The U.S. House approved a defense budget for fiscal year 2013 yesterday by 326 votes to 90 (roll call). Four of the five members of Iowa’s delegation supported the bill. After the jump I’ve posted details about how the Iowans voted on key defense budget amendments as well as on final passage. Statements released by each of the representatives are at the end of this post.

Yesterday Senator Chuck Grassley and other Republicans blocked an effort to bring new campaign finance disclosure rules to a vote in the U.S. Senate.  

AFSCME Iowa Council 61 filed a prohibited practice complaint yesterday with the Iowa Public Employment Relations Board, charging that Governor Terry Branstad disregarded Iowa’s collective bargaining law when he signed an executive order allowing state employees to contribute to their health insurance premiums.

Governor Terry Branstad confirmed earlier this week that employee contributions to health insurance premiums will be a major battleground during the next round of contract negotiations with unions representing state workers.  

The U.S. Department of Labor announced yesterday that it will not seek to regulate agricultural work done by children under age 16. Several members of Iowa’s Congressional delegation welcomed the news. Their statements are after the jump, along with background on the proposed rules and the full statement from the Labor Department.

UPDATE: I’ve added Senator Tom Harkin’s comments below. He was the only Iowan in Congress to express concern about the government walking away from “regulations that were, at their core, about protecting children.”

The Iowa Supreme Court ruled unanimously today that Governor Terry Branstad impermissibly used his line-item veto to strike language about Iowa Workforce Development field offices without vetoing the money allocated to fund those offices.

UPDATE: Added Branstad’s reaction below as well as statements from Iowa House and Senate Democrats.

NOTE: A third Democrat, Nick Volk, filed nominating papers in this district on March 15.

Shelley Parbs announced today that she will run for Iowa Senate district 38. She is the second declared Democratic candidate in this district; the winner of the June primary will face first-term Republican Tim Kapucian, a Senate minority leader and ranking member of the Transportation Committee. Background on Parbs is after the jump, along with election-related developments in the two Iowa House seats that make up Senate district 38.

The Iowa Supreme Court held an unusual evening session on February 21 to hear oral arguments in Governor Terry Branstad’s appeal of a district court ruling that declared two of his line-item vetoes illegal.

Yesterday the U.S. Senate approved a conference committee report to provide about $63 billion for the Federal Aviation Administration through 2015. The House approved the same bill last Friday. Iowa’s delegation was divided, primarily because of provisions affecting airline workers’ ability to form a labor union.

President Barack Obama hits the road today through Friday to promote proposals from last night’s State of the Union address. Cedar Rapids is the first stop on his itinerary, which also includes Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver, and Detroit. All cities are in states Obama hopes to win or at least put in play this November.

Follow me after the jump for links on the president’s Cedar Rapids visit. I will update this post later with highlights and reaction.

Last year, Governor Terry Branstad made only a brief appearance and declined to give a speech at the annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Day event in Des Moines. He wasn’t dumb enough to make that mistake twice.  

Iowa Workers’ Compensation Commissioner Chris Godfrey filed suit against the state, Governor Terry Branstad, and several other officials yesterday over attempts to remove Godfrey from office and cut his pay between December 2010 and July 2011. The lawsuit also accuses several state employees of defaming Godfrey by publicly claiming that his poor job performance motivated attempts to replace him.

Polk County District Court Judge Brad McCall has upheld a legal challenge to Governor Terry Branstad’s veto of language intended to keep Iowa Workforce Development offices open across the state. Excerpts from the court ruling and background on the controversy are after the jump.

Yesterday the U.S. House approved H.R. 3094, the Workforce Democracy and Fairness Act. The bill seeks to reverse proposed National Labor Relations Board actions that could make it easier for organized labor to win union elections. Although the bill has no chance of clearing the U.S. Senate, yesterday’s vote could reverberate in some of next year’s Congressional races in Iowa.

The public policy organization representing the Catholic Church in Iowa released its list of 2012 legislative priorities this week, along with a statement on “Labor and the Common Good.”

Iowa Department of Education Director Jason Glass and Governor Terry Branstad’s senior education adviser Linda Fandel rolled out a blueprint for reforming Iowa schools yesterday. The plan didn’t include any big ideas not mentioned by Glass and Fandel a few weeks ago. It also didn’t estimate how much state government and/or school districts would need to spend to make the blueprint a reality.

New Iowa teachers would no longer receive automatic raises based on years of experience or post-graduate degrees under an education reform proposal to be revealed in the coming weeks. Iowa Department of Education Director Jason Glass and Governor Terry Branstad’s special adviser on education, Linda Fandel, shared the outlines of the proposed changes with journalists yesterday.

About 4,000 Federal Aviation Administration employees are on furlough and many airport construction projects are on hold because the U.S. House and Senate failed to agree on a bill extending the FAA’s authorization. Depending on how and when Congress resolves this dispute, several Iowa airports and the travelers who use them could be affected.  

