I saw on Talking Points memo’s DC Wire that Senator Tom Harkin is sounding out Republican colleagues on a potential compromise for the Employee Free Choice Act, according to Roll Call. The Republican leadership will certainly try to filibuster this bill, and Democrats do not currently have 60 votes in favor. Some weaselly Democrats who voted for the EFCA in 2007 (knowing President Bush would veto it) are hedging now. In addition, Republican Senator Arlen Specter, who has supported the EFCA in the past, has flipped on the issue in light of a primary challenge from the right.

CEOs from three companies (Costco, Whole Foods and Starbucks) proposed a compromise on the EFCA recently. Harkin and other leading Democrats are not willing to accept that proposal for various reasons. For one thing, it would not include binding arbitration.

Earlier this month, Harkin had an excellent response to Republican critics who say we can’t afford to help labor unions now:

“In 1935, we passed the Wagner Act that promoted unionization and allowed unions to flourish, and at the time we were at around 20 percent unemployment. So tell me again why we can’t do this in a recession?” said  Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), invoking the pro-labor changes of the New Deal. “This is the time to do it. This is exactly the time we should be insisting on a fairer playing field for people to organize themselves.”

The Center for American Progress Action Fund created this outstanding web page supporting the Employee Free Choice Act. You’ll find many useful resources there, including a basic overview of what the EFCA would and would not do and an interactive map showing why unions are good for workers and the economy.

I clicked on Iowa and learned, “Union workers in Iowa make 8.40 percent ($1.48 per hour) more than non-union workers, on average.” (Click here and scroll down the page to see how the Center for Economic Policy Research calculated those figures.) Higher wages are not only good for individual families, they boost the economy as a whole consumer spending drives so much economic activity.

I am pessimistic about the prospects for passing the EFCA this year, but I give Harkin credit for trying to find a compromise that would still make it significantly easier for workers to form unions.

Jill Richardson reported at La Vida Locavore that a group promoting the use of chemicals in agriculture is lobbying First Lady Michelle Obama not to make the White House garden organic. They want the White House to “consider using crop protection products and to recognize the importance of agriculture to the entire U.S. economy.”

Jill posted the full text of the Mid America CropLife Association’s letter to the first lady.

It’s notable that conventional farming advocates were unconcerned about First Lady Laura Bush’s insistence that White House chefs cook with organic food. Former executive chef Walter Scheib wrote that Mrs. Bush was “adamant that in ALL CASES if an organic product was available it was to be used in place of a non-organic product.” It’s fine for the Bushes to be closet organic eaters, but very different for the Obamas to promote growing food without pesticides or herbicides. I think Americans will be surprised by how much one organic garden can produce.

More important, as Think Progress noted, the Bush administration’s agriculture policies repeatedly sought to water down organic standards. That hurts organic growers, not conventional growers. It remains to be seen how far President Obama and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will go in rewriting organic regulations. If I were the Mid America CropLife Association, I would probably also be trying to assure the first lady not to fear chemical-based “crop protection technologies.”

Anyone with an interest in food or agriculture policy should bookmark La Vida Locavore and check it regularly.

I was downtown today helping set up a couple of booths for the Natural Living Expo tomorrow, which has been taking up a lot of my time lately. Maybe I’ll see some of you there, but I won’t have my “desmoinesdem” hat on, so won’t be talking about partisan politics.

As always, please post a comment or send me an e-mail (desmoinesdem AT yahoo.com) if you know of an event I’ve left out.

The calendar is after the jump.

Bring Rail Service to Iowa

We need your help. Right now, the Iowa Legislature has the opportunity to invest in Passenger Rail service that will connect Iowa cities to Chicago and the Midwest Regional Rail Network. $8 billion in Federal stimulus funds are available for rail projects, and Iowa could benefit tremendously from using these funds to establish rail service.

