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by State Representative Patti Ruff
Last week there was conference committee work beginning on several budgets. The Health and Human Services budget and a few bills were the only floor action seen by the House in a very light week of work. It appears that the end of session will not commence for a couple more weeks, which very well may put us into June.
Earlier this year, the Governor started a proposal of closing two of Iowa’s four Mental Health Institutes (MHI) without legislative input or approval. Already, some employees have received termination notices and patients are no longer being accepted at the MHIs.
As part of the Health and Human Services budget bill, the House majority party proposed a plan to delay the closure of the two institutes by six months. The plan does not provide enough funding to keep the institutes open and provide the needed services to Iowans.
Many lawmakers support a plan passed by the Iowa Senate that would fully fund the institutes and keep them open. On the final vote, the House majority passed the plan to close the institutes in mid-December of 2015. The bill, including this proposal, now goes back to the Senate for consideration.
The House voted to create the “Iowa First-Time Home Buyers Savings Account Act.” The bill would encourage first-time home buyers to establish accounts to help save for the purchase of a house.
The program allows a first- time home buyer to subtract up to $3,000 for a single filer or $6,000 for a couple from individual income taxes for contributions to the account. In addition, an account holder may also subtract the interest and earnings from the account holder’s first-time home buyer’s account.
Iowa ranks eighth in the country in terms of accessibility to preschool, according to a Rutgers University report. The nonpartisan National Institute for Early Education Research also looked at funding for preschool, which showed that Iowa had more than 26,000 students participating in preschool programs in 2014.
The Iowa House has already approved a bill this year to give preschool programs more flexibility. It would allow for transportation of preschool children with other children, and administrative costs would now be able to cover rent and outreach activities.
The Department of Education (DE) announced that 33 new school districts have been accepted to launch their plans for Iowa’s Teacher Leadership and Compensation System. This brings the total number of districts in the system to 198 out of 338 school districts. Starmont and Central were among those 33 approved.
The new districts will implement their teacher leadership plans in the 2016-17 school year. Districts statewide are close to wrapping up their first year, while others are gearing up for participation.
The Governor signed the “Safe at Home” Program, which allows victims of domestic abuse, stalking, human trafficking, or sexual assault to use the Secretary of State’s Office for a secure mailing address. Many times victims are terrified that their perpetrators will get their home address and be re-victimized, and this provides a layer of protection.
In order to participate, victims must sign up through the Secretary of State’s Office, and then they can use the office’s addresses as their own when they do things such as signing up their kids for school, putting an address down for work purposes, etc. The money to pay for this program will come from a combination of funding streams, including a new $50 surcharge on persons who violate a domestic abuse protective order, and a $100 surcharge against persons found guilty of domestic abuse assault, stalking, and sexual abuse. The program will begin January 1, 2016, but the collection of surcharges will begin July 1, 2015. This enables some money to be collected to help with the start-up cost of the program.
Peregrine Falcons have made a comeback in Iowa. According to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, five additional falcon nesting pairs have been found along the Mississippi River in Bellevue, Dubuque, Clinton, Muscatine and Keokuk.