Governor Terry Branstad has nixed Iowa Democrats’ top tax policy priority for the second time this year. The governor signed the broad budget “standings” bill yesterday, but used his item veto power to eliminate several provisions, including an expansion in the earned income tax credit for working people. The governor’s veto message said,

“This change is estimated to reduce revenue to the state general fund by $28.5 million for fiscal years 2012-2013,” Branstad said. “It is my desire to approach tax policy in a comprehensive and holistic manner. As such, I urge members of the House and Senate to continue to work with my office on an overall tax reduction package that both fits within or sound budgeting principles while reducing those taxes that are impeding our state’s ability to compete for new business and jobs.”

Branstad vetoed the same tax credit expansion in a compromise bill the legislature approved in April. At that time, he also cited his “desire to approach tax policy in a comprehensive and holistic manner.”

Spending $28.5 million over two years would have helped at least 225,000 Iowa households, more by some calculations. The earned income tax credit goes entirely to lower-income and middle-income families earning less than $48,000 per year.

In a press call this morning, AFSCME Council 61 president Danny Homan described Branstad’s action as “mean-spirited,” and I would agree. In this economy, why would you block a little extra help to working households? Iowa Senate Ways and Means Committee Chair Joe Bolkcom noted in a statement, “Studies show that the Earned Income Tax Credit is the most effective antipoverty program for working families. Plus the money is spent at our small and Main Street businesses, helping to further spur our local economy.”

Branstad’s veto doesn’t look like smart politics either. During the 2012 legislative session, he wants to pass a major education reform package, comprehensive property tax reform and corporate income tax cuts. Yet he’s tanked the top Democratic tax priority twice. He is forging ahead with closing Iowa Workforce Development offices, even though saving those offices was high on the Democrats’ list throughout the 2011 session. Democrats have only a narrow Iowa Senate majority, but that majority held together for the last six months. I don’t understand why Branstad thinks he’ll be able to get any of his priorities through the upper chamber next year.

The Iowa Fiscal Partnership published a short piece on why expanding the earned income tax credit is good policy. I’ve posted that piece after the jump, along with the full text of Bolkcom’s statement on the Branstad veto and a comment from U.S. Representative Bruce Braley (IA-01).

Iowans for Tax Relief, an advocacy group that claims to be “the taxpayers’ watchdog,” was missing in action today. The organization endorsed Branstad in the 2010 gubernatorial primary as well as the general election. Iowans for Tax Relief criticized Branstad’s veto of the earned income tax credit expansion in April. Since then, the organization has had substantial turnover on its staff and board of directors. Still, you’d think they would notice the governor blocking a tax break for hundreds of thousands of Iowans.

Also from the standings bill, Branstad item vetoed a ban on bonus pay for state employees. His communications director says the bonuses are needed to attract and retain “exceptional employees,” but it looks bad for Branstad to insist on bonuses for his favorites while vetoing help for woking families. O.Kay Henderson noted at Radio Iowa that Republican lawmakers criticized Democratic Governors Tom Vilsack and Chet Culver for awarding bonuses to some state employees. Speaking on behalf of AFSCME, Homan slammed Branstad for “running around the state telling the citizens how the state’s going broke because they’re giving the union employees a two percent raise and a one percent raise and now he’s going to allow for bonuses for his department heads.”

If Republican legislative leaders comment on Branstad’s vetoes, I will add their statements to this post. So far, it’s been radio silence from the Iowa House and Senate GOP leadership.

Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty started running his presidential campaign’s second television commercial in Iowa today. The 30-second spot describes victories for Pawlenty in battles with public workers and Democrats in Minnesota.

Most of the Republican presidential candidates haven’t launched paid advertising in Iowa yet, but Pawlenty needs to make headway before the Republican Party of Iowa’s straw poll in Ames, now less than six weeks away. His camp also appears to be feeling pressure to halt Representative Michele Bachmann’s momentum in Iowa.

The video, annotated transcript and other news from the Pawlenty campaign are after the jump.  

The Cedar Rapids City Council has rescinded a project labor agreement approved last December for the $75 million downtown Convention Complex project. Governor Terry Branstad’s administration said it would withhold $15 million in I-JOBS state funding for the convention project, because Cedar Rapids had violated his executive order against project labor agreements (full text of order here). Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett and other city officials maintained that the governor’s executive order did not apply to project labor agreements signed before Branstad took office.

The dispute seemed likely to be settled in court after the governor rejected two compromise offers from Corbett. However, the convention center is a crucial part of Cedar Rapids’ downtown revitalization plans, and construction could not go forward without the $15 million in I-JOBS money. So Corbett negotiated a different solution:

In turn, the city has agreed to rescind the project’s project labor agreement – the governor opposes such agreements on public projects – between the city and the Cedar Rapids/Iowa City Building and Construction Trades Council.

Meanwhile, the city is promising the trades council that the city will use a project labor agreement on the $21-million renovation of the city-owned Five Seasons Hotel next to the Convention Complex and the new $10-million parking ramp across First Avenue East from the hotel and Convention Complex. Neither project involves state funds.