Passenger rail service is three times more efficient than cars, and six times more efficient than air travel. It’s convenient, affordable and enhances quality of life. And, perhaps even more importantly in tough economic times, it creates tremendous economic development opportunities and thousands of jobs. But unless our legislators and Governor Culver make securing the funding a priority, we may have to continue waiting for service while other states move forward with their own rail projects.

To get passenger rail service moving into Iowa, we need to put forward an initial investment of $3 million in state funds that will allow us to get Federal funding for rail service.

Please, take a moment to let your legislators and Gov. Culver know that you support an investment in passenger rail service for Iowa’s future. And once you’ve sent your message, forward this to every person you know who might want to help. Together, we can make rail service in Iowa a reality!

Take action today it’s easy and only takes a minute or two to get it done!

http://actionnetwork.org/campa…

Looking ahead to the 2010 elections, I’m concerned  that Iowa Democratic leaders will try to coast on our party’s voter registration advantage and well-organized early voting effort.

As I’ve written before, I believe Democrats need to have big successes to show for 12 years of control of the governor’s office and four years of a legislative majority. Democrats have posted net gains of seats in the Iowa House and Senate for four straight elections now. Voters are going to ask what have we done for them lately, especially if the country is still in recession 18 months from now.

Trouble is, the budget outlook continues to deteriorate. Deep cuts to education and other popular programs are expected when Governor Culver submits his revised draft 2010 budget to the legislature. Iowa’s budget problems are nowhere near as bad as those faced by some other states, but they’re bad enough to prevent legislators from throwing money toward every good idea.

For those reasons and more, it’s important for Democrats not to blow it when they have a chance to do something tangible (yet inexpensive) for a key voter bloc. You know how they say, “When women vote, Democrats win?” Now Democrats in the Iowa legislature have a chance to return the favor. I enclose part of an action alert the Iowa Commission on the Status of Women sent out on Wednesday:

We need your help today to contact your legislators on all three issues.

   * SF 137 Being the first state in the nation to extend the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to the state level

(The House and Senate have passed different versions and are working to reach consensus.)

   * HF243 Tripling the number of women making decisions that impact our communities by requiring gender balance on local boards and commissions

(Passed the House and now deferred on the Senate Floor for later action. Local government officials have been contacting legislators, urging them to oppose the bill “because it would be difficult” to achieve gender balance.  Please contact your Senators!)

   * Justice Systems Appropriations bill: Keeping Iowans safe by restoring a $4 million state appropriation to fund victim services

For more information on any of these issues, please visit our policy page. Also, you might want to listen to yesterday’s Talk at 12 on Iowa Public Radio, which featured discussion on the wage discrimination and gender balance bills and the issue of women running for office.

If your representatives are Democrats, please contact them about these issues. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act is a no-brainer. Frankly, refusing to pass it would be a tremendous insult to all the women who have worked so hard for so many years to elect Iowa Democrats.

It’s false to imply that Iowa lacks enough talented women to serve on boards and commissions.

There aren’t many well-organized interest groups working the phones to demand appropriation for victim services, but cutting those funds would cause real suffering.

It’s time for our leaders to step up and show that when Democrats vote, women win.

The Washington Post ran a feature in Wednesday’s edition about Iowan Dave Murphy, who founded Food Democracy Now in November. The whole piece is worth reading, but I particularly liked this passage about what Murphy is bringing to the sustainable food movement:

Perception gets you in the door in Washington. But it’s policy that keeps you in the room. The laws that govern food policy, such as the nearly $300 billion Farm Bill and the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act that funds the school lunch program, are notoriously complex and political. “As a movement, we have not had nearly enough sophistication on policy,” [author Michael] Pollan said. “We’ve been outgunned by people who understand the Farm Bill.”

Equally important, Murphy says, is to recast the debate about good food from a moral battle to an economic one. Take the school lunch program, which Congress will review this year. Food activists have long argued that more fruits and vegetables from local producers should be included to help improve childhood nutrition. But Murphy says the better way to sell the idea to legislators is as a new economic engine to sustain small farmers and rural America as a whole. Talk about nutrition and you get a legislator’s attention, he said. “But you get his vote when you talk about economic development.”

