Des Moines Register. March 15, 2018
Iowa’s elected officials ignore the needs of seniors
The GOP’s dedication to tax cuts and starving government has resulted in huge cuts to agencies designed to help vulnerable people. Unfortunately these agencies are headed by political appointees who do not consider seniors a priority either.
The Iowa Department on Aging now has 17 employees. Nine years ago it had 40 workers. Yet Director Linda Miller said she has not asked Gov. Kim Reynolds for additional funding, partly because the governor and her staff are already aware of the effect that the budget cuts are having.
“Those people are not stupid over there and they know what’s going on here,” she said. “But we’re making it work.”
Really? Who exactly is it working for?
Perhaps for Miller, who earns more than $100,000 annually. But it’s not working for anyone else.
The most recent proposed budget cuts to her agency are expected to result in 50,0000 fewer meals delivered to the homes of these Iowans. Hundreds of older residents will see cuts in help obtaining everything from eyeglasses to utility assistance.
Down the hall from the aging department is another state entity intended to assist seniors. The Iowa Long-Term Care Ombudsman’s Office investigates complaints against nursing homes and assisted-living centers.
Except Iowans who call the office to report abuse or neglect are often routed to an automated messaging system telling them no one is available to take the call. Over the past 14 months, the office has shrunk from 17 employees to 12. Three vacant positions will not be filled.
Last summer budget cuts forced the ombudsman’s office to eliminate virtually all spending on travel.
Instead of visiting nursing homes in response to complaints about care, investigations are done over the phone. This appears to directly violate state law, which requires the agency to “visit” long-term care facilities.
One would expect Ombudsman Cynthia Pederson to be screaming from the rooftops. After all, she is supposed to be advocating for about 550,000 seniors in this state.
Instead she submitted to the governor a zero-growth budget that does not restore funding for on-site visits. She has failed to register support for legislation that could provide money to her agency.
Iowans should be furious that scarce public dollars are being used to pay the salaries of these two officials. They are not advocates for seniors.
Neither is the GOP-controlled Legislature, which refuses to fund programs to help older Iowans.
Neither is a governor who continues to push an income tax bill that will further reduce state revenue and further starve the government services Iowans need.
Do these public officials not understand government has a responsibility to do what it can to take care of people who cannot take care of themselves?
A state entity is supposed to respond when there are complaints about mistreatment in a nursing home. Our older neighbors who cannot leave their homes should be able to have a meal delivered. The reason long-term care ombudsmen exist is that everyone has long recognized seniors need someone on their side.
But these are not priorities for this state’s current leaders. They bend over backward to reduce state revenue and then they say the state cannot afford to provide basic services. They starve government to the point of breaking, then justify starving it some more because it’s broken.
This shrinking of services for older Iowans comes as their ranks are mushrooming. Those 65 and older account for 16 percent of Iowa’s population, the 14th-highest share in the nation as of 2015. The percentage is expected to reach 20 percent by 2050.
In the 2010 Census, Iowa ranked third in the “oldest-old” age group, those 85 and older.
Any Iowan who is a senior or plans to become one someday should vote in November to remove these elected officials from office. They are not working on behalf of Iowans. They are not helping protect the state’s most vulnerable people. They do not listen to senior advocates who plead for help.
Iowa’s only hope for getting on track is to send them packing.
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Quad-City Times. March 16, 2018
So much for home rule
Don’t buy the hype. Iowa’s GOP-run Legislature is ramming through a cynical attempt at silencing Scott County’s urban voters, who just so happen to vote Democrat.
That’s the reality of House File 2372, which would overhaul how Iowa’s 10 largest counties - and only those counties - elect county supervisors.
Gerrymandering is rampant, squeal sponsors of the bill that would require any county with more than 60,000 residents to elect supervisors by district. It’s a curious allegation to level at Scott County, though, which elects its supervisors in an at-large election.
Frankly, there is no gerrymandering in Scott County. Nor can there be, under the long established system. Funny thing is, this bill would actually create the conditions necessary for the creation of skewed districts wholly designed to protect incumbents.
