Capitol transitions into highly productive week

(1-30-26) Hello SD 44!

Following a shortened schedule last week, the Capitol transitioned into a highly productive full week. A bill I have been working on for the past 6 months deals with how the state required casino “donations” have been distributed for decades.

I will try to simplify a very complex structure. There are 19 casinos in 15 of Iowa’s 99 counties. Every year, Iowa law requires those casinos to donate 1% of their revenues to the state that then splits those monies up and sends them out to the counties that do not have casinos. For example, in Jefferson County, the Greater Jefferson County Foundation receives those funds and awards them to projects within the county every year and those monies are typically around $100,000. Of the 5 counties I represent, Jefferson, Henry, Van Buren, Keokuk, and Mahaska, none have a casino so they would have an organization similar to the Greater Jefferson County Foundation to disperse their casino funds. These funds are very helpful to these counties, however they are not even close to the “casino cash cow” that counties that have casinos receive.

Iowa law also requires the license for each casino to be held by a QSO, Qualified Sponsoring Organization that is in the county that the casino resides. The casino is then to donate revenues (typically 3%) to the QSO to then donate to projects within their QSO areas. Since all 5 counties that I represent lay within the Washington County Riverboat Foundation’s designated QSO area, for the purpose of this newsletter, I will focus on this QSO. The Washington County Riverboat Foundation has established a QSO area that covers 20 counties that they have identified via the County Endowment Program. Thus, they are supposed to be annually supporting projects (typically from non profits, schools, fire departments, churches, elderly organizations, etc. that come from these 20 counties. But they don't. In the past 20 years, the Washington County Riverboat Foundation has distributed:

$52,212,200 to projects in Washington County

$1,778,026 to projects in Keokuk County

$204,995 to projects to Henry County

$33,188 to projects in Jefferson County

$0 to projects in Mahaska County

I can certainly understand Washington County projects receiving more funds than neighboring counties and I would guess that Riverside Casino has more customers from Washington County than Jefferson, but certainly NOT 2,000 times more! For every $1 that Jefferson County has been awarded by the Washington County Riverboat Foundation, they award $2,000 to Washington County, and that is NOT right. Not only does Washington County profit from all of the jobs that were created by the casino and all of the related taxes, they should not be fleecing all of the neighboring counties that support and spend money in the Riverside Casino.

When legislators set up the casino structure decades ago, the 1% and 3% rations should have been reversed, unfortunately this was not the case. The bill I have drafted simply donates these monies to the counties where the customers come from through data that the casinos already have. This way counties that have casinos and counties that do not, have more of a equitable distribution. My proposed legislation may not be the solution, but I hope it forces the discussion to finally take place, something that has been ignored for 2 decades!

To wrap up the rest of the week, on Monday, I was able to meet with school boards to discuss education priorities in Iowa. On Tuesday, I was with President Trump in Des Moines. On Wednesday afternoon, I spoke with representatives from the Iowa Developmental Disabilities Council about how legislation that our Workforce committee has introduced would assist Iowans with disabilities in finding jobs. And on Thursday, I welcomed my fellow brotherhood of Firefighters as the Iowa Firefighters Association had their annual chili cook-off in the Capitol. I have been a volunteer firefighter for 34 years, and always enjoy visiting with the “red coats” when they visit.

Speaking of fire departments, Saturday morning, Jan. 31, I encourage everyone to attend the Packwood Volunteer Fire and Rescue Department's pancake breakfast from 7-10. That day we will also honor Garry Dickey who will be retiring after having volunteered with our department and in our community for 50 years of service! Thank you Garry!

Thank you!

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