(C) Iowa Capital Dispatch
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Governor’s agency revamp undermines Legislature, Democrats argue [1]
['Robin Opsahl', 'More From Author', '- February']
Date: 2023-02-20
Gov. Kim Reynolds’ bill to reorganize state government will take away legislative oversight and consolidate power with the governor, Democrats said Monday.
A House State Government subcommittee held its first of four meetings on the 1,500-page bill, which consolidates Iowa’s system of state government from 37 cabinet-level agencies to 16.
In the Monday meeting, representatives discussed the changes in House Study Bill 126 made to three departments, Iowa’s boards and commissions and to agency director salaries and appointments.
Democrats questioned the governor’s staff about the new appointment process for the superintendents of credit unions and banking divisions in Iowa’s Department of Insurance and Financial Services — the current Department of Commerce. The bill outlines that the positions serve at the pleasure of the governor instead of for a four-year term. This language comes up 29 times in the bill, Rep. Adam Zabner, D-Iowa City, said.
The bill also would lower the current two-thirds majority, or 33-vote threshold for Senate approval for an appointee to a three-fifths majority, or 30 votes. Rep. Austin Baeth, D-Des Moines, said Iowans had a say in approving or disapproving of the people in these positions through their legislators’ confirmation votes. He questioned how this legislation keeps executive branch positions accountable to Iowans instead of just accountable to the governor.
“Let’s keep in mind when we talk about the governor, we’re not talking about Governor Reynolds — we’re talking about a future governor,” Baeth said. “So this is not any sort of negative comments or worries about this particular governor … This is about for the decades and generations that follow.”
Democrats also questioned if the governor’s proposed changes to the salaries of appointed state officers would limit recruitment opportunities for Iowa. Jacob Nicholson, the governor’s Chief Operating Officer, said the legislation will allow the governor to better recruit talented, experienced people to run the cabinet agencies if she can set the positions’ salaries.
“It’s very difficult to go out on a national search, for instance right now, and say, ‘Hey, we need somebody to run our Department Health and Human Services.’ It oversees, you know, 4,000 people. It’s a significant enterprise effort,” Nicholson said. “And by the way, we can only advertise this position, at (no higher than) $154,000 a year.”
The House subcommittee will continue its panel meetings 12 p.m. Tuesday.
Advocates oppose changes to child advocacy panel
The Senate subcommittee held its final meeting Monday on the Senate Study Bill 1123, the Senate version of Reynolds’ bill. The legislation will head next to the full State Government committee this week, Sen. Jason Schultz, R-Schleswig, said.
The series of Senate subcommittee hearings ended with discussions on proposed changes to the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The department itself is a product of a merger approved in 2022 of the state’s Department of Public Health and Department of Human Services.
Iowa HHS would also incorporate the Department on Aging and the Department of Human Rights under the legislation. In addition to folding in the agencies, HHS would take over administration of Early Childhood Iowa, the Iowa commission on volunteer services and the Iowa Child Advocacy Board (ICAB).
Multiple volunteers with ICAB spoke against the bill’s provision putting it in HHS. The board currently is attached to the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals, but operates independently. ICAB consists of nine members, appointed by the governor and approved by the Senate, to discuss child welfare issues in Iowa.
The board members, alongside Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) volunteers, work as advocates for children who may be experiencing abuse or neglect, as well as working with those in the state’s child care systems such as those in foster case. Bill Owens, an associate juvenile judge lobbying for ICAB, said the change would compromise the ability of the board and volunteers to make objective assessments of Iowa’s child welfare system.
If the Board falls under HHS administration, Owens said there could be an “inherent conflict” for a volunteer to make recommendations to a court on how Iowa’s child welfare care providers should improve if they are working for the same agency.
“Volunteers regularly make recommendations to the court that are directly contrary to the recommendations that the HHS case manager makes in most cases,” Owens said. “So how credible will those recommendations be to the court, if the CASA volunteer essentially is being supervised by someone who works for HHS? How free will the child or family be in sharing information with that CASA volunteer when they learn that the volunteer is essentially supervised by someone who works for the very agency that they’re commenting on?”
Owens asked for the board to remain under the Department of Inspections and Appeals — which itself would be renamed the Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing through the reorganization bill and take on other responsibilities.
Molly Severn, Reynolds’ legislative liaison, said ICAB will remain an independent board appointed by and answerable to the governor.
“However, its alignment with HHS better positions it to work collaboratively with child welfare partners and enhance its ability to evaluate the system,” Severn said.
While there will be technical amendments brought forward on the bill, Schultz said there are no current amendment proposals to address the issues like those brought up from ICAB members or from blind and deaf Iowans in earlier meetings. Any discussion of bigger changes to the legislation will wait until floor debate, he said.
“In my mind, this has to go in front of both full caucuses because it is an entire state alignment process,” Schultz said. “So I see this coming out of subcommittee as is, continuing to work on the technical amendment … but also the discussions on the concerns we’ve heard.”
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