri in the lawsuit.