Gazette Daily News Briefing, February 11 and February 12
Welcome to Super Bowl weekend!
This is Stephen Schmidt from the Gazette digital news desk and I’m here with your update for Saturday, February 11, and Sunday, February 12.
I am happy to report it will be strangely nice again for a February weekend. According to the National Weather Service on Saturday it will be sunny in the Cedar Rapids area with a high near 42 degrees. Sunday will be mostly sunny, with a high near 45 degrees. Expect warm weather to persist until next Thursday.
Something to consider when working on your taxes. Donations to Iowa's Fish/Wildlife fund, informally called the Chickadee Checkoff, fell nearly 15 percent last year, and have been gradually shrinking since the fund was created in the early 1980s.
Study and support for Iowa’s nongame animals, including songbirds, turtles, frogs, owls and salamanders, is needed more than ever as many species decline in numbers, mostly because of lost habitat.
North America has lost nearly 30 percent of its birds — about 3 million — since the 1970s, according to a 2019 article in the journal Science.
“There is a lot of vulnerable wildlife we still don’t have a good feel for how they are doing,” said Stephanie Shepherd, a wildlife diversity biologist for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.
Iowa’s five Wildlife Diversity program staff members work with land managers to make sure they are incorporating practices that support nongame animals. Staff lead surveys of bald eagles, frogs and toads and the rusty patched bumblebee to see how these species continue to fare in Iowa.
Iowa Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, saying she is not done cutting taxes, announced Friday it is her goal to abolish the state income tax by the end of her four-year term.
State lawmakers have passed various tax reform measures over the last several years, including establishing a “flat tax” in the state for personal income tax.
“And I can tell you without hesitation, we’re not done,” Reynolds said during a state policy leadership forum in Washington, D.C., hosted by the conservative Cato Institute. “My goal is to get to zero individual income tax rate by the end of this second term.”
Seven states — Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Wyoming — have no state income tax. New Hampshire does not tax earned income and is currently phasing out a tax on interest and dividend income. Washington similarly does not have a traditional income tax, instead taxing capital gains of income of high earners.
Brenna Bird, Iowa’s new Republican attorney general whose primary campaign platform was a pledge to stand up to Democratic President Joe Biden, has asked state lawmakers to approve nearly $1 million to “push back on overreach.”
The request is part of a presentation Bird’s office made recently to lawmakers, who in the coming weeks will craft state spending for the next budget year beginning July 1.
Bird requested an additional $920,514 to fund six full-time equivalent positions — four lawyers and two paralegals whose primary duties would be, according to the office’s presentation, “to protect the state’s interests against federal overreach, protect Iowa farmers, and defend Iowa’s statutes.”
Bird became Iowa Attorney General in January after defeating Democrat Tom Miller, the longest-serving state attorney general in U.S. history, in this past November’s elections. During her campaign, Bird frequently pledged to use the state Attorney General’s Office as a legal firewall between Iowans and the Biden administration.
The most recent example was revealed Thursday, when Bird’s office announced it has joined Republican attorneys general in two dozen other states who are suing the Biden administration over a federal regulation that requires gun owners to register any guns with attached pistol braces.
Have a good weekend everyone!
