DES MOINES — Both the Iowa House and Senate worked overnight and are still in session this morning as they try to conclude the 2025 session. Lawmakers have approved several different items in the last 24 hours:
== Negotiators are striking final deals on a more than $9.4 BILLION state budget. Legislators have already approved five bills laying out spending for several state agencies. The governor’s recommendation to spend a million dollars for University of Iowa research into the state’s rising cancer rate is in one of those bills.
== A tax break for businesses has cleared the Iowa legislature. The bill reduces the business tax rate for the state fund for unemployment benefits.
== After three years of negotiations, the legislature has approved a plan to distribute nearly $57 MILLION for opioid addiction treatment and prevention programs. Companies that produced, marketed and sold the powerful painkillers are paying billions to states and local governments over two decades to settle a national lawsuit. Iowa’s attorney general and the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services will decide where the money goes — something Senators favored, but those officials must get recommendations from leaders in the state’s seven behavioral health regions. That’s something House members sought.
== After three years of trying, the governor’s plan to provide state employees four weeks of paid maternity leave and one week of paid paternity leave has passed the legislature. It will also provide four weeks of leave to state employees who adopt a child.
