The League of Women Voters of Linn County held a legislative forum Saturday, March 19. Topics discussed by legislators included the private and charter school scholarships, water quality and Medicaid privatization, among others.
When it came to support for the taxpayer fundings to private schools and charter schools, none of the legislators were in favor of that bill.
“I’m 100 percent in favor of school choice in Iowa, but I do not believe public funds should follow a student,” said Molly Donahue (House District 68). “The public funds are established for the common good.”
Art Staed (House district 66) said he was against the bill and noted that Republicans could not meet the 5 percent request for school districts in the state, yet found enough money in the coffers to offer a voucher for private schools.
“One of the most wonderful things in Iowa is the option we have here for both public and private schools,” Liz Bennett (Hose District 65) said. “I had the opportunity to experience both. I found that the private school did not work for me, and having a public school to go back to was beneficial.”
Charlie McClintock (House District 95) said he was a no vote on that particular bill as well.
“I was not in favor of vouchers for private schools,” McClintock said. “It’s one of those deals I don’t think you can have it both ways. If districts ask for a budget and we don’t give them what they need, then we can’t be offering an alternative for scholarships or vouchers. And while I voted no on the bill, Staed offered several excellent amendments to the bill that I supported.”
When it came to Medicaid being operated by an out of state company, several lawmakers also were against it.
“With the worker shortage seen in health care in the past few years, the care offered by Medicaid has been far worse since before it was operated by an out of state company,” Donahue said.
Tracy Ehlert (House District 70) said that she has seen situations where care that used to be paid by Medicaid in the past is not being covered by providers.
“It’s especially hard to find anyone who is willing to take Medicaid insurance for dental coverage,” Ehlert said.
Another bill most of the lawmakers were opposed to was the childcare bill allowing 16-year-olds to be a childcare provider without an adult present in the room.
“I feel teenagers should be part of the childcare field, but I feel they need to be working alongside adults as a mentor,” Ehlert said.
Todd Taylor (Senate District 35) said for him the distinction between childcare or early childhood education with teenagers being allowed as childcare providers on their own.
“If it’s just babysitting parents are expecting, then a 16-year-old is definitely qualified, but if it’s early childhood education experience, that’s a different matter,” Taylor said.
McClintock was also a no vote on that particular bill.
“I started my career in law enforcement, and one of the top areas where child custody issues would erupt was in schools or daycare centers,” McClintock said. “I have no problem with a teenager working in a daycare if they are supervised, but to put them in a situation where they have to determine which parent a kid goes home with puts them in a bad position to deal with.”
The bottle bill revisions were mostly supported by lawmakers, with many noting this is the closest this bill has come to seeing significant changes in several years.
Donahue said she was still looking for ways for people, especially in rural communities, to be able to exchange the cans they paid deposits on back at the stores they purchased them from as part of the bill.
McClintock said it was an issue he was still torn on. He noted that the bill has reduced the amount of trash that ends up in the roadway ditches, but his experience with the recycling market as a small-town mayor has shown that the value of recycling markets means some communities have had to end those programs when there’s not a market.
When it came to the increase in traffic fatalities from 2018 to 2022 and how they’d address the matter, senator Rob Hogg (District 35) noted that the success in reducing automobile fatalities is something that gets blurred over.
“In 1970, we had 900 Iowans who died on the roadways annually,” Hogg said. “Now, we have people who drive four times as much, but our fatality levels are two-thirds the level they were in 1970. Part of that is cracking down on unsafe drivers, but another part is improvements to automobile safety and safer roads.”
Hogg said more work is needed to be done, but that the successes also need to be noted.
McClintock said that workforce shortage, as is happening in many industries, is impacting law enforcement.
“In 1994, I applied to be a Cedar Rapids police officer,” McClintock said. “They hired 22 of us, and there was a pool of 600 applicants. In the past year, Cedar Rapids was hiring 15 new officers, and they had a pool of 30 applicants. Likewise, the 911 center used to frequent 100s of applicants when they had an open position. We’re lucky to get 20 applicants now. It’s a problem across the workforce.”