Inside this Issue:
    Health Care for All Children
    School Aid Passes House
    Statewide Smoking Ban Passes House Committee

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House Democratic Research Staff
State Capitol Building
Des Moines IA  50319
515-281-6312

Health Care for All Children
 
This week members of the Iowa Legislature unveiled an initia-tive to provide health insurance for all children in Iowa under 18 years of age.  Senate Study Bill 3140 and House Study Bill 636 were intro-duced for consideration.

The legislation to cover all children in Iowa was one of the recommendations of the Legislative Commission on Affordable Health Care Plans for Small Businesses and Families, co-chaired by Repre-sentative Ro Foege.  The Commis-sion met for eight months across Iowa developing recommendations on how to cover more Iowans and control rising health care costs.

The legislation introduced this week would cover an additional 25,000 children through Healthy and Well Kids in Iowa (hawk-i), Medicaid, and other government health insurance programs.  The 19,000 remaining Iowa children without health care would be cov-ered by private insurance plans.  Families with an income between 200% and 300% of the federal pov-erty level would receive a state subsidy to help them purchase in-surance for their children.  These children come from families whose parents work but do not make enough to afford health insurance on their own.

The private health insurance plans included in the proposal will be those approved by a new Health Care Insurance Exchange.  This quasi-public agency will set mini-mum requirements, similar to the existing hawk-i Board.

This initiative is the first piece in a major overall reform of Iowa’s health care system including tele-medicine, the creation of “medical homes” to help patients receive consistent care focused on preven-tion, cost containment, and an in-surance exchange to improve qual-ity and lower costs of private insur-ance plans sold in Iowa. 

The implementation of the leg-islation is dependent upon the availability of funds.  As more funds become available, more chil-dren will be covered.

Opponents of the legislation feel that Iowa is already providing health insurance for 97% of Iowa’s children and that is enough.  Pro-ponents say that Iowa is in the best position to provide health insurance to every child, and that no family should have to worry about choos-ing between providing food or health care for their children.

The House and Senate Human Resources Committees will hold joint subcommittee meetings to work on the new legislation as it moves forward.
 
School Aid Passes House
 
The House passed the bill known as allowable growth in school aid, House File 2140, on a bi-partisan vote of 97 to 2 on Wednesday.  This funding goes to Iowa’s K-12 public schools.

Allowable growth for the 2009-2010 school year was set at 4%, which will give districts an increase of $112.6 million in state aid and $45 million in property taxes.  The allowable growth for the 2008-2009 school year was set last year at 4% also.  Allowable growth is always set 18 months in advance so that school districts can budget accordingly.

House File 2140 will provide over $3.5 billion for school districts for the 2009-2010 school year.  Two-thirds of this amount comes from the state, the remaining one-third from property taxpayers.  This will provide a district per pupil cost of $5,768, an increase of $222.

This year’s bill includes a promise made last year to provide an increase in funding for early childhood education.  It will go to the first school districts who re-ceived grants this fall to provide childhood education to four-year olds.  Starting with the 2007-2008 school year, 60 school districts were granted preschool awards with the initial $15 million allo-cated.  
Those grantees now will need preschool allowable growth to con-tinue their programs.  For the 2009-2010 school year, the preschool foundation aid will be $33 million.  The $15 million for another round of grantees will be considered sepa-rately from this allowable growth.

Iowa law states that allowable growth must be passed and to the Governor thirty days after the Gov-ernor’s budget recommendations are released.  House File 2140 will now move to the Senate Education Committee and will have to be voted on by both chambers and sent to the Governor before February 14th.
 
Statewide Smoking Ban Passes House Committee
 
Legislation banning smoking in the workplace and most public places has passed the House Com-merce Committee.  The bill now can go before the full House for its consideration.
The intent of House Study Bill 537, known as the “Smoke Free Air Act,” is to protect the health of Iowa employees and the public by reducing their exposure to tobacco smoke.  Supporters point out that second-hand smoke contains 60 chemicals that cause cancer, asthma and other respiratory dis-eases.  In addition, tobacco smoke will make many other existing con-ditions worse.

Where Smoking Is Banned

The smoking ban would apply to all profit or nonprofit workplaces and public places.  Public places are any enclosed area to which the public is invited or permitted, in-cluding bars and restaurants, retail establishments, public buildings, private and public schools, daycare providers, health care providers, and certain private clubs when the general public is invited to an activ-ity.

The smoking ban also applies to hotels and motels, except for designated smoking rooms, which must be in a contiguous areas and cannot exceed 22% of all rooms.  In addition, places that are not cov-ered by the smoking ban may vol-untarily be declared a nonsmoking place.

Exceptions

The smoking ban does not ap-ply to casinos, private residences  (unless used for child care), private long-term-care rooms, stores pri-marily selling tobacco, certain pri-vate clubs with no employees when not used by the public, limos under private hire, and employer owned vehicles provided exclusively to one employee.

Enforcement

The smoking ban will be en-forced by the Iowa Department of Public Health (DPH), which will provide compliance information to employers and those having cus-tody of a public place.  Signs must be posted where smoking is banned that include the   telephone number for reporting complaints.  In addi-tion, employers and those with cus-tody of a public place are obligated to inform violators of the smoking ban.

A person performing any state or local government inspection process must also assess compli-ance with the smoking ban and report violations to DPH.  Any per-son, including an employee, may file a complaint with DPH or bring a legal action to enforce the smok-ing ban, including the seeking of an injunction.  Judicial magistrates shall hear and determine violations.

Penalties

•    A person who smokes in a prohibited place must pay a $50 fine.  
•    An employer, or one with cus-tody of a public place, who fails to comply with the smoking ban must pay a $100 fine for a first violation, a $200 fine for a second violation within a year, and a $500 fine for additional violations within a year.
•    An employer that retaliates against an employee will be fined not less than $2,000 nor more than $10,000 per violation.