“Everybody gets a little, everybody gives a little,” said Corbett, a former speaker of the Iowa House of Representatives. “We have an agreement with all the parties, and that’s how compromise is supposed to work. … Ultimately, the taxpayer wins because they aren’t involved in a costly legal dispute.” […]

The City Council voted last night to formally rescind the existing agreement with the trades council and to develop a new project labor agreement with the council on the hotel and ramp projects.

According to Rick Smith of the Cedar Rapids Gazette, federal litigation is pending over the Branstad administration’s decision to set aside project labor agreements on state-funded projects in Coralville and Marshalltown. The Central Iowa Building and Construction Trades Council and the Cedar Rapids/Iowa City Building and Construction Trades Council jointly filed that lawsuit.

UPDATE: I agree with Todd Dorman:

I’m a little disappointed that we’ll probably never get an definitive answer on whether Branstad’s order, as it applies in local projects like this one, oversteps his executive authority. The order as written is remarkably broad and sweeping and seems to extend the governor’s power far beyond the executive branch he controls. It reads a lot like legisaltion, and that, as the term implies, is usually the job of the Legislature.

Essentially, the legislature approved a state grant program in a a bill signed by a governor, in this case the Big Lug [Chet Culver]. Then, Branstad takes office and issues an order that in turn modifies the terms of that legislation, and for that matter, any legislation that hands out state dollars for a local projects, without any legislative input or approval. Enforcing his order amounts to the deappropriation of millions of dollars simply by executive edict.

I’m not sure why any lawmakers, regardless of party, would be OK with that sort of precedent. Republicans who think it’s swell now won’t feel that way when a Democratic governor takes Branstad’s precedent and runs.

The Branstad administration’s disregard for local authority is one of the most under-reported stories of the year. I’m not talking only about this executive order, but also about Branstad’s preferred property tax reform plan and zero growth for K-12 budgets, both of which would leave local officials with fewer options.

Terry Branstad was incensed last year when outgoing Governor Chet Culver quickly agreed to contract terms proposed by AFSCME and other unions representing state employees. Culver signed off on AFSCME’s request for a 2 percent across-the-board raise on July 1, 2011, followed by a 1 percent raise on January 1, 2012, another 2 percent raise on July 1, 2012, and a 1 percent raise on January 1, 2013. Other unions also asked for modest wage increases during the next two fiscal years.

On principle, Branstad felt Culver should have left the negotiating to the person who would be governor during the contract period. As a practical matter, Branstad insisted that the state of Iowa could not afford the salary hikes. He and other administration officials called on public sector unions to renegotiate the contracts, but union leaders refused to come back to the negotiating table.

This week Branstad formally asked the state legislature to give non-union state employees the same pay increases those represented by unions will receive.

While the governor continues to believe this contract spends too much money at a time when the state cannot afford it, there are not two classes of state employees, everyone is together and should be treated the same,” [Branstad’s spokesman Tim] Albrecht said.

The governor has not recommended the state pay for the upcoming salary increases. That means that state departments must find the money elsewhere in their budgets to pay for the salary increases.

House Study Bill 247 provides for the salary increases, as well as a few other things on the governor’s wish list. For instance, the bill would “lift the cap on the salary of Iowa’s economic development director, which Rep. Tyler Olson, D-Cedar Rapids, described as troubling.”

AFSCME and other state employee unions won this round, but count on a bruising battle when it’s time to negotiate contracts covering fiscal years 2014 and 2015. Branstad will resist pay increases and will demand benefit cuts, including substantial employee contributions to health insurance expenses. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the contracts for state employee unions end up in arbitration during the next go-around.

If Republicans gain an Iowa Senate majority in the 2012 elections, union-busting will be high on the agenda. A bill to limit state employees’ collective bargaining rights and curtail binding arbitration passed the Iowa House in March after a marathon floor debate. The bill died in the Iowa Senate Labor Committee.

P.S.–Branstad isn’t getting along much better with private-sector unions. Yesterday the Central Iowa Building and Construction Trades Council and the Cedar Rapids/Iowa City Building Trades Council filed a federal lawsuit seeking to force the governor and other state entities to honor project labor agreements for construction projects in Coralville and Marshalltown.

After more than five hours of debate, the Iowa House on April 26 approved a bill to let MidAmerican Energy charge consumers for costs associated with a nuclear reactor it may or may not build in the coming decade. House File 561 passed 68 to 30. All Republicans present except two voted yes, joined by 12 House Democrats: Deborah Berry (district 22), Chris Hall (district 2), Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (district 67), Dan Muhlbauer (district 51), Pat Murphy (district 28), Rick Olson (district 68), Brian Quirk (district 15), Mark Smith (district 43), Phyllis Thede (district 81), Andrew Wenthe (district 18), John Wittneben (district 7) and Mary Wolfe (district 26). The remaining 29 House Democrats voted against the bill. Two Republicans voted no: Guy Vander Linden (district 75) and Kim Pearson (district 42).

Details on the House debate and efforts to amend the bill are after the jump, along with some speculation about its prospects in the Senate and thoughts about the coalitions lobbying for and against it.  

