IowaPolitics.com BlogWatch

Sen. Larry McKibben was one of several Republican legislators who took
"points of privilege" this morning to voice distain with the current
direction of legislation that aims to revise the School Infrastructure
Local Option sales tax, commonly known as SILO. The plan now being
considered by the Iowa Senate passed the House last week with 17
Republicans crossing the aisle to support it. "We aren't here just to
put a rubber stamp on what's passed by the House," McKibben told those
in chamber this morning. "We don't have to pass this just because it
has been a bipartisan effort. It's a bipartisan tax." The plan calls
for SILO, now optional by county, to become mandatory and no longer
limited to 10 years.

Labels: SILO, state Senate

We Republicans convened on a District wide basis today. Perhaps the
most interesting occurrence was the passage of the following platform
amendment in every one of the five Districts: "Resolved: We oppose any
efforts to take away Iowans' right to vote on our local option sales
tax (SILO) that eliminate local control of SILO and replace it with a
permanent 20% statewide sales tax increase which puts school
infrastructure funds at great risk of being raided by state government
and expands taxation of Iowa small businesses." Obviously the SILO
debate in the House was somewhat contentious over the last few weeks
and our Caucus was certainly not unified at the end. The issue now
goes to the Senate.

Labels: SILO

Quick exhausted look at the numbers:
# Turnout picks up a bit late in the day as the snow slows, still a bit short of 1999
# Hot Spot: Iowa City 4 (Manville Heights and Peninsula)with 86%; Lone Tree with 81%
# West side pretty warm, upper to mid 70s, also IC24 (City High) and North Coralville)
# The cool spot in town, as always for school measures, was southeast Iowa City. Not so much regressivity as read my lips working class tories here.
# A few scattered rural precincts, mostly in the south, were weak or actual no votes.
# Top percentage turnout was Solon
# Student turnout near non-existent.
Now that the penny SILO tax is consistent statewide, the Johnson-Linn legislators can better make a case for some restructuring of education funding.

Labels: SILO