Gov. Reynolds proposes school cellphone bans, strengthening child care workforce

[cigaretteman]

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds used her eighth Condition of the State address Tuesday to call for a statewide policy requiring school districts to restrict the use of cellphones in the classroom and outlined proposals intended to strengthen Iowa’s child care workforce and address the state’s physician shortage.



The Republican governor, in her annual address to a joint session of the state’s House and Senate, also outlined plans to seek work requirements for Iowans receiving state-funded Medicaid coverage, lower the tax rates businesses pay to fund benefits for unemployed workers and address gaps in math and civics education.


Reynolds said there “is so much to be proud of” from policies Iowa Republicans have enacted in the past several years — from raising teacher pay to reducing taxes to consolidating and reshaping state agencies, eliminating dozens of boards and commissions and cutting regulations to make government smaller and more efficient.




The governor’s office asserts those efforts have saved Iowa taxpayers $217 million in the last 18 months.


“We’ve transformed the way the state interacts with our citizens, businesses and entrepreneurs — shrinking and aligning government so that our tax cuts are sustainable,” the governor said.


And she’s not done, announcing the creation of an Iowa task force on government efficiency — similar to the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, planned by President-elect Donald Trump.


The Iowa DOGE task force will be headed by Emily Schmitt, chief administrative officer and general counsel of Sukup Manufacturing.


Schmitt has worked with Reynolds’ administration on multiple occasions, having served on a pair of state task forces.


“I like to say that we were doing DOGE before DOGE was a thing,” Reynolds said. The new task force will work to support DOGE’s efforts at the federal level “to find even greater savings and efficiencies in both state and local government.”


“Because, to pass meaningful property tax reform, we also need to be lean at the local level,” the governor said.






Reynolds did not propose a plan for lowering property taxes, listed as a top priority by House and Senate Republicans, who have expanded supermajorities in the Iowa Legislature following the November election.


Republican House Speaker Pat Grassley said lawmakers intend to work with the governor’s office as they craft proposals.


“I'm not surprised that it wasn't in the speech,” Grassley told reporters afterward. “I don't think that means the governor's not supportive. It's just we know there's not just one bill sitting out there that's the right solution at this point.”


House and Senate Democratic leaders said some ideas in the governor's speech are promising, but it failed to address immediate financial crises facing Iowans, from housing to workforce issues.


“People have immediate financial crunch, and we heard nothing that's going to make that better,” said House Minority Leader Jennifer Jennifer Konfrst, D-Windsor Heights. “We heard nothing about housing. We heard nothing about workforce. We really heard a lot about long-term plans, nothing that's going to make bills lower by July.”

Cellphones in schools​

Citing concerns over distractions in classrooms, Reynolds proposed a policy requiring school districts to restrict cellphone use for K-12 students. At a minimum, schools would be required to ban cellphone usage during instructional time.


“Let’s make sure the classroom is a place for learning, growth and connection,” Reynolds said. “Let’s pass this bill and give students their best possible chance at success.”


Multiple Iowa schools, including the Ottumwa Community School District, have implemented some restrictions on cellphone use.


The state Department of Education would provide sample policies for the floor-level requirements as well as “bell to bell” restrictions on personal electronic devices. The policy also would require “effects of social media” training for all sixth- through eighth-grade students, which would be through Google’s “Be Internet Awesome” program.


Sen. Amy Sinclair, the Republican Iowa Senate president from Allerton, said she wants school districts to have some flexibility to implement a policy that best fits their schools.


“What it sounded like to me was a ban on cellphones being accessible, except for emergencies, during instructional time. And I think most districts can get on board with that,” Sinclair told reporters after Reynolds’ speech. “I like the idea of giving them some ownership so that they can come in and make those local decisions that make the most sense for implementation: for their districts, for their parents, for their kids.”


Grassley said he agrees with Reynolds that there needs to be a minimum standard for cellphone restrictions in schools.


“Having that minimum standard, I agree with her that that is the route that we should go, and I think that's something that we'll be able to see support for in the house,” Grassley told reporters.


Reynolds also said she is aiming to set new standards for math and civics education, including addressing gaps in math education and requiring high school graduates to pass the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Naturalization test.