Public hearings are scheduled today through Thursday in Council Bluffs, Bettendorf, Cedar Rapids, and Des Moines to discuss the Legislative Services Agency’s redistricting proposal. Citizens will be able to listen in to some of those hearings at other locations around Iowa. Times and places are after the jump, along with details on other events taking place around the state this week.

As always, post a comment or contact me by e-mail if you know if a public event worth adding to this calendar.

Governor Terry Branstad and Cedar Rapids officials have made no progress toward resolving a dispute that could derail $15 million in funding for the city’s Convention Complex project. Branstad administration officials continue to insist that Cedar Rapids set aside a project labor agreement signed in December, because it conflicts with Branstad’s Executive Order 69.

Follow me after the jump for recent news on this story, including comments this week from Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller.

The days are getting warmer and longer, early wildflowers are starting to come up, and two of my favorite spring events in Iowa are happening the next two weekends. The Planned Parenthood spring book sale starts this Thursday and continues through Monday at the State Fairgrounds (4H building). This semi-annual sale supports the education and community outreach programs of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, covering most of Iowa and part of Nebraska. Come Thursday night or Friday for the best selection, Sunday or Monday for the lowest prices.

The sixth annual Natural Living Expo will be held April 2 and 3 at the Polk County Convention Complex in Des Moines. This free event showcases more than 100 natural and/or environmentally friendly Iowa businesses and community organizations. I’ll be helping staff the tables for a couple of non-profits, but I always look forward to browsing during my break times.

Like many in the Bleeding Heartland community, I’m excited to see the new map of Iowa political boundaries, which the Legislative Services Agency will release on March 31. The LSA will hold public meetings around the state on April 4 to discuss the proposed map.

Details on those events and much more are after the jump. As always, please post a comment or send me an e-mail if you know of an event that should be added to this calendar.

Cedar Rapids officials and Terry Branstad’s administration are still at odds over labor policy, and the dispute could cost Iowa’s second-largest city a $15 million state I-JOBS grant for work on its Convention Complex flood recovery project. Mayor Ron Corbett, a former Republican speaker of the Iowa House during the 1990s, has suggested compromises to accommodate Branstad’s opposition to project labor agreements, but  the governor has so far dismissed those ideas.

Follow me after the jump for background and recent news on the most significant clash between the new Branstad administration and a local government.  

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? The footage coming out of Japan the last couple of days has been horrifying. At least 10,000 people are now estimated to have died in the 9.0 earthquake near Sendai and subsequent tsunami. Hundreds of aftershocks, some of them quite powerful, threaten to destroy structures the first earthquake weakened. Power outages will occur because several of Japan’s nuclear reactors have been shut down. Radiation is leaking from the 40-year-old Fukushima nuclear plant, where one of the buildings exploded on Saturday and a meltdown seems to have occurred.  Authorities are distributing iodine to protect people nearby against some adverse health effects from radiation exposure. The nightmare scenario is northerly winds blowing a radioactive cloud toward Tokyo. Although Japanese nuclear plants have more containment features than Soviet reactors like the one destroyed in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, people are comparing the two catastrophic events. Chris Meyers and Kim Kyung-hoon reported for Reuters,

However, experts said Japan should not expect a repeat of Chernobyl. They said pictures of mist above the plant suggested only small amounts of radiation had been expelled as part of measures to ensure its stability, far from the radioactive clouds Chernobyl spewed out 25 years ago.

Japan’s nuclear safety agency said it was rating the incident a 4 on the 1 to 7 International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES), less serious than 1979’s Three Mile Island, which was rated a 5, and Chernobyl at 7. […]

Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters the nuclear reaction facility was surrounded by a steel storage machine, which was itself surrounded by a concrete building.

“This concrete building collapsed. We learnt that the storage machine inside did not explode,” he said.

Saturday morning I was disgusted by MSNBC’s coverage of the nuclear plant explosion. The only “expert” they interviewed to discuss the meltdown risk was from the Nuclear Energy Institute. He spent almost all his air time talking about how the radiation leak was very short-term, affecting a small area, and anyway we’re all exposed to radiation every day just by virtue of living on planet earth. I’m sure General Electric (major shareholder in NBC communications) wouldn’t want viewers to get too worried about nuclear power. GE built the Fukushima facility.

This disaster reveals one of the major hidden costs of nuclear power:

The liability costs associated with cleaning up after the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant will ultimately be borne by the Japanese government instead of the private insurance market, according to experts from the insurance industry.

Those liability costs, if they prove substantial, will place an added burden on the government as it copes with tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars in other expenses linked to the massive rebuilding effort that lies ahead.

This is an open thread.

UPDATE: Added YouTube clips from Ronald Reagan’s 1980 Labor Day address after the jump. Speaking about Polish workers, Reagan said, “Where free unions and collective bargaining are forbidden, freedom is lost.” Reagan served six terms as president of the Screen Actors Guild in the 1940s and 1950s (when he was a Democrat). As Republican governor of California and president of the U.S., however, he did a lot of damage to the organized labor movement.

