Governor Kim Reynolds signed an economic development bill twice last month after the legislature initially forwarded an incomplete version of the bill to her office.
Secretary of the Senate Charlie Smithson wrote to the governor on May 10 that “due to a clerical error,” part of a late amendment was omitted from the enrolled text of Senate File 574, which the governor had signed on May 1. Smithson enclosed “an accurate version of the bill,” which Reynolds signed the same day.
Former legislative staff who worked in the chambers for decades told Bleeding Heartland they could not recall any similar mix-up happening.
AN UNEVENTFUL JOURNEY TO FINAL PASSAGE
Senate File 574 creates a “Major Economic Growth Attraction” (MEGA) program under the Iowa Economic Development Authority. Eligible projects must involve an investment of at least $1 billion and meet other conditions to qualify for certain tax incentives. The program can be used for no more than two projects and will sunset on January 1, 2027.
The authority proposed the concept in early 2023, and the Iowa Senate passed a version of the bill on the penultimate day of last year’s legislative session. But House leaders did not bring the MEGA bill to the floor before both chambers adjourned.
The House Ways and Means Committee revived the bill this year, and the lower chamber added several provisions during floor debate on March 6. One new division allocated $300,000 to the Iowa Economic Development Authority’s Certified Sites Program, stipulating that funds be used in counties with a population below 50,000, and that the agency certify at least two sites in each Congressional district. House members approved the amended Senate File 574 by 89 votes to 4.
The Senate took up the revised bill on April 16, with one amendment that included all of the House changes. Senators approved the House amendment by voice vote, then unanimously passed the bill.
ENGROSSMENT AND ENROLLMENT
Bills don’t go to the Iowa governor’s office immediately following passage in both chambers. First, legislative staff compile an “engrossed bill,” incorporating language from all approved amendments. For House files, that work happens in the House Chief Clerk’s office; for Senate files, the Secretary of the Senate’s office handles the task.
Timothy McDermott, director of the nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency (LSA), described the next steps via email: “LSA then prepares the enrolled bill from the engrossed bill, the enrolled bill is returned to the chamber of origin, and the chamber of origin coordinates getting the legislative signatures for the bill.” Once the House speaker and Senate president have signed the bill (as the Iowa Constitution requires), “the chamber of origin presents the bill to the Governor for consideration.”
When Reynolds is in a hurry, the legislative branch can get a priority bill to her desk within a few hours, or overnight. But it’s more typical for the process to take a few days or weeks. Sometimes, more than a month passes before a bill is signed and enrolled.
Somewhere along the way, that process broke down for Senate File 574, which was enrolled and sent to the governor on April 29.
“THE MOST TRANSPARENT METHOD OF RESOLVING THE ISSUE”
According to Smithson’s May 10 letter, the “clerical error” during “the engrossing/enrolling process” affected one portion of the House amendment. The first enrolled version of Senate File 574 included language allocating $300,000 to the certified sites program, but was missing language instructing the Economic Development Authority to adopt emergency rules on the MEGA program, as well as the effective date for that part of the bill.
Smithson said the mistake “was brought to my attention” on May 7, after which his office restarted the process of engrossing and enrolling the bill, and obtaining the necessary signatures. He added, “The legislative branch believes this is the most transparent method of resolving the issue.”
The fix was transparent, in that the Senate published Smithson’s letter on the legislature’s website and noted the change in the Senate Journal. On the other hand, Smithson did not respond to Bleeding Heartland’s inquiries about when and how the clerical error occurred, who spotted the mistake and informed him of the problem, or whether any other bill in recent memory had been incorrectly enrolled.
McDermott said he didn’t know whether there was any precedent for this sequence of events, and that to his knowledge, the LSA did not maintain records on such mistakes.
Mike Marshall, who served as secretary of the Senate from 1999 to early 2017, said he was not aware of any bill having to be re-enrolled and signed a second time.
Mark Brandsgard also could not remember any comparable situation. He worked on the Iowa House staff for more than 30 years, beginning as a research analyst in 1977 and eventually serving as House chief clerk from 2007 through 2010.
It was fortunate that someone noticed the flaw in Senate File 574 within the 30-day window when the governor can sign or veto bills after the legislature adjourns (which happened on April 20 this year). That allowed the law to take effect after Reynolds approved the corrected version. It’s not clear whether this mistake could have been fixed after May 20. The MEGA program might have been delayed until the House and Senate could pass enabling legislation in 2025.
I wondered whether the chambers had actually approved identical versions of Senate File 574, as the constitution requires. If the emergency rule-making provision had been missing from the amendment prepared for the Senate, the bill Reynolds signed would be null and void, because each chamber would have voted on different language. However, the House amendment does contain the language that was omitted from the first enrolled version of the bill. So it appears that there is no constitutional problem with how this bill became a law.
The most surprising aspect of this strange episode may be that it doesn’t happen more often, given how frequently Iowa’s governing majority attaches long and complicated amendments to bills shortly before final passage.
Are you aware of any precedent for this kind of legislative fix in Iowa? Please reach out to Laura Belin.
UPDATE: Jake Heard, an attorney and former staffer in the Iowa Senate President’s office, flagged one other late correction to an already-signed bill. On May 19, 2021 (the last day of that year’s session), Republican lawmakers approved a wide-ranging election bill known as Senate File 568. Reynolds signed the bill on June 8. Smithson included the following notice in the Senate Journal for June 22, 2021:
Here’s how that part of the bill appears after the strike was removed from the space between the “impression” and “facsimile.”
Reynolds didn’t sign Senate File 568 a second time; the correction appears to have happened outside the 30-day window for her to approve legislation. But the change was so minor that I doubt this “scrivener’s error” would invalidate the law. The bill Reynolds signed was not missing language approved by the legislature, nor did it contain any language not approved by both chambers.
Appendix: Senate File 574 materials, including Secretary of the Senate Smithson’s letter to the governor, the signed corrected version of the bill, and the previously signed version, on which every page is stamped “Incorrectly engrossed and enrolled”