Guy Vander Linden Capitol News Update – March 1, 2012
Representative Guy Vander Linden works at his desk in the Iowa House of Representatives
Iowans support House Republicans’ Property Tax Plan
A recent Iowa poll by the Des Moines Register showed widespread support for the House Republican Property Tax Plan. One of the questions posed was the following :
A trade-off the Legislature is considering is about tax rates on commercial property. Reduced rates might make Iowa more attractive to business, and would also mean lower tax revenues for cities, counties, and schools. Do you favor such an approach?
Public response to the question revealed that 60 percent of Iowans said they favored cutting commercial property taxes, even if that meant lower revenues for local governments. Evidently, the public understands that governments at all levels need to spend less and free up the private sector for investment, growth and job creation. The Register Poll showed support for this across political lines: 70% of Republicans ; 60% percent of Independents ; 47% of Democrats.
Apparently a majority of Iowans support this effort as 73 percent said this plan would attract businesses to Iowa and motivate already existing Iowa employers to add jobs here. Iowans have indicated that the House Republicans’ plan to provide broad based tax relief to all classes of property is what they want.
House Republicans have pursued this legislation in order to give Iowa taxpayers a seat at the table.
Des Moines Named Top Jobs City By Forbes Magazine
This week, Forbes magazine released its list of top cities in which an individual should look for a job. Des Moines was second on that list behind Washington, D.C.
Forbes cited high household incomes and a low unemployment rate as the primary reasons for the ranking. The magazine also stated that projections from Moody’s Analytics estimate that employment in the Des Moines area will see an increase of 8.6% over the next four years, which would translate into 36,000 jobs.
The story referenced a number of Iowa employers including John Deere, Pioneer, Kemin Industries in the ag/biotech area. These businesses are providing thousands of Iowans jobs. Forbes also lauded Des Moines’ ability to retain big downtown businesses during the downturn such as Principal, Wells Fargo, and Meredith as other big cities across the nation lost downtown jobs and haven’t been able to recover them.
Governor Branstad set an ambitious goal of creating 200,000 new jobs and increasing the wealth of Iowa families by 25 percent. If the projections that Forbes makes are accurate, Des Moines could play a very large role in helping to achieve those goals.
Justice Systems Budget Passes House with Bi-Partisan Support
Tuesday night, House Republicans proposed a Justice Systems Appropriation Bill that did just that. By a vote of 69-30, House File 2335 passed the house and is now waiting for action in the Senate.
House File 2335 spends $504.5 million from the General Fund. The money appropriated in this budget is used to cover costs of the Attorney General, the Department of Corrections, Community Based Corrections, the Iowa Law Enforcement Academy, State Public Defender, Board of Parole, Department of Public Defense, Department of Public Safety, Gaming Enforcement, and the Civil Rights Commission. All budgets are the same as FY12, except for the Attorney General and the Civil Rights Commission, both of which were reduced by 10 percent. The impact on both of these groups is expected to be minimal.
House Republicans have worked to ensure that needs of all departments were met within the budget target. HF 2335 was supported by 13 Democrats who agreed that the House Republicans’ budget was the right course of action.
The Senate must now review HF 2335 and determine if they will meet the House recommendations or propose a different budget. If the Senate does not agree with the House the bill will be sent back to the House for further negotiation.