Murphy is realistic that change won’t come quickly. He knows he is battling huge, entrenched corporations with better connections and more resources at their disposal. To succeed, he must unite grassroots organizations and persuade an array of other interests — health insurers, senior citizens and teacher lobbies, all of which have a stake in healthful eating — to join the fight. “If you want to change the ballgame, you have to address the policies that are responsible for the system we have in place,” Murphy said. “If you change policy, the market will change.”

Economic development isn’t what sparked my interest in eating locally-produced food raised without hormones, antibiotics or toxic chemicals, but it’s definitely the key to bringing policy-makers on board.

I learned that lesson from Woodbury County rural economic development director Rob Marqusee, who talked his county supervisors into approving amazingly good policies to promote local foods and organic farming. Marqusee runs the Woodbury Organics website, a superb resource on what I call the cold-blooded capitalist case for local foods.

On a related note, look what sustainable food producers have done for the economy of Hardwick, Vermont, an industrial town that fell on hard times during the 20th century. (Hat tip to La Vida Locavore diarist JayinPortland.)

UPDATE: The Iowa Republican (citing Steve King’s office) says the D.C. Property Tax Office admitted they made a mistake in this case. I didn’t see a link to any official notice of the correction from the D.C. tax office and will be looking for confirmation of that.

I’m glad to hear that Congressman King will pay the full amount of property taxes he owes to the District of Columbia.

Iowa Independent noticed an article in Roll Call about four members of Congress (all House Republicans) who “appear to be improperly receiving the Washington, D.C., homestead tax deduction, reducing their annual property tax bills by hundreds of dollars and potentially much more over the long term.” Wouldn’t you know, Iowa’s own Congressman Steve King is one of the apparent tax cheats.

Roll Call is available by subscription only, but Iowa Independent has the relevant details:

The exemption allows people who own homes in Washington, D.C., to receive a $67,500 reduction on the assessed value of their home. The deduction also caps increases on the assessed value of homes at 10 percent above the previous year’s tax assessment. It is not supposed to be available to those who claim residency in another state even if they have a home in the District.

If Congressman King wants to change his official residence from Kiron to the District of Columbia, that’s fine with me. But more likely he’ll keep trying to have it both ways, paying less than his fair share of D.C. property taxes, unless the local media in Iowa’s fifth district pick up on this story.

Former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania got caught a few years back claiming a homestead exclusion for a house he did not occupy. Some conservative heroes have a funny sense of “personal responsibility.”

A friend alerted me to this news release from the Rebuild Iowa Office. I’ve posted the whole release after the jump, but here is an excerpt:

Five Iowa communities affected by the tornadoes and floods of 2008 will receive assistance in recovering stronger and smarter through the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Smart Growth Implementation Assistance (SGIA) program.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Rebuild Iowa Office (RIO) and the Iowa Department of Economic Development (IDED) recently announced that New Hartford, Cedar Falls, Cedar Rapids, Coralville and Iowa City have been chosen to receive expert technical assistance to help with growth and redevelopment.

This is good news, because rebuilding with smart growth principles in mind will bring economic and environmental benefits to those cities.

I’m not watching it live, but I will update this post later with some clips and commentary.

In the meantime, share your thoughts about what the president is saying tonight.

UPDATE: I am swamped with preparations for the Natural Living Expo and didn’t watch the replay of the press conference.

Sam Stein wrote up the story for Huffington Post.

TomP had an interesting take on Obama’s comments about how we should not demonize investors.

Beltway journalists seem to think the big story of the night was whom the president didn’t call on, as opposed to what he said. They do like to make everything about themselves.

SECOND UPDATE: Todd Beeton’s liveblog at MyDD was good.

