Note: Previous agendas are achived and copies can be obtained by contacting the office.
It is time to plan for the 2012 Session of the 84th General Assembly. Items being watched this year include:
The 2012 Membership Drive begins! Your member counter-parts need your support to continue the advocacy work. This legislative session issues to be tackled will, in part, include:
• Negotiating the new Iowa Economic Development Partnership (formerly IDED)
• The Regional System of Mental Health Delivery
• Commercial Property Taxes and Local Government Budgets
• Small Business Development Resources for Rural Regions
• TIME 21 Funding for Transportation Infrastructure
• Continued Advocacy for the Hwy 34 Corridor Bridge
The Coalition board and members begin work after the close of the legislative session each year to evaluate what issues are on the horizon for the next session that may need advocacy or what new policy proposal(s) can be introduced to strengthen the region's local economies and spur business growth.
A draft of the Southwest Iowa Coalition's Legislative Agenda of Priorities is determined by September. Either a Candidate's Forum (on election years) or a Legislative Forum (on non-election years) is held where the draft agenda is introduced to the region's legislators for their review and comment. The public is welcome and encouraged to attend the forums.
The agenda is finalized by January and select delegates from the board and membership schedule a day at the Capitol to visit with Senate and House leadership and the Governor to discuss SWICO's priorities.
2010 Membership Advocacy Included - 2011 advocacy continues
TIME 21: Advocacy continued for the transportation fund. Members were kept updated throughout the year on corresponding legislative activity and Board Member, Joe Blankenship attended and reported on the Transportation Day event at the Capitol. Members continue to express concern about the correlation between healthy commerce and the region’s transportation system.
HWY 34 Bridge: Members of SWICO have actively advocated at a State and Federal level to secure funding for this infrastructure that is critical to the economic growth of the region for more than a decade. The groundbreaking ceremony for the bridge took place on September 9th at Hwy. 34 & 190th Street at I-29. State and Federal Legislators and their representatives from both Iowa and Nebraska were on hand.
Clarinda Mental Health Institute: Budget cuts drew legislative review of Iowa’s state funded mental health institutions located throughout the state. The Clarinda Mental Health Institute was targeted to be closed. Coalition members from the region’s smallest communities to its largest used the power of emails to expedite urgent communications to legislators during their deliberations. The facility was kept open in the end, but this is likely not the last chapter. Legislators look to move mental health services to local, community-based programming in the future. However, the absence of accessible local programming, and the education about the effectiveness of the CMHI to serve the region’s needs from the advocacy campaign, have brought some additional thought to the legislative discussion.
Hazard Analysis & Critical Control Points (HACCP) System: SWICO members assisted with an email campaign against instituting new, cost-prohibitive rules for rural, local lockers to implement. Had the new regulation for testing been implemented, the region would have lost many of its local meat lockers.
Coalition told there's strength in numbers
Creston News Advistier Headline/excerpt
1998
Rural Southwest Iowa can be stonger and louder with a unified voice.
Dale McAllister of Clarinda, Southwest Iowa Coalition president, presented the regional cooperation report to 39 area citizens at a special meeting of the coalition Thursday.
He said 66% of Iowa is rural and by working together issues of concern will be heard.
"We must go with a unified voice and say we need the best for the State of Iowa," McAllister said. "Nothiing but positive things can happen."
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