SECOND UPDATE: What a total disgrace. The Obama administration has forced State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley to resign because he said last week that the Defense Department’s treatment of accused Wikileaker Private Bradley Manning is “is ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid.” President Obama was asked about Crowley’s comments at Friday’s press conference and (disgracefully) defended the way Manning is being treated in custody.

THIRD UPDATE: Physicist Michio Kaku: “At present, it seems that Unit 1 has only suffered partial melting. The situation at Unit 1 is stable, but the situation with Unit 3 continues to worsen hour by hour. The danger is that a further secondary earthquake or pipe break could cause the sea water to flush out of the core, uncovering the uranium and initiating a full-scale meltdown. “

Three days into floor discussion of a bill to reduce public employee bargaining rights, Iowa House Republicans voted to cut off debate on House File 525 yesterday. At least 80 percent of more than 100 amendments proposed by House Democrats had not been discussed yet. The House proceeded to reject the remaining Democratic-proposed amendments in a quick series of votes, and the final bill passed 57 to 39. The House Journal (pdf) contains details on yesterday’s debate, including all the roll calls. Most of the votes went along party lines. I was surprised to see one House Republican (Gary Worthan of district 52) vote with the whole Democratic caucus against final passage of the bill. I wonder whether he accidentally pressed the wrong button there, because he voted with the rest of the Republicans on ending debate and lots of amendments.

House Democrats were outraged by the Republican maneuver and the fact that the House switchboard wasn’t working Friday morning (which House Speaker Kraig Paulsen said was an oversight). Jason Clayworth noted at the Des Moines Register, “Limiting debate without the prior agreement to both parties is rare but not unique. Democrats, for example, limited debate in 2009 on another union bill known as prevailing wage that would have setting standards for minimum pay and benefits on government projects.”

Paulsen said the bill “addresses the cost of government in Iowa” by “leveling the playing field for taxpayers.” I am so tired of Republicans scapegoating public employees for our budgetary constraints. Iowa is in better fiscal condition than more than 40 other states. In any event, there is “no correlation between state budget shortfalls and union negotiating laws”:

“The thing that’s driving budget shortfalls is the impact of the national economy on state revenues,” said Elizabeth McNichol of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research group in Washington, D.C. “It’s definitely other factors driving these shortfalls,” rather than union agreements, she said. […]

Five states – Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia – prohibit public employee union negotiations. Each of those states faces budget shortfalls that cumulatively amount to almost $20 billion, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the National Council on Teacher Quality say.

Texas, one of the states prohibiting public union negotiations, has one of the largest projected budget shortfalls for next year, figured as a percentage of the current budget.

Iowa is among states with one of the lowest projected shortfalls for next year.

Forty-five states face budget shortfalls for the fiscal year that begins July 1. Of the five states that do not face budget shortfalls, each allows some type of public employee union bargaining.

Iowa’s public employees are paid less than their private sector counterparts when education levels, experience and hours worked are taken into account. Republicans tell us modest raises (about 3 percent per year) for state employees are unaffordable because they would cost $414 million over two years (if non-contract employees get the same pay increases). Yet David Osterberg pointed out this week,

The Iowa House has proposed cutting state income taxes by 20 percent. That would cost $350 million in 2012 and $700 million per year subsequently.

The governor has proposed lowering the top rate on the corporate income tax. That would cost $130 million in 2012 and $200 million per year subsequently.

The Senate and House have proposed adopting “bonus depreciation” rules. These new breaks for business would cost the treasury between $27 million and $83 million in 2011 and $99 million and $141 million in 2012.

While Republicans are selling House File 525 as a way to control government spending, the bill appears to be designed to undermine organized labor. It would shred binding arbitration and create new incentives for state employees not to join a union. In a statement yesterday, Iowa House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said, “Like Wisconsin, Republicans in Iowa will stop at nothing to take away rights from police officers, fire fighters, state troopers, teachers, correctional officers and other hard-working Iowans. This bill to end collective bargaining is worse than the bill approved in Wisconsin earlier today.” After the jump I’ve posted excerpts from a House Democratic Research staff analysis on the bill.

Senate Democratic leaders have made clear that House File 525 is going nowhere in the upper chamber this year. If Republicans gain a majority in the Iowa Senate in 2012, they will certainly revive this kind of legislation.

Members of Congress rarely comment on news from the Iowa legislature, but both Senator Tom Harkin and Representative Bruce Braley (IA-01) released statements on yesterday’s Iowa House vote. I’ve posted those after the jump.

MARCH 14 UPDATE: Iowa Senate Labor Committee Chair Wally Horn confirmed that this bill won’t make it out of committee in the upper chamber and is therefore dead for the 2011 legislative session.

Members of the Iowa House Republican leadership team forgot that simple rule yesterday.

The video and transcript are after the jump.