Look beyond the pretext and the real motivation of HF 2372, which this past week passed through Iowa House and now sits in the Senate, becomes exceedingly clear. Six of the 10 targeted counties - including Polk, Linn and Johnson - voted for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in 2016. All 10 include an urban center that’s more favorable to Democrats than the state’s rural expanses. Iowa’s 89 other counties, Republican strongholds, they just so happen to go untouched.
But rural voters are too often ignored in big counties, proponents say. This would give them a voice, they plead. In the case of Scott County, that claim is total and complete rubbish. Scott County Board of Supervisors universally touts at least one “rural” member. While not the case everywhere, Scott County’s elections aren’t dominated by one or two haughty neighborhoods that pump out candidates. And, by law and policy, Scott County Supervisors of late have been particularly keen to rural needs, especially farmland preservation.
This bill is solely about expanding Republican power in unfriendly territory. It’s about neutralizing those pesky liberal professors in Johnson County. It’s payback for urbanites in Des Moines who demanded drinking water not infected by farm waste. It’s another salvo in Iowa’s festering culture war pitting struggling rural towns and growing cities. And, like the Electoral College, it’s another attempt at favoring acreage over actual voters.
An estimated 172,000 people live in Scott County, according to the most recent estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. Of those, about 144,000 - a whopping 84 percent - live in Davenport, Bettendorf or Eldridge. It’s these voters who would ultimately have their political power diluted should the Senate approve HF 2372 and Gov. Kim Reynolds sign it.
HF 2372 is an attack on home rule mounted by members of a party that claim to believe in local control. Any lawmaker who supports this legislation forfeits the ability to pretend otherwise. It’s a master class in partisan self-service under the guise of election fairness. It’s a power grab, plain and simple.
And it’s an odd one, too. Farmers are a huge component of Iowa. They represent one-third of the state’s economy. They define how Iowa is viewed throughout the country. But it’s downright dishonest to argue that they’re under-represented in the halls of power. Iowa Farm Bureau wields massive influence over a countless number of state lawmakers and can unilaterally decide if legislation lives or dies. It was true for the recent school equity bill. It’s been true when anyone brings up water quality.
Iowa Senate should come to its senses and kill this blatant attempt at railroading voters just because they happen to live in a city.
It’s voters, not vast expanses of acreage, that should matter in elections. Unfortunately, too many Republicans in Iowa’s Legislature believe otherwise.
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Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier. March 13, 2018
Council: Adopt a budget and then own it
The adults have spoken. The state Department of Management told the bickering Waterloo City Council majority and Mayor Quentin Hart that its failure to adopt a fiscal year 2018-19 budget has consequences.
The infighting about raising taxes (and fees) or making significant cuts, particularly in public safety positions, has led to a budget stalemate between the 4-3 council majority and mayor. The failure to meet the March 15 state deadline will leave the city with the same level of tax collections for next year as in the current fiscal year. (The City Council added the budget to its Monday night agenda so a vote could come then.)
“Waterloo will still need to complete the adoption of a budget by resolution of the council,” said Ted Nellesen, of the Iowa Department of Management. “Without a budget adopted by resolution, the city would not be allowed to tax or expend cash on hand during (FY 2018-19).”
The penalty prohibits the city from adopting a tax rate causing nondebt service property taxes to be higher than the current year, although that’s unlikely to deter the current council majority.
Hart proposed raising the tax rate from $17.60 to $17.76 per $1,000 of value. That’s actually a 1.4 percent cut in homeowner tax bills because the state rollback order reduced a home’s assessed value from 56.9 percent to 55.6 percent.
Under Hart’s plan, $12.14 would pay for police and fire services; $2.99 for debt obligations; 27 cents each for voter-approved library and Grout Museum levies; and $2.09 for parks, the library, general administration, culture and arts and all other property tax-supported operations.
He would pay the increased operating costs by raising the current gas and electric utility franchise fee from 3 percent to 3.5 percent to generate $450,000. The city adopted a 2 percent fee in 2013 and pushed it to 3 percent in 2014.
Franchise fees became a go-to “tax” for many cities after the Legislature approved property tax relief for commercial and multi-residential property owners in 2013, while promising local governments “backfill” funds to compensate for revenue losses, which inevitably fell short.
Council members Margaret Klein, Steve Schmitt, Bruce Jacobs and Chris Shimp supported a tax rate cut to $17.17 in line with the city’s strategic goal of $16.50 by 2022.
