(Des Moines)– The 2020 Iowa Legislative session gets underway this (Mon.) morning at the statehouse in Des Moines. State Representative John Wills of Spirit Lake says the session is starting off on a positive note when it comes to the state’s finances…
“Our revenues again just like last year are more than expected, more revenue coming in than what we anticipated and so we actually have about a billion dollars in reserves right now and those are in specific funds that are set up, but then we had $300 million more in revenue, 380 million I think, more revenue than what we had anticipated so we actually had a surplus there as well so overall we’re doing really spectacular on the budget front in the state of Iowa, we just need to make sure that we are budgeting responsibly and making sure that we’re not overspending the revenue and sending taxpayer dollars back when we don’t need it.”
One issue likely to come back up this session is medical marijuana. State Senator Zach Whiting of Spirit Lake…
“But the big hangup on this issue, this is what held things up last year and I think ultimately led to the Governor’s veto, is what do we do about the THC. The level right now is limited at three percent. There has been some conflict about if we shift that to a per gram limit, what do we shift it to. The Medical Canibidol Board recommended somewhere in the maybe four to five range and the House somewhere maybe in the 25 to 30 range. That’s just too high for me. And so I trust the judgement of the board so if we do shift to a per gram limit, it needs to be a little lower for me to support it.”
Whiting says the bottle bill, the school start date, two perennial issues for lawmakers, are likely to come back up again this session as well.