Child care​

In an effort to continue stabilizing Iowa’s child care workforce, Reynolds proposed a fund that allows individuals and businesses to make donations to help raise wages for child care workers.


It’s meant to build upon a state pilot program in 10 communities, funded with donations and government matching grants. The state pilot program, which sought to attract and retain child care workers by increasing wages and improving benefits, created 275 new child care slots in those communities, a study released last year found.


The short-term funding program required matching funds from business partners in the local community up to $2 for every $1 pledged, and used nearly $3 million in federal pandemic dollars.


Reynolds also proposed codifying a child care assistance pilot program that provides free child care to child care workers. More than 1,600 families have been served by the pilot program, which has no family income limit that applies to other Iowa families. Individuals must be employed in a direct care position at the child care program and meet all other child care assistance eligibility requirements.


According to the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services, 88 percent of those who responded to a survey already were employed in child care when they applied for assistance. Forty-four percent previously applied but were denied assistance for being over the income threshold; 49 percent said they were likely to leave their child care job if assistance was no longer available; and 12 percent said they began working in child care because of the pilot program.


Reynolds said she also plans to reintroduce legislation to provide paid parental leave to state employees. The governor’s proposal would provide four weeks of paid leave for state employees who give birth or adopt a child, and one week paid leave for employees who did not give birth to welcome a new child.




Konfrst and Senate Democratic Leader Janice Weiner, of Iowa City, said the state needs to focus on affordability in addition to accessibility.


“We've been talking about child care for a long time, and have yet to see costs go down,” Konfrst said.

Preschool grants​

Reynolds announced the launch of a new $16 million grant program to provide three-year grants of up to $100,000 to preschool providers — typically school districts — and child care providers to provide wraparound services for working families.


Reynolds gave the example of Center Point Urbana Community School District, which partners with a private child care center that operates in the building.


In 2022-23, Iowa served 67 percent of its 4-year-olds in state-funded preschool, ranking near the top of the nation for access. While preschool is widely available, some working parents cannot participate if it covers only a portion of the day and requires them to leave work.


“Parents need a solution that meets the demands of their busy lives — one that allows their children to benefit from our successful preschool program and have access to child care,” Reynolds said. “It’s about more than convenience; it’s about offering our children the educational foundation they need while giving parents peace of mind that their children are cared for throughout the work day.”


Funds could be used to defray the cost of transportation to bring children from school to child care, or vice versa. They could also pay for a preschool teacher at a local child care center, or for child care staff at a preschool.

Reynolds proposes school cellphone bans, strengthening child care workforce

The governor, in her annual Condition of the State Address, also proposes $1 million to start new cancer research effort.

www.thegazette.com

 

[cigaretteman]

Health care proposals​

Iowa ranks 44th in the nation for patient-to-physician ratio per 100,000 population. The nation also is experiencing a significant physician shortage estimated at 64,000 physicians.


Iowa also has the fewest OB/GYNs per capita of any state, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and is one of five states with the highest losses of access to obstetric care over the past 13 years.


Reynolds said she's directing Iowa Health and Human Services to partner with Broadlawns and the University of Iowa to draw down more than $150 million in federal dollars to create a projected 115 new medical residency slots at Iowa hospitals. Once fully implemented over four years, 460 new physicians would be trained in Iowa, the governor’s office projects.


Other health care proposals include:

• Investing $642,000 to "unbundle" and increase Medicaid reimbursement rates to OB/GYNs and primary care physicians for complex cases. She also proposed increasing rates for certified nurse midwifes and adding doula services as a covered Medicaid benefit;
• Direct Iowa Health and Human Services to seek federal approval to provide more Medicaid rate flexibility to encourage regional collaboration between health systems, with a focus on creating access to specialty care in rural areas;
• Consolidate and more than double the state’s five health care loan repayment programs and expand eligibility to those educated outside of Iowa who agree to practice in the state for five years.

And Reynolds planned a new partnership between Health and Human Services and the UI to establish a dedicated team of epidemiologists to research the behavioral, genetic and environmental factors that play a role in Iowa’s high cancer rate, and is asking lawmakers to appropriate $1 million to get their work started.


