Hite Capitol Update – April 8th, 2022
by Dustin Hite
This week has been another busy week at the Statehouse. On Tuesday night, the House passed the final two budget bills necessary to complete its initial work on the Fiscal Year 2023 budget. This annual task was completed as the Health & Human Services and the Rebuild Iowa Infrastructure Fund (RIIF) appropriations bills were adopted by the House on bipartisan votes.
The RIIF budget continues the House’s efforts to focus infrastructure funds on maintaining and improving state facilities. The bill increases major maintenance funding to $28 million in FY 23, which will be used to address major structural issues at facilities throughout the state. The bill also advances funding for multi-year projects approved by previous budgets, completing those projects a year early. One big focus of the RIIF bill is addressing quality of life for Iowans. The bill triples the amount of infrastructure funding for state parks, and doubles the funding for the Community Attractions and Tourism (CAT) grant program and the Great Places program. The RIIF bill also increases the funding for the Dept. of Transportation’s trails program.
In the Health and Human Services budget, the focus is on addressing community-based services for those with intellectual disabilities by providing a $14.6 million reimbursement increase for Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) waiver providers (dedicated for wage & benefit costs) and an increase in the number of Intellectual Disability waiver slots available throughout the state. The bill also provides funding to increase access to mental health care in Iowa’s hospitals and children’s mental health provider network. Substance abuse treatment facilities and rural home health providers would also see an increase in funding, as well as Iowa’s programs for seniors.
With the passage of these two bills, all nine budget bills produced by the budget subcommittees have moved from the House to the Senate where they are all currently residing in the Senate Appropriations Committee. The Senate has yet to release the funding levels allocated to each budget subcommittee.