They opposed the franchise fee increase and felt, rightly so, that Hart is too optimistic in including $1.7 million in backfill when the Republican-controlled Legislature is intent on straining state coffers with a huge tax cut.
Yet Jacobs and Klein didn’t want to be bothered with service cuts.
“The council sets the direction of the levy rate, and we expect the administration and department heads to find ways to help us get there,” Jacobs said. “I don’t think it’s our job to find what we’re going to cut.”
“We are simply the big picture organization,” Klein said. “I will leave the development of that to the administrators.”
Not so. To quote Pottery Barn, “If you break it, you’ve bought it.” You’ll own the pieces.
Waterloo Police Capt. Joe Leibold said a 2.5 percent cut in the police tax asking could reduce the force of 123 sworn officers by seven, while eliminating the Violent Crimes Apprehension Team and Safe Streets Task Force, which has taken almost 400 firearms “out of the hands of people who shouldn’t have them. They’ve prevented shootings. . They are really dialed into the criminal culture at the street level.”
A 5 percent cut could forfeit grant funding and 12 to 15 officers.
With a 2.5 percent cut, Capt. Pat Treloar of Waterloo Fire Rescue anticipated longer response times, now about 30 seconds behind its four-minute average goal, and station closures. Five percent could shutter Station No. 6 at Ansborough Avenue and Dixon Drive.
Leisure Services is facing revenue losses due to a new Young Arena lease with the Waterloo Black Hawks and a downturn in golf.
Klein suggested selling one of the three golf courses and closing one of the two swimming pools, although draining the Gates Park pool could make for a politically hot summer.
Schmidt broached Cedar Falls’ approach to public safety officers - police trained to assist on fire calls, which Leibold and Treloar resisted. Given worst-case scenarios, it shouldn’t be dismissed out of hand.
However, his idea of a metropolitan police force - saddling Cedar Falls with Waterloo’s problems - will happen when pigs fly.
Waterloo is Iowa’s fifth-largest city, but 12th in property values, causing its tax rate to be comparatively high, which the council majority cites as an impediment to economic development.
However, a significant reduction in city services also would be a large red flag to prospective businesses factoring in quality of life.
That’s part of the big picture.
The folks on the City Hall playground need to reach a viable compromise.
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Sioux City Journal. March 16, 2018
Farm states stand to lose in trade war
It’s hard to find supporters outside the administration for President Trump’s plan to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum entering the United States.
Typical was the reaction from House Speaker Paul Ryan.
“We are extremely worried about the consequences of a trade war and are urging the White House to not advance with this plan,” AshLee Strong, a Ryan spokeswoman, said in a statement.
Trump wants to slap a 25 percent tariff on imported steel and a 10 percent tariff on imported aluminum. So far, the European Union, Canada and China have threatened tariffs on American-made products in return.
The primary reason we do not back the tariffs is their potential negative impact on farm country. Agriculture states like Iowa stand to lose in a trade war.
Consider these reactions from the Midwest:
. “Every time you do this, you get a retaliation,” Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan. “And agriculture is the number one target. I think this is terribly counterproductive for the (agriculture) economy and I’m not very happy.”
. “Our farmers are the first target and we know that’s where the unintended consequences will fall is on our farmers and on our manufacturers,” Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds said. Those “unintended consequences,” she said, could be “devastating” to Iowa and other agriculture states.
Iowa leads the nation in exports of pork, corn, and feed grain, ranks second for soybean exports, and is second for overall value of agriculture exports. If Trump moves ahead with his plan for steel and aluminum tariffs and other countries target U.S. agriculture products for retaliation, Iowa will feel the pain as much as, if not more than any state.
This, at what is an already challenging time for the farm economy. Net farm income fell 46 percent in Iowa since 2015, reported David Peters, associate professor and extension rural sociologist at Iowa State University, in a new publication, “Rural Iowa at a Glance.” American net farm income in 2018 is expected to fall to a 12-year low, according to USDA Economic Research Service’s most recent 2018 Farm Sector Income Forecast.
We urge all farm-state leaders, regardless of political party affiliation, to form a strong, united front of opposition to these tariffs.
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