House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (D-Des Moines) laid out a scenario yesterday whereby a skeleton crew of top legislators would stick around Des Moines to figure out the "strings" on the federal stimulus package money that's headed Iowa's way. Once the details are hammered out, the entire General Assembly would reassemble in Des Moines to direct the spending of that federal money.  McCarthy indicated there are two scenarios under consideration:  a special session or a break in the regular session that's currently underway with most legislators leaving Des Moines, then returning later to ratify the details of a budget deal worked out by legislative leaders.

"We don't have the answers yet on what's called 'maintenance of effort' or the purse strings that are going to be required," McCarthy said, during an appearance on IPTV's "Iowa Press" on Friday.  "Now, I'm hopeful that the federal government moves very fast and in an efficient fashion and we get all this money soon and we can figure out how we can make our budget work for Iowans better.  My fear is that it's going to take longer to get that done because of the bureacracy in the federal government and that may make our budget challenge here in Iowa that much greater, because we have to wait to figure exactly what requirements are placed on all this money."

Governor Culver and his staff believe the state will be getting $1.9 billion from the federal stimulus package over a period of three years. 

Here's McCarthy on the two scenarios mentioned in the first paragraph: "I think a couple of things are possibilities.  One would be that rank-and-file legislators go home and leadership and appropriations members stay and work through this maze of federal rules that are going to be coming down to deal with all this money and then when there's a deal, bring (rank-and-file legislators) back.  That's one option.  The other option is to pass a fairly lean budget and then come back in special (session) and fill certain areas once we figure out the maze of all these federal rules, so that's another option."

Late yesterday, the Iowa House debated the idea of selling the state-owned fiber optic network known as the I.C.N. (Iowa Communications Network). The proposal was advanced by House Republicans, in the form of an amendment on an appropriations bill. The amendment failed on a 43 to 55, party-line vote, but here's the key quote during that debate, from a key Democrat:  "I think it's an important issue to talk about, as we should every other issue that may affect the state budget," said Rep. Jo Oldson, a Democrat from Des Moines who is chairwoman of the House Appropriations Committee. "But I think it's a pretty complicated issue and it needs to be done in a pretty plan-full way."

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (D-Des Moines) is the guest on this evening's IPTV program "Iowa Press" and McCarthy said it's time to start the discussion about selling or leasing the fiber optic network.

After the program, McCarthy spoke with other reporters who watched the show.  Rod Boshart of The Cedar Rapids Gazette noted that Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal in the past has said selling the network would yield the state 10-cents on the dollar in terms of the state investment.  "What's changed?" Boshart asked.

"I'm not sure anything's changed.  I think it's something worth exploring," McCarthy replied.  "It may not be a viable thing to do after some analysis, but I think we should move forward and have some analysis to see what the potential is there.  I know there's been some private industry that's been in my office that'd like to look at it, but I think it's worth exploring."

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