Warning: long diary ahead.

Hanna Rosin makes “The Case Against Breastfeeding” in the April issue of the Atlantic Monthly. The provocative title is misleading, because as Rosin explained in an interview on NBC’s Today show on March 16, she isn’t against breastfeeding. In fact, she kind of likes breastfeeding. Her problem is with the people who promote breastfeeding. Here’s the lead-in to her piece:

In certain overachieving circles, breast-feeding is no longer a choice-it’s a no-exceptions requirement, the ultimate badge of responsible parenting. Yet the actual health benefits of breast-feeding are surprisingly thin, far thinner than most popular literature indicates. Is breast-feeding right for every family? Or is it this generation’s vacuum cleaner-an instrument of misery that mostly just keeps women down?

Rosin packs a lot into the article, but I would summarize her main points as:

1. American women face intense social pressure to breastfeed exclusively.

2. Advocates exaggerate the benefits of breastfeeding, which the scientific research does not support.

3. Advocates downplay the negatives about breastfeeding and fail to acknowledge that formula-feeding can be the right choice for some mothers. On a related note, Rosin depicts breastfeeding as extremely inconvenient for mothers who work outside the home.

4. Advocates have medicalized the conversation about breastfeeding, and American women are wrongly led to believe they are harming their babies if they give formula instead.

I address those points and more after the jump. Rosin’s conflicted feelings about breastfeeding are valid, but unfortunately, she draws too many broad conclusions based on her personal experiences.

For those who don’t care to read the rest of this post, be assured that as a feminist and pro-choice woman, I respect the right of women to decide what and how to feed their own babies. I am also aware that some women are unable to breastfeed for physical or medical reasons, and many more women are unable to breastfeed because they lacked the information and support they needed in the critical early weeks.

My intention is not to judge any mother for her choices or add to the pain of any mother who did not have the breastfeeding experience she sought.

“I believe candidates with strong, sound stances deserve our support, and this is a race where your dollars can make the difference. Please make a contribution to this critical cause.”

Sound familiar? If you have any experience with our fundraising pages you will have seen this (and perhaps fallen asleep to it) a few too many times. It is the default text for ActBlue’s fundraising pages. ActBlue’s customizable fundraising pages allow progressive activists to raise money for the best Democratic candidates out there easily and effectively, and the fifty state blog network has taken advantage of this feature to support state and national candidates with customized, targeted pages. But while the original blurb did help Democrats use our pages, we’re in year 5 of ActBlue, and this is definitely year 3-4 material. We’ll be working with thousands of new fundraisers this cycle, and we want to make sure they have the best language. And, well, this isn’t it.

So, we need ideas.

We know you’re best equipped to know what language will appeal to your friends and neighbors, so we wanted to give all of you an opportunity to create the next fundraising page blurb. If we pick yours, it will show up automatically on almost every fundraising page created on ActBlue. To show our appreciation, we’ll send the winner and two runners-up an ActBlue Ice Cream Scoop! (No, we’re not kidding. And trust us, it’s a high quality scoop – The Original Zeroll.)

Okay, here are the guidelines:

1. The blurb must be fewer than 50 words.
2. It has to be fairly generic (no specific issues or names), but still get across the basic reason for the fundraising page. This is something our current text does fairly well, if you are looking for an example.
3. If you can make it apply to pages for candidates and/or committees, all the better. If not, at least make it appeal to people looking to donate to candidates.
4. We are Democrats, and our pages are for Democrats. If your message would appeal to Democrats, that would probably earn points.
5. Humor is a big plus, but only that universal humor that works for everyone.
6. Effective fundraising is personal. Think about what kind of language would help you be a better fundraiser, and think about why your friends and family might feel compelled to give.
7. All entries must be received by 3/25.

Fill out your entry form right here! Thank you for your participation!