The Iowa House settled in Wednesday for a long floor debate on the labor bill formerly known as House Study Bill 117, now House File 525 (full text). This bill would sharply restrict collective bargaining rights and end binding arbitration for public employee unions. When the Iowa House Labor Committee considered this bill, Democrats kept lawmakers in session all night, offering dozens of amendments. House Democrats have proposed at least 100 amendments for consideration on the floor, and many legislators are speaking about each one. About six hours into the debate, fewer than ten amendments have been considered. It’s not clear whether the chamber will adjourn later tonight, but even if House members pull another all-nighter, this debate could take days. With a 60-40 majority, Republicans have the votes to pass House File 525 eventually, but it could be an exhausting experience. Senate Democratic leaders have vowed to block the bill in the upper chamber.

Meanwhile, Governor Terry Branstad traveled the state today pushing his message about how Iowa can’t afford to give public employees raises during the next two fiscal years. Statehouse Democrats say that Iowa can afford the new union contracts negotiated by former Governor Chet Culver, if Republicans give up their planned corporate and higher-income tax cuts.

Labor issues were contentious even when Democrats had the trifecta in Iowa. Culver’s 2008 veto of a bill that would have expanded collective bargaining rights caused a lasting rift between him and the state’s labor movement. The following year, six House Democrats stood with Republicans to block a prevailing wage bill, undermining the credibility of the majority leaders. Another Democrat’s opposition to “fair share” legislation prompted an unsuccessful primary challenge in 2010. Now that the political battle in Iowa has shifted to defending rather than expanding labor rights, the Democratic House caucus is more united.

Today’s unusual circumstances in the Iowa House  are nothing compared to the circus unfolding in Wisconsin. Senate Democrats left the state three weeks ago to deny Republicans the quorum they needed to pass an even more restrictive collective bargaining bill. Republicans moved to end the standoff today by supposedly removing the fiscal portions of the labor bill, making it no longer subject to the Wisconsin Senate quorum rules. The chamber then convened and passed the bill in about five minutes with no debate or amendments and only one dissenting vote. However, Democrats claim not all parts of the bill affecting the budget were removed before today’s power play; this pdf file is the Wisconsin Legislative Fiscal Bureau’s analysis of the revised bill. There will surely be a legal challenge to passing the bill without a quorum, and some union representatives in Wisconsin are even talking about organizing a general strike.

Any comments about political battles over labor issues are welcome in this thread.

UPDATE: The Iowa House adjourned Wednesday night after eight hours of debate on House File 525. The discussion resumes on Thursday; here’s a link to live video.

Senator Tom Harkin issued this statement on the Wisconsin events:

“I am appalled by the actions of the Republicans in Wisconsin.  They trampled over the democratic process, ramming through legislation taking away a fundamental right of Wisconsin’s public servants – the right to organize.  The law has nothing to do with budgets.  It is blatant political scapegoating, and it is shameful.  Our elected leaders at every level of government should be focused on helping working families succeed, not tearing them down.”

A public hearing on the collective bargaining bill under consideration in the Iowa House is likely to be one of the main political events of the week, but there’s much more going on around the state as well. Details are after the jump.

As always, post a comment or send me an e-mail to let me know of public events that should be included on this calendar.

The Des Moines Register continues to release results from its latest statewide poll. Selzer and Co surveyed 800 Iowa adults between February 13 and 16. Bleeding Heartland discussed the Register’s poll numbers on Governor Terry Branstad here.

Follow me after the jump to discuss President Barack Obama’s approval inching up in Iowa, slight growth in support for same-sex marriage rights, views on ways to close the state budget gap, and more.

The U.S. Air Force announced on Thursday that Boeing will receive a $35 billion contract to build aerial refueling tankers. The contract is expected to create roughly 800 jobs in Iowa, including 200 at Cedar Rapids-based Rockwell Collins. Iowa politicians from both parties hailed the decision, including Republican Governor Terry Branstad and Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett and Democratic Representatives Bruce Braley and Dave Loebsack. Branstad, Braley and Loebsack all noted in their official statements that they had urged the U.S. Department of Defense to award Boeing the contract.  Former Governor Chet Culver went to Washington to lobby for Boeing’s bid last year. Boeing’s rival for the contract was the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company, which makes Airbus planes. Airbus also uses subcontractors based in Iowa, but Boeing’s subcontractors employ more Iowans. The European company may protest the Air Force’s decision and has support from some members of Congress.

Des Moines business owner Mike Draper published a guest editorial in Saturday’s Des Moines Register undermining Republican claims about corporate tax cuts creating jobs:

I recently heard “cutting state taxes will add jobs” delivered with a perfect, deadpan tone, but I was the only one laughing. Wasn’t it meant to be a joke?

After all, since starting a small downtown clothing store, Raygun, in 2005, I have added about 25 jobs and never once considered the state tax rate when doing so. […]

Most job growth nationally and in Iowa will come from small businesses like mine, and many small businesses are set up as S-corporations, which don’t pay corporate tax; rather, any profits for the company are paid on the personal tax statements of the owners. So corporate tax cuts will only really affect the largest companies in Iowa, which add the least number of jobs over time.