“Iowans don’t need more speculation — they need answers,” the governor said.


Reynolds’ husband, Kevin, was diagnosed with lung cancer more than a year ago. Reynolds on Tuesday said his cancer remains in remission “and he continues to do well.”


Sinclair, the Senate president, said she supports the effort to determine the cause of Iowa’s high cancer rates.


Konfrst said “$1 million is a nice start” to study the issue, “but doesn't really help anyone who is currently getting a diagnosis today or tomorrow.”


“So those people need to have access to health care, they need to have access to the treatments that they deserve and they need to have research that's going to make it easier for them to have cures,” she said.


Reynolds also is proposing a requirement for Medicaid recipients to work to be eligible for benefits. Currently, Medicaid eligibility in Iowa is based on income and whether a person has a disability, but a Medicaid work requirement would require that recipients who are able-bodied adults need to work to receive benefits. The governor’s office did not specify whether work requirements would include job training or volunteering.


“It’s always been a priority of mine to make sure that our government programs reflect the culture of work,” Reynolds said. “From promoting training programs to turning our unemployment system into a reemployment system, we’ve succeeded in making sure that Iowans wake up in the morning with a sense of purpose.


“Some of those efforts have been hampered by a federal government that often pays people to stay home,” Reynolds continued. “But starting next week, we’ll have a president who understands the importance of work.”


During Trump’s first administration, 13 states were approved to implement work requirements and nine others requested approval but did not receive it by the time his term ended, according to KFF. The Biden administration ended up withdrawing all work state work requirement waivers that had approval.

Business taxes​

The governor is again proposing cutting the taxable wage base in half and lowering unemployment taxes to a maximum rate of 5.4 percent on wages up to $18,000 per employee, as opposed to the current 7 percent on wages up to $36,000 per employee.


It also would reduce the number of tax tables from 168 to 36, effectively cutting overall tax categories. Her office estimates the cut would save Iowa employers by nearly $1 billion over five years.


Representatives for the Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO and IBEW Iowa State Conference worry Iowa’s unemployment trust fund will face challenges in the long term if the economy takes a downturn.


“We have seen layoff after layoff, plant closure after plant closure,” Weiner said. “... What Senate Democrats want is to ensure that enough money is in this fund to cover them, to allow them to get back on their feet. And I'm not really concerned with … cutting taxes for corporations with bait when everyday Iowans are hurting.”


The governor’s office said Iowa’s Unemployment Trust Fund Balance stands at all-time high of $1.8 billion, and far exceeds what is needed to support Iowans. Reynolds’ office said unemployment claims in the state are at a record low. Lawmakers passed and Reynolds signed into law a cut to unemployment benefits in 2022.


“We need to stop punishing our employers by requiring them to pay more tax than necessary,” Reynolds said. “Instead, employers should keep and reinvest this money into their businesses, their workers and their communities.”

Reynolds backs hands-free driving measure​

Reynolds, for the first time publicly, pressed lawmakers to pass a hands-free driving bill.


“For the sake of all our loved ones on the road, let’s finally pass legislation that requires drivers to keep their eyes on the road and away from their phones,” the governor said.


The Senate last year overwhelmingly passed Senate File 547, which would ban motorists' handheld use of cellphones behind the wheel. But the House hit the brakes. Bills limiting cellphone use by mandating voice-activated or hands-free technology while driving have been introduced in the Legislature since 2019, but all attempts at passage have been unsuccessful.


The Iowa State Patrol and the Governor’s Traffic Safety Bureau conducted a survey during the 2024 Iowa State Fair that found nearly 85 percent of the more than 1,300 Iowans surveyed supported legislation mandating hands-free phone use. And 96 percent said they regularly see others driving with a cellphone in hand.




Despite bipartisan and law enforcement support, a libertarian wing of Republicans in the GOP-controlled House objected to the legislation, saying it infringes on Iowans’ individual rights.


Grassley said he thought it was “interesting” the governor brought up hands-free driving in her address but said he is open to the proposal.


“I've kind of moved into a position of if we can do something in a responsible way and look at what some other states have done to find a balance, I think it's something that I would be supportive of and expect to have that conversation,” Grassley said.

 

[Sharky1203]

All great things to fix.