ActBlue is active in all 50 states, helping Democrats raise money for their chosen candidate from the comfort of their living rooms and offices. We believe that your voice should be heard everywhere from your state capitol to the Senate floor, and we’re working to make sure it is. Please support our work with a $15 recurring contribution today!

I haven’t had a chance to watch today’s White House regional forum on health care yet (the Des Moines Register made the video available here).

According to the Des Moines Register, Senator Tom Harkin promised that health care reform will not fail this time:

“This is not something that we’re going to kick the ball down the field,” he said. “This is going to happen this year.”

The Register noted that some people at the forum favored single-payer health care reform, while others would like to see only small incremental changes. Protesters supporting a single-payer system gathered outside the forum too. I agree that single-payer makes the most sense for all kinds of reasons, but President Barack Obama will not seek that change, and Congress will not pass it. I’m willing to settle for a compromise that includes a strong public-insurance option.

Obama’s representative at today’s forum expressed optimism about finding an acceptable compromise:

Nancy-Ann DeParle, the leader of Obama’s health-reform effort, said past health-reform debates saw too many people who were wedded to specific plans. They wouldn’t compromise if they couldn’t get everything they wanted, she said. “Their fall-back position was always the status quo.”

This time, she said, people seem more willing to listen to other people’s ideas and find compromises.

Prospects for passing universal health care reform will depend on large part on whether the bill is subject to a filibuster in the U.S. Senate (meaning it would need 60 votes to pass). Obama reportedly wants to include health care reform in the budget process, so that it could pass with only 51 votes.

Chris Peterson, president of the Iowa Farmers Union, talked about health insurance for rural Americans at today’s forum:

“Rural Iowans struggle with finding affordable insurance. Even solidly middle class farmers are feeling the pinch. Nearly one in eight Iowa farmers battle outstanding health debt,” Peterson said. “I am one of them.”

Peterson, who is 53, was kicked off his private insurance plan about two years ago for what the company said was a preexisting condition. Peterson and his wife, who has no private insurance either, have accumulated $14,000 in medical debts in the past two years. “The health care system in this country is dysfunctional and burdensome,” Peterson said of the private insurance industry. “…Personally, what I’ve been through, it seems at times it’s a ponzi scheme — they’re taking your money — or (it’s) just the robber barons pulling money out of your pockets.”

On this note, I highly recommend reading this article by Steph Larsen: “For healthy food and soil, we need affordable health care for farmers.”

Getting back to today’s events, @personaltxr was at the forum and tweeted that Senator Chuck Grassley was expected but didn’t turn up. Does anybody know why? Grassley has an important role to play as the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee. UPDATE: The Des Moines Register reported that Grassley stayed in Washington because of ongoing Senate business.

If you saw the health care forum, either live or on video, let us know what you thought. Everyone else can use this thread for any comments related to our health care system and prospects for reform.

 As Congress prepares to act on President Obama’s budget this week, the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate of the budget deficit has created new pressure to reduce spending. Fifteen Senators, and a number of House members, have already suggested that Congress must reduce spending significantly below the levels that President Obama requested.

But Iowans need to be aware that reducing spending on domestic appropriations could make this recession longer and hurt our environment while doing very little to reduce the long term deficit.

As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities warns policy makers:

(click “There's more” to read on) 

Happy Spring, Bleeding Heartland readers! There’s a lot happening this week, and I’ve posted the events after the jump.

Post a comment or send me an e-mail (desmoinesdem AT yahoo.com) if you know of something good happening that I’ve left out.

If you live within striking distance of Iowa City, there’s a benefit for the Iowa Renewable Energy Association tonight at the Mill (details below).

It’s not yet clear whether Iowa’s Republican Secretary of Agriculture, Bill Northey, will seek re-election in 2010 or run against Governor Chet Culver instead. But at least one Democrat appears ready to seek Northey’s job next year.