But for argument sake, let’s say the governor wanted to cut state income-tax rates as well to help small businesses add jobs. Say he even reduced my state taxes by 20 percent and I was expected to hire new staff with that savings. On a salary of $40,000 per year, that 20 percent reduction moves my taxes by 1 percent, or 400 annual dollars.

So, indeed, I could hire a new employee with my savings; it would just take 100 years (and by 2111, would $40,000 per year even be enough for them to afford the newest hover-board that all the other guys at the store will have?).

However, if that tax savings were coupled with public pre-K being eliminated for my son, a $400 annual savings may be slightly offset by the additional $8,000 annually I’d have to spend on day care.

With the governor’s math, I’d be laying off someone every 5 years and hiring every 100.

State tax collection data doesn’t support the claim that corporate tax cuts would help Iowa’s small businesses expand:

About 885 businesses, with sales over $25 million in Iowa, paid 65 percent of the state’s corporate taxes in 2008. That’s $142 million of nearly $219 million paid, Iowa Department of Revenue data show.

In addition, the data show the biggest corporate taxpayers are large retailers with sales outside the state. Iowa taxes companies only for income earned within the state.

Branstad has said small businesses would benefit the most because most of their sales – and income – are within the state.

But data from a state report show the 22,000 companies that have sales exclusively in Iowa contributed just 19 percent of the revenue collected via the state’s corporate taxes. That was about $41.6 million in 2008.

The governor has promoted his plan to cut the state’s corporate tax rates – with the highest rate at 12 percent – to a flat 6 percent for all companies. Branstad has said the tax cut – along with reducing commercial property taxes and government spending and eliminating regulations that stifle job growth – will help create 200,000 jobs and boost income 25 percent for Iowa families over five years. […]

But Iowa State University economist Dave Swenson said “it’s very unclear to me how this tax cut would create significantly more jobs in Iowa.”

Swenson said the proposed tax would be “very beneficial to a lot of large retailers and service firms that serve Iowa demand.”

“But cutting the corporate tax rate isn’t going to create more of those firms,” he said. “And for those large firms we want to attract – the Googles, IBMs, the Microsofts, companies that produce for a worldwide market – it’s a meaningless tax cut because they already do not pay very much Iowa corporate tax,” given that their sales and services are mostly sold outside Iowa and avoid state tax.

Economist Peter Fisher fleshed out that argument in his recent report on Corporate Taxes and State Economic Growth (pdf file):

Business tax breaks are an expensive and inefficient way to attempt to stimulate a state economy. Because of the small effect of tax breaks on business costs, and the much larger importance of other production costs and location considerations, tax breaks will have little if any positive effect on private- sector employment. In fact, the revenue losses may well produce immediate public-sector job losses. Furthermore, the private-sector employment effects of such tax cuts could be reduced or even eliminated by a long-term deterioration in the quality of public services, which themselves have been shown to be important to businesses making location decisions, and which provide an important part of the foundation for the state economy.

The business owners I know hire new employees when they anticipate greater demand for their goods or services. Tax rates are not a factor in that decision.

This is an open thread. What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers?

Anyone go to the labor rally on Saturday at the capitol? Snow couldn’t keep 70,000 to 100,000 people from attending the labor rally in Madison, Wisconsin.

The first all-nighter of the 2011 legislative session ended this morning around 6:05 am, as the Iowa House Labor Committee approved a bill restricting public employees’ collective bargaining rights on a party-line vote.

Details on the bill, the debate, and the fight to come are after the jump.

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? Some news that caught my eye recently:

Tens of thousands of people in Wisconsin have protested against efforts by Republican Governor Scott Walker and the GOP-controlled legislature to impose big benefit cuts on public employees and curtail their collective bargaining rights. The 14 Democrats in the Wisconsin Senate left the state to deny Republicans a quorum for passing the anti-union bill. I’ve been following the day to day news on the Uppity Wisconsin blog.

Joel Northup, a wrestler for Linn-Mar high school, qualified for the state tournament but defaulted when his bracket paired him with Cassy Herkelman, a girl from Cedar Falls. Herkelman and Megan Black of Ottumwa made history this year by becoming the first girls to qualify for the Iowa high school state wrestling tournament.

Johnson County supervisors voted 5-0 on Thursday to ban firearms and dangerous weapons from buildings, lands and vehicles owned by the county. Some Republicans in the Iowa legislature are pushing a bill that would bar local governments from restricting guns in that manner.

State Senator Mark Chelgren’s stupid comments about Iowa’s voluntary preschool program for four-year-olds prompted Mr. desmoinesdem to look up information about pre-primary education in the Communist bloc. Contrary to Chelgren’s assertion that the Soviets started indoctrinating children early, when “they’re so malleable,” the USSR provided essentially day care rather than formal education for children under age 7.

The Internal Revenue Service declared this month that breast pumps are a tax-deductible expense, reversing a determination made last fall. A quality pump can cost hundreds of dollars. Pumping has its detractors but can be invaluable for working women who want to continue breastfeeding, or for women whose babies are unable to breastfeed.

