The Iowa State Capitol on the first day of the 2023 Legislative Session - Monday, January 9, 2023

The first regular session of the 90th Iowa General Assembly gaveled in at 10:00 am on Monday, January 9th, 2023. This marked the first day of the scheduled 110-day session, with a target adjournment date of Friday, April 28th, 2023. 

First Day of Session - House (left) and Senate (right). In the Senate photo, Senator Amy Sinclair takes the Oath of Office to serve as President of the Iowa Senate.

New legislators

The 90th General Assembly includes a total of 53 new legislators: 39 in the Iowa House and 14 in the Iowa Senate. The 39 new House members include 23 Republicans and 16 Democrats, with one of the new Republicans having come from the Iowa Senate. The 14 new Senators consist of 9 Republicans and 5 Democrats, with 4 of the Republicans and 3 of the Democrats having come from the Iowa House. 

Chamber Control

The Republicans control the Iowa House by a 64-36 margin and the Iowa Senate by a 34-16 margin. This is an increase of 4 seats in the House and 2 seats in the Senate from last year’s session. Additionally, Republicans nearly swept all Statewide offices, with Governor Kim Reynolds, Secretary of State Paul Pate, and Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig all winning easily. Republican Brenna Bird was able to oust longtime Democrat Attorney General Tom Miller, and Republican Roby Smith was able to defeat longtime Democrat Treasurer Mike Fitzgerald, flipping those two offices for the first time in 40 years. The only statewide office that Democrats were able to hold onto was the reelection of State Auditor Rob Sand.

Leadership

In the Senate, Republican Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver remains in his role as Floor Leader of the Chamber as well as Senator Brad Zaun as Senate President Pro Tempore. Senator Amy Sinclair now serves as the President of the Senate and Senator Waylon Brown serves as Majority Whip. The Senate Democrats are led again by Senator Zach Wahls who is joined by new Minority Whip Senator Sarah Trone Garriott.

In the House, Republicans Speaker Pat Grassley, Majority Leader Matt Windshitl and Speaker Pro Tempore John Wills all return to their roles. For the Democrats, Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst and Minority Whip Lindsay James also return to their roles. You can view the full leadership teams of each party in each chamber HERE.

Senate Opening Statements

Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver’s Opening Comments HERE

Senate President Amy Sinclair’s Opening Comments HERE

Senate Minority Leader Zach Wahls’ Opening Comments HERE

House Opening Statements

Speaker Pat Grassley’s Opening Comments HERE

We were unable to find printed copies posted of the opening day speeches from House Majority Leader Matt Windshitl, Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst, or House Speaker Pro Tempore John Wills, but you can watch the House video of all three by following THIS LINK and moving the scroll bar to 11:18:41am for Majority Leader Windschitl’s remarks, to 11:12:41am for Minority Leader Konfrst’s remarks, or to 11:06:10am for Speaker Pro Tempore Wills’ remarks.

Condition of the State

Governor Reynolds delivered her Condition of the State address at 6:00 pm on Tuesday, January 10th, where she provided her budget and priorities for the 2023 legislative session. The main legislative highlights the Governor wishes to pursue are:

• A school choice proposal that allows any Iowa student (after a 3-year phase-in) to be able to take the $7,598/year that would have flowed to their public school and instead direct it toward a private school. 
• Major new restructuring of state government that will reorganize the duties of 37 executive branch entities and shrink cabinet level offices to 16.
• Put a moratorium on any new administrative rules until a four-year review is completed.
• Big investment in health career pathways (apprenticeships) - adding $12 million more to the $3 million already appropriated.

You can read more about the Governor’s budget and policy priorities at the two following links. The first link - HERE – will take you to a document produced by the Governor’s Office. The second link HERE - will take you to a preliminary analysis of the Governor’s budget that was put together by the non-partisan Legislative Services Agency. 

What’s Next

With the Governor’s address in the rear view mirror, the Legislature will now spend the next seven weeks introducing bills by the truckload and having policy discussions about them in preparation for the March 3rd first funnel (which we’ll talk more about later). Be checking the Bill Tracker for more daily updates and take this opportunity to reach out to your legislators (HERE).

Library News

As you know, last year, the library community was able to fight off a number of damaging bills with the help of several library-friendly legislators. This year will likely be a similarly challenging year. It’s important that ILA members are active in reaching out to your legislators and educating them on library issues. Remember that 53 are new this year, over a third of the Legislature! 

Reorganization

The Governor’s goal of reorganizing State government will most likely mean moving the State Library and Enrich Iowa to the Department of Administrative Services (from the Department of Education). We will be working with the State Library and their team to provide feedback to legislators on this as it moves forward. We won’t know all the details on this until we see the Governor’s bill introduced to implement these changes.

Transparency

Thirty-three House Republicans have introduced a school transparency bill (HF 5) similar to the discussions on this topic last year. The focus of the bill appears to be on ensuring that procedures are in place in all of Iowa’s school districts for parents to follow when they want to find out more information about curriculums, library collections, processes for selecting or challenging books, etc. 

ILA will be working to ensure that decision-making on these issues stays at the local level and does not become overly burdensome for those tasked with implementation. Please take a moment to review the language of HF 5 yourself and talk with your legislators.

The Senate held a subcommittee meeting on SSB 1022 (more below) on January 12, 2023. Several members of the public came to speak for and against the bill.

The Governor’s School Choice Bill (HSB 1/SSB 1022) began its trip toward enactment right away in Week One. Her legislation builds on last year’s bill by proposing to give students wanting to attend a private school that money that would have gone to their public school ($7,598/year). The bill would be phased in over three years with low income students becoming eligible immediately and higher income families becoming eligible in the second or third year. 

The Senate bill (SSB 1022) was approved by the subcommittee in a packed committee room on Thursday afternoon. The minority party in the House exercised their right to request a public hearing which has been scheduled for 5:00 pm on Tuesday, January 17th. If you have an interest in weighing in about HSB1/SSB1022, you are free to sign up to speak or submit comments HERE. Given the large amount of people likely wanting to sign up, you may wish to submit comments. 

The Governor’s Budget proposal represents the first shot across the bow in setting the Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 budget, one of very few things the Legislature and Governor MUST get done during the session. The Governor proposes to spend $8.4866 billion, an increase of 3.3 percent over FY 2023. Her budget would spend 88.17 percent of available tax revenue. 

The two biggest increases in the Governor’s budget include $106.9 million toward Educational Saving Accounts (in HSB1/SSB1022) and $82.8 million toward K-12 Supplemental State Aid (a 2.5 percent increase). Overall, the Governor’s budget would leave a projected ending fund balance of almost $2 billion, an amount equal to 23.5 percent of the budget.

The Legislature will now take this proposal and use it as a starting point as they begin to assemble their own budget. This process will take a back seat to policy discussions until March when the Revenue Estimating Conference meets and provides updated revenue projections that will further guide both the Governor and the Legislature on the size of the next year’s budget.

Inauguration

Week One concluded with the Inauguration of Governor Reynolds and Lt. Governor Gregg on Friday morning along with a widely attended Inaugural Ball on Friday night, both of which were held at the Community Choice Credit Union Convention Center in downtown Des Moines. All Iowa elected officials, at the State and Federal level, were invited to attend, as well as several justices, business leaders and supporters of the Governor and Lt. Governor.

Above: Governor Kim Reynolds (left) and Lt. Governor Adam Gregg (right) being sworn into office. Below: Governor Kim and First Gentleman Kevin Reynolds greet an overflow crowd at the Inaugural Ball. January 13, 2023