Francis Thicke, an organic dairy farmer near Fairfield with a Pd.D. in agronomy and soil fertility, announced yesterday that he has formed an Exploratory Committee to consider running for Iowa Secretary of Agriculture. I’ve posted the press release from Thicke after the jump. One of his top priorities would be expanding local food networks:

“Growing more of our food in Iowa represents a multi-billion dollar economic development opportunity.”  This potential economic activity could “create thousands of new jobs and help revitalize rural communities in Iowa, as well as provide Iowans with fresh, nutritious food,” said Thicke.

Thicke would be an outstanding asset to Iowa as Secretary of Agriculture. A working farmer and expert on many agricultural policy issues, he currently serves on Iowa’s USDA State Technical Committee and has an impressive list of publications. In the past he has served on the Iowa Environmental Protection Commission, the Iowa Food Policy Council, and the Iowa Organic Standards Board.

He has also won awards including “the Activist Award from the Iowa Chapter of the Sierra Club, the Outstanding Pasture Management award from the Jefferson County Soil and Water Conservation District and the Friend of the Earth award from the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition in Washington, D.C.”

Here’s an interview Thicke gave in 2003 about his organic dairy operation. He also wrote this piece on the benefits of pasture-based dairies for CounterPunch in 2004. I found a YouTube video of Thicke speaking about livestock farming in Pella last year.

Thicke’s relationship with the Culver administration is strained, to put it mildly. He did not go quietly when Culver declined to reappoint him to the Environmental Protection Commission. In addition, Thicke is a strong advocate for “local control” of confined-animal feeding operations (CAFOs), which Lieutenant Governor Patty Judge opposes and Culver has not pursued as governor.

If Thicke runs for Secretary of Agriculture, his campaign is likely to become a focal point for environmentalists who aren’t satisfied with our current Democratic leadership in Iowa.

UPDATE: Denise O’Brien responded to my request for a comment on Thicke’s candidacy:

I have pledged my support to Francis. He has an excellent background to be a strong leader of our state agriculture department. His depth of knowledge of agriculture and natural resource management gives him credibility when it comes to truly understanding the relationship of agriculture to the rest of the world. It is my intention to work hard to get Francis elected.

On March 18 the Iowa House voted 96 to 0 to pass a bill banning candidates from using campaign funds to pay themselves or immediate family members a salary. This measure closes the so-called “Ed Fallon loophole,” named because Fallon received $13,750 from his gubernatorial campaign between June and November 2006 after losing the Democratic primary.

The Iowa Senate approved Senate File 50 in February (also unanimously). Governor Chet Culver is expected to sign the bill and may have done so already, but I did not find confirmation of that on the governor’s website.

Looking at the text of Senate File 50, I noticed that it defines “immediate family member” as “the spouse or dependent child of a candidate.”

I’ve been told that at least 20 members of the Iowa House (including Democrats and Republicans) employ either their spouse or child as a clerk. Apparently it is fine for spouses and children of state legislators to draw a salary from taxpayer dollars, but it becomes a terrible ethical problem for a candidate to draw a salary from money voluntarily contributed by supporters.

I have more to say about this farcical bill after the jump.

I haven’t written anything yet about Senator Chuck Grassley’s comments on the AIG bonuses. The whole episode was such an empty populist gesture. First he said the AIG no-goodniks should act like the Japanese and either offer a humble apology or kill themselves. Then he walked back his comments and said they should offer a sincere apology. That’s all? I’d like to see more strings attached to the Wall Street bailout program, which Grassley voted for.

The Twitterer for the Daily Iowan Opinion page had the best response to Grassley I’ve seen so far. After the senator explained that “I do want an attitude in corporate American that’s similar to what they have in corporate Japan,” DIOpinions commented, “Making failed American executives more like their Japanese counterparts would require massive pay cuts.” Don’t hold your breath until Grassley gets behind that.

Anyway, we’ll find out how much Grassley cares about getting taxpayers’ money back from AIG when the Senate votes on the bill the House of Representatives passed yesterday.