Zach Wahls, whose testimony against the marriage amendment at an Iowa House public hearing went viral on YouTube, appeared on the Ellen show this week.

Governor Terry Branstad’s double-dipping (continuing to draw his $50,000 state pension while receiving a $130,000 salary as governor) made news in Iowa a few days ago. Branstad’s communications director, Tim Albrecht, said the governor “made a significant personal sacrifice” by resigning as president of Des Moines University. In that job he had received more than $350,000 per year.

One low-profile story that should be getting more attention is the wide-ranging spending cut bill under consideration in the House of Representatives. H.R. 1 would decimate funding for too many good programs to list in this post. For example, Iowa would lose $12 million in K-12 funding for various programs, $116 million in Pell grant funds, $1.4 million for vocational and adult education, $6.9 million for job training, $1 million for mental health and substance abuse treatment grants, $4.3 million for various low-income housing programs, $28 million in clean water-related funds, $28 million for Community Development Block Grants, and $1.3 million for justice assistance grants. Key transportation programs nationwide would also lose funding, including public transit and high-speed rail.

This is an open thread.

Governor Terry Branstad and the Republican mayor of Iowa’s second-largest city are at odds over a project labor agreement for construction of the $76.5-million Cedar Rapids Convention Complex. The Branstad administration has threatened to withdraw a $15 million I-JOBS grant for building the convention center, and the dispute could end up in court.

Join me after the jump to discuss on the biggest state-local power struggle Iowa’s seen in years.

UPDATE: Click here for more details on the draft budget the governor presented on January 27.

During his regular weekly press conference, Governor Terry Branstad announced today that state departments would have to take cuts because the state can’t afford the salary increases in the two-year contract Governor Chet Culver approved last year with AFSCME, the largest labor union representing state workers. Branstad added that he’s not worried about facing a lawsuit (like the one AFSCME successfully filed against him in 1991) because the Iowa legislature won’t fund the new AFSCME contract. AFSCME members overwhelmingly voted to approve the contract, which includes salary increases of just under 3 percent in fiscal years 2012 and 2013. Branstad wants the union to reopen negotiations.

Citing budget constraints, Branstad said today “he will not request any increase in ‘allowable growth’ in state aid for K-12 school districts base budgets in either of the next two fiscal years.” I believe the Democratic-controlled Iowa Senate will resist that plan.

UPDATE: Doesn’t sound like a way to provide “world-class education” for Iowa kids. Under Branstad’s “no allowable growth” proposal,

a school would not be legally allowed to expand their budgets unless the district sees a surge in enrollment.

Inflation for such things as employee salaries and fuel costs make a no-growth policy virtually impossible for hundreds of Iowa’s district to handle without massive cuts to programs, services and teachers, educational advocates said.

“The only way they can make it up is to cut programs or services and most of the schools have already been doing that,” said Brad Hudson, a lobbyist for the Iowa State Education Association. “Most of the schools have already looked at reductions to music, art and physical education. Now we’re to the point of looking at the elimination of programs and probably larger class sizes.”

Also during today’s press conference, Branstad said he does not favor state subsidies for passenger rail, although he isn’t against communities or railroads subsidizing that service, the Des Moines Register’s Kathie Obradovich reported. Those comments indicate that like Iowa House Republicans, Branstad wants to eliminate about $10 million in state funding needed to secure an $81 million in federal money to extend passenger rail service from the Quad Cities to Iowa City. The federal government awarded the funds last October.

UPDATE: William Petroski has more detail on Branstad’s passenger rail stance:

He noted that the $310 million state-federal project in cooperation with the state of Illinois would include money to upgrade the tracks of the Iowa Interstate Railroad, and he suggested the railroad could be asked to help contribute towards the costs.

“There are two questions: One is the state’s initial requirement and then there is an ongoing subsidy. I am most troubled by the ongoing subsidy. I don’t think we should be in the business of subsidizing passenger train service,” Branstad told reporters. […]

The governor, who will issue his state budget recommendations on Thursday, added that he still hasn’t made a final decision yet about the proposed Iowa City-to-Chicago train.

Branstad continued to advocate for biennial budgeting today. Legislators from both parties are wary of that proposal, because it would in effect increase the governor’s budget transfer powers. The national trend has been away from biennial budgeting, which tends to result in less accurate budget forecasting and greater need for supplemental appropriations than annual budgeting.

AFSCME Iowa Council 61 announced on December 22 that its membership overwhelmingly approved a new contract covering fiscal years 2012 and 2013. The vote means Governor-elect Terry Branstad will not be able to persuade state employees to accept a pay freeze in the name of budget austerity.

Details on the vote and more are after the jump.

Iowa’s three-member Revenue Estimating Conference again raised projections for state revenues during the current fiscal year and fiscal year 2012, following another month of growing state tax collections in November. The news hasn’t deterred Republican leaders from planning mid-year budget cuts, and legislators from both parties acknowledged the end of federal stimulus funds will make the next budget year difficult. Details and proposals are after the jump.