Iowa’s Right-to-Work status provides employers in the state and those considering doing business in Iowa a competitive advantage. Any alteration to Iowa’s Right-to-Work status would significantly impair future job retention and creation efforts in the state. It is imperative Iowa preserve its Right-to-Work status without modification.

The Employee Free Choice Act, also identified as the Card Check bill, would dramatically change unionizing practices for businesses across the United States by altering the existing method of secret ballot union organization elections currently monitored by the National Labor Relations Board [NLRB] to provide for open balloting practices by union organizers. The bill would eliminate the NLRB from the process and subsequently authorize card check elections [non-secret ballots], which would leave the process open to coercion tactics.

Iowa’s current system providing for employer direction of medical care for work-related injuries-Iowa law since 1913-should not be altered in any way.

Iowa’s current property tax system, which allows for burden shifting to commercial and industrial property owners, is a major inhibitor of economic growth and should be reformed to more equitably distribute tax liability among property classes.

The Iowa Values Fund is Iowa’s most important economic development engine and should be fully funded in 2010. The Fund, which operates under a tiered wage threshold system, should be amended to allow for wage thresholds to be lowered for startup companies in disadvantaged counties like those in Southeast Iowa.

Iowa’s workforce issue should be addressed with long-term, multi-faceted policies which include education, training, retention and recruitment. Existing workforce development programs, including the 260E and 260F Industrial New Jobs Training programs, should be preserved and expanded to address Iowa’s widening workforce availability and skills gap. Proposals by Iowa Workforce Development to address the increasing number of unemployed Iowans and to provide additional resources for workforce retraining should be given serious consideration by the legislature.

The implementation of the Iowa Core Curriculum represents an important step toward a statewide education system with more emphasis on math and science skills development. Further education policy reforms including early childhood education expansion, performance-based assessment programs for educators and students, and statewide accountability standards should be given serious consideration. Too, the state should explore ways in which to more readily and expansively incorporate workforce preparedness education programming, i.e. career academies, into school curriculums to help address Iowa’s workforce availability and skills gap.

Zoning regulations should be established in Jefferson County, one of only a handful of Iowa counties without a formal development policy. In order to motivate orderly, efficient and comprehensive land use policies and practices, Jefferson County should produce and maintain straightforward zoning regulations which demonstrate to existing and future property owners an investment in orderly and lawful land governance.