Follow me after the jump to read about Grassley’s recent comments on medical marijuana and health care reform.

Also, I can confirm that at least one Democrat is stepping forward to challenge Iowa’s senior senator in 2010. Details are below.

On Wednesday IowaVoter posted a diary here about a bill passed by the Iowa House to allow absentee ballots to be counted before election day. Click here to read the text of HF 670, formerly known as HSB 133.

IowaVoter uses humor to raise valid concerns about this bill. Quite a few people could be tipped off about the early voting results, and if they leak the information, some candidates could gain an advantage on election day. Lots of state legislative races in Iowa were decided by very narrow margins last November, and it is not uncommon for a local or county-level race to be decided by a handful of votes.

I can’t see any public interest served by this bill. Even though early voting has grown in Iowa, with about a third of the electorate casting early ballots last fall, we still got our election results promptly.

Mr. desmoinesdem pointed me to this site, which shows that only California and Colorado allow early ballots to be counted before election day. Many states don’t allow them to be opened until after the polls close on election day (Iowa law currently allows counting to begin the morning of election day).

I can understand why many would support early counting of absentee ballots in a huge state like California. Even though California election officials were allowed to start counting on October 25 of last year, some had hundreds of thousands of votes still uncounted after election day. But California has three counties more populous than all of Iowa, six more counties with at least 1 million residents, plus another 12 counties that have more residents than Iowa’s largest county (Polk).

There is no logistical need for county auditors in Iowa to open the early ballots before election day. I would rather wait a few more hours for the final results than open the door to political mischief by insiders.

HF 670 is worse than a solution in search of a problem–it’s a solution that could spark allegations of fraud and misconduct every time we have a very close election outcome. The Iowa Senate should reject this bill. If they pass it, Governor Culver should veto it.

Sorry to bring you down on a Friday afternoon, but the Iowa Revenue Estimating Conference released new estimates today, and it ain’t pretty:

The conference estimated that the current year’s revenues will sink by $129.7 million compared to its December estimate. Revenue for the budget year that begins July 1 will drop by $269.9 million.

The drop is in addition to December’s estimates, which cut $99.5 million in the current year and $132.6 million in the fiscal year that begins July 1.

Charlie Krogmeier, Gov. Chet Culver’s chief of staff and a member of the conference, said federal stimulus money may help offset the blow but that the dramatically lower estimates will leave lawmakers with tough options.

It would be difficult to find enough job cuts and furloughs in the current fiscal year to fill the gap. The fiscal year ends June 30, in roughly 10 weeks. […]

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy […] and other Democratic leaders noted on Thursday that they were already planning a budget that was $130 million less than Culver’s in the upcoming fiscal year. It’s unclear how they will make up the additional $270 million loss for the current and upcoming year.

Clearly difficult choices lie ahead. I urge Iowa leaders not to implement spending cuts alone, because cutting government spending too much during a recession can make things worse.

I was encouraged to read recently that legislators are looking carefully at all of the tax incentives Iowa provides. The combined effect of all these tax incentives is larger than all state spending:

There are at least 191 tax breaks for income and sales taxes that cost or prevent Iowa from collecting almost $7.2 billion, according to a 2005 review by the Iowa Department of Revenue and Finance.

That’s more than total state spending, which is projected to be $7.1 billion next year.

Not all of these tax breaks provide good value for the lost revenue, and not all of them can be preserved with the budget shortfall we’re facing.

In other unpleasant news this Friday, the Principal Financial Group, one of Iowa’s largest employers, announced pay cuts between 2 and 10 percent, which will affect all employees, management and the board of directors. Some benefits will also be reduced.

Principal already imposed a large layoff in December, and I think they are doing the right thing by reducing pay rather than cutting more jobs now. Labor market specialists differ on whether it’s better for companies to cut pay or lay off more workers in lean times. Click here to read some arguments for reducing pay, or click here for the pro-layoff argument.