Iowa GOP Ignores the Will of the People
Clean water, outdoor recreation, healthy Iowans, the GOP says, Not in Our State.
Iowa News Update Feb. 19th: As I finish off my Substack column for this week about the continued stalling in funding the Natural Resources and Outdoor Recreation Trust Fund for 15 years, a bill has been introduced in the Senate State Government Committee to repeal the constitutional amendment passed in 2010, by a 63% majority vote. There are 65-70 lobbyists representing Iowa interests in the subcommittee hearing today (Feb. 19th) with 67 against repeal, and 3 for the repeal. The 3 lobbyists for the repeal of the Trust Fund all represent the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation.
Feb. 20th Update: The three-member Senate subcommittee voted 2-1 Wednesday to advance the resolution to the full State Government Committee for consideration. Water quality, outdoor recreational opportunities and all Iowans lose the day. I will track the process and keep reporting on this issue.
My story below is a modified version that I wrote in 2024 for the Okoboji Protective Association (OPA) Newsletter. I have been a long-standing board member of the state’s oldest environmental organization founded in 1905. OPA Website
Iowans love the outdoors and would like more opportunities to enjoy the beautiful lands and waters of this great state for recreation, leisure, personal and family health. Iowans work very hard and when it is time to spend that hard-earned income, they witness lands and waters neglected, and imperiled, by elected officials of this state denying the public the healthy outdoor opportunities which Iowans overwhelmingly support.
The American outdoor recreational culture is relatively new in human history but really took off in the 1970's and 1980's with the running and exercise movements. The 1980's ushered in a time of lavish personal expenditures on numerous leisure activities such as camping, hiking, boating, fishing, hunting, mountain biking, distance running and walking, as examples. An outdoor infrastructure also needed to be expanded and built to accommodate this growing interest and Iowa was no exception.
In 1987, at the direction of the Iowa Legislature and Governor Terry Branstad, the Iowa DNR was challenged to "prepare a statewide, long-range plan for the acquisition and protection of significant open space lands." In 1988, the Iowa DNR enacted the "Iowa Open Spaces Plan" which included an aggressive goal, convert 10% of Iowa's lands and waters into public open spaces by the year 2000. In 1989, the Resource Enhancement and Protection Fund (REAP) was created, and it appeared Iowa was on the verge of a cultural shift to include the new outdoor recreational economy as a major part of Iowa's future.
Unfortunately, this vision was not to be. Big agricultural interests saw this as a threat to their ever-expanding vision of the state and the Iowa Open Spaces plan stalled and REAP has been chronically underfunded since.
In 2010, Iowa voters had had enough of their representatives' failures to represent the majority wishes to clean up Iowa waters and provide more outdoor opportunities and went directly to a ballot initiative. A new Constitutional Amendment was passed with a 63% majority to create Iowa's Natural Resources and Outdoor Recreational Trust Fund (IWILL). Iowans voted to tax themselves 3/8th of a cent of sales tax to create the funding to implement the Iowa Open Spaces Plan that had been languishing for over two decades. IWILL would be a dedicated source of funding for clean water, outdoor recreation, soil quality and wildlife habitat.
Once again however, the Iowa legislature and the governor failed the people by not raising the sales tax to fund the trust. After 14 years, IWILL remains unfunded, and the legislature remains defiant to act at the will of the majority of Iowans. Recent polling shows that over 80% of Iowans "strongly support" funding IWILL. Improving Iowa's horrific water quality has remained the number one priority during this time.
There are 86,000 Iowans who recognize themselves as farmers by profession. They comprise 3% of the state population, yet they control 86% of the state's 36 million acres of land. 31 million acres are devoted to row crops and CAFOS. The Iowa DNR is responsible for about 425,000 acres of land. Think about this, Iowa's public lands would fit into a 40 square-mile parcel for over 3 million people. Iowa ranks 48th in the country in the amount land owned by the state and federal government comprising 2% of our state's vast lands, a far cry from the 10% goal envisioned by our people and representatives 35 years ago.
To our north in Minnesota, the state enacted a very similar "Clean Water, Land and Legacy" Amendment to their constitution with a 57% majority vote in 2008. In 2009, the Legacy Amendment went into effect. Since that time over $2 Billion dollars have been raised by the 3/8th of a cent sales tax generating 3,300 water quality and recreational projects in every county in the state. Minnesota has also achieved the Iowa goal of 10% of their lands as public domain.
Iowans deserve the same chance to fund the trust and implement the Iowa Open Spaces vision before it is too late. It is estimated that Iowa's water quality disaster would cost over $4 Billion dollars alone to address. Instead, the Iowa House has attempted to curb the DNR's acquisition of lands for public use and a current Iowa Senate bill would remove from Iowa Code the visionary language of the Iowa Open Spaces Plan and the goal of transitioning 10% of our Iowa lands and waters into public domain and zero-out funding for nutrient load monitoring in our streams and rivers across the state. Without data Iowans are flying blind and have no idea if our waters are safe to use for drinking or recreation.
As a lifelong Iowan, and a resident of Okoboji for over 40 years, I feel honored to live in Dickinson County, an outlier in the state. Here we have implemented the vision of the Iowa Open Spaces Plan and IWILL. After decades of working together on conservation projects and collecting data, we know that we can improve water quality, protect our watershed, work with the agricultural community as a partner, build popular trails and add city, county and state parks in our area. Everyone loves the Iowa Great Lakes region, and we are the only rural county which is growing in the state with an outdoor recreational economy valued at $300 million a year.
I've written and spoken about the merits of the "Okoboji Model" for a couple decades and the value of exporting it to the other rural counties in the state. We have proven the IWILL concept works in Dickinson County. Agriculture is still thriving, and farm families are enjoying the expanded recreational opportunities. A "tragedy of the commons" is happening in real time in the rest of the state all because our elected officials are ignoring the will of the great people of Iowa. We deserve better.
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The separation of our politicians from the people they supposedly represent has been a disturbing trend for decades now. A number of them insulate themselves from contrary viewpoints and simply do not listen. Some have been so thoroughly bought out and made beholden to a party leader and party line that good governance is impossible in Iowa. This must stop, and it relies in part on an Iowa Democratic Party that will reform itself to listen and act on behalf of the people whom they represent.
Our two Republicans claim it's obsolete because they dealt with water quality in other ways!