Stories

“I like to think that good legislation gets passed regardless of whether it is an election year or not,” said Marcia Nichols, political and legislative director for American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Iowa Council 61.

Despite some efforts to cast the long nights at the capitol this weekend as a sneaky way for Democratic leaders to push through their agenda, no major policy surprises emerged from the waning hours of the 2009 legislative session.

A bill that would change the workers compensation system to permit employees injured on the job to choose the doctors who treat them will go before the public Tuesday.
A public hearing on the measure, known as the “Choice of Doctor Bill,” will take place from 7 to 9 p.m. Tuesday in the chamber of the [...]

Publicly, Iowa’s union leaders and their supporters believe the four measures currently listed at the top of organized labor’s priority list – choice of doctor, prevailing wage, open-scope bargaining and Fair Share – are still very much alive.

But privately, several state legislators concede that recent difficulties trying to pass prevailing wage legislation have hurt the chances of any other labor bills this session.

Two controversial labor bills – choice of doctor and Fair Share – were introduced in the Iowa House Wednesday morning.

The Iowa Association of Business and Industry has begun airing radio ads around the state arguing against union-backed legislation, Radio Iowa’s O.Kay Henderson reports.
The ads attack all four of the major bills being pushed by labor this session: Fair Share, open scope bargaining, prevailing wage and choice of doctor.

Top Republicans in the Iowa House and Senate told The Des Moines Register today that stoping union-backed legislative proposals will be a priority in the upcoming session, with shutting down the legislature entirely as one viable option.

A link on the website for the Iowa chapter of Concerned Women for America opens up an MP3 clip with soft music behind a soothing voice.
The voice belongs to Tamara Scott, director of CWA of Iowa. “Our mission is covering our communities, our state and our nation in prayer,” she says on the clip. “Whether [...]

At the close of the Iowa legislative session about a month ago, perhaps no constituency felt more shafted than organized Labor. Labor had raised a lot of money for Democratic candidates with the promise that a Fair Share bill would be passed, which would have allowed public employee unions to charge fees for services given [...]

As the Iowa legislative session came to a close early Sunday, House Democrats marveled that they had passed all but one of the items on their legislative agenda. The next day, they learned that they were short one more thing: a caucus member. The two issues were not unrelated.
On Monday, Rep. Dawn Pettengill, a Democrat [...]