Tuesday, February 23rd will mark Session Day 44 of the scheduled 110-day session, exactly 40% of the way to the April 30th last (scheduled) day of session. We are also two weeks now from the March 5th First Funnel Deadline when bills must be out committee in order to stay alive for the session (Tax and spending bills are exempt.)

The biggest lifts the past couple weeks have been the House moving 6 childcare bills over to the Senate, both chambers finalizing allowable growth for schools, movement in both chambers on the Governor’s housing, broadband and renewable fuels bills, and both chambers introducing major election reform legislation this past Tuesday and moving it quickly through committee this week.

Childcare

Week 5 saw the Iowa House pass six bills in one day dealing with childcare in Iowa. They continue to work on a few additional bills addressing this issue, but the Senate will now determine which pieces to take. (Many of the six already had a Senate companion bill.) The six measures passed include:

• HF 230 - Increases the income threshold for the Child Care Tax Credit from $45,000 to $90,000. 
• HF 370 - Creates an incentive for employers to provide child care for their employees by providing a tax credit up to $150,000. 
• HF 260 - Allows individuals providing child care in their homes to take care of 6 or fewer children, an increase from 5 or fewer.  
• HF 292 - Raises Iowa's child care rates to the 50th percentile according to the Market Rate Survey.  
• HF 302 - Creates an "off ramp" from Child Care Assistance program so parents can continue to grow in their career without losing their child care assistance entirely, all at once.  
• HF 301 - Creates a fund to provide child care workforce grants on a dollar-for-dollar matching basis from communities.

Allowable Growth

The House finished a lengthy and contentious debate Thursday afternoon on legislation that allocates $30 million in supplemental funds to school districts that had more in-person days during the pandemic. This bill put the final touches on the school funding issue for this year, following the Legislature’s passage of allowable growth (SF 269) for schools earlier this week. The House and Senate settled on a 2.4 percent increase for 2022.

Revenue Estimating Conference

The March meeting of the Revenue Estimating Conference (REC) has been set March 29. They will review current projections for Fiscal Year 2021 and 2022 and produce a report that will guide the Legislature on their next steps in enacting a budget.  The Legislature will be required to use the LOWER of the March 2021 and December 2020 REC projections. Iowa revenues have been more solid than many other states. Legislators will likely be paying close attention though to the gaming revenue projections that end up funding the Rebuild Iowa Infrastructure Fund (RIIF). In addition to challenges created by the casinos’ closures during the pandemic and the efforts to get them back up and running, Nebraska’s recent decision to build casinos will no doubt affect Iowa’s revenues.

Broadband

A number of bills dealing with elements of broadband are making their way through the legislative process. Some level of contention has arisen between providers over the bill’s requirement of 100 megabytes for upload and download to be eligible for the grants, however most groups are in agreement about the goals of the bill.  SF 390 has been passed by the Senate Commerce Committee and is awaiting either full Senate debate or referral to another committee. It’s important to note that the Governor’s request of $450 million over three years for these grants is NOT yet in the bill, and will be addressed either at the bill’s next step or in separate legislation.

Watch other bills tracked by our partners at Professional Developers of Iowa.