It appears the state’s 40-year-old “bottle bill” will remain intact for another year. There was a hearing Tuesday morning on a House bill that would have repealed the law, but Republican Representative Guy Vander Linden of Oskaloosa made it clear the bill was going nowhere. “This bill is dead, but it was dead before we came in the room and I just wanted to make that absolutely clear, because even the proponents have what they think is a better idea,” Vander Linden said. “The purpose of the meeting was to get everybody in the room and, hopefully, clear the air a little bit and come to a better understanding.”

Consumers pay a nickel deposit on bottles and cans of beer, soft drinks and wine and they can get the deposits back by returning the empties. Grocery stores object to being forced to redeem the cans and bottles, arguing the empties are filthy and pose a health hazard. A bill to repeal the state’s bottle deposit law and expand recycling programs across the state is still pending in the Iowa Senate.

(Radio Iowa)

NEW HAMPTON, Iowa (AP) — A trial has been delayed again for a northeast Iowa man whose dead 4-month-old son was found in an infant swing, his body infested with maggots. The delay in the trial of Zachary Koehn was granted Tuesday. Lawyers for both sides wanted more time to prepare. The trial in New Hampton had been scheduled to begin March 28 after being delayed from a Jan. 3 start. The new date is June 11.

Koehn and the baby’s mother, Cheyanne Harris, have pleaded not guilty to murder and related charges in the death of their son, Sterling Koehn. Her trial starting date also is June 11. They’re having separate trials. Authorities say deputies and medics called to the couple’s Alta Vista apartment on Aug. 30 found Sterling dead in the swing.

Republicans in the Iowa House have approved a plan to address an expected deficit in the current year’s state budget. Cuts are necessary because of lower-than-expected state tax collections. Representative Pat Grassley, a Republican from New Hartford, guided the plan through House debate.”We’re not Washington, D.C. We don’t print money,” said Grassley, whose grandfather is U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley. “We have to have a balanced budget at the end of each year, so we have to go in and make decisions, which they’re tough decisions. There’s a lot of decisions in here that are extremely tough. We have to try to do the best we can with our priorities.”

More than 40 percent of the cuts will fall on the state university campuses in Ames and Iowa City. Administrators will be asked to cut nearly 11 million dollars from the University of Iowa and Iowa State University budgets. “Yes, our universities take it on the chin and they deal with it, but at what cost to the students?” That’s Representative Vicki Lensing, a Democrat from Iowa City. Representative Beth Wessel-Kroeschell, a Democrat from Ames, calls the cuts to the two public universities “simply irresponsible.” “We’re not going to stay top-of-the-line unless we invest in the universities,” she said. “Our students, our faculty and our staff can’t live on the bare bones.”

The University of Northern Iowa — the other state-supported university — will NOT be forced to make mid-year budget cuts. There are a little more than three months left in the current state budgeting year. Administrators in the Department of Human Services, the state’s prison system and the state’s court system also are being asked to make significant spending cuts. Senate Republican leaders have signaled they’ll support the plan House Republicans approved late Tuesday afternoon.

(Radio Iowa)

Former Texas Congressman Tom Delay — the former majority leader in the U.S. House of Representatives — was among the speakers at a hearing in the Iowa Capitol Tuesday night. Delay is now part of a coalition of 120 groups pressing for bills — like the one pending in the Iowa House — that would ban abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detected.  “I am very proud of Iowa taking the lead on passing a heartbeat bill because it is time,” Delay said. “Ladies and gentlemen, it has been 45 years…Something has to change.” Delay is an opponent of the 1973 Roe v Wade decision that legalized abortion and he told Iowa legislators public attitudes are changing because of what people can see on a sonogram. “It’s not a piece of flesh. It’s not a bug. It’s not a parasite,” Delay said. “It’s a little baby.”

Delay resigned from congress in 2005 shortly after being accused of campaign finance irregularities. He spoke briefly with Radio Iowa after the hearing, suggesting his travels to Iowa and other states are a bit of penance for inaction during his 15 years in congress.  “I regretted all this time that I was in congress and, frankly, had the strength of power, that I didn’t get rid of abortion,” said Delay. Planned Parenthood of the Heartland C-E-O Suzanna de Baca testified immediately after Delay.  “We are once again being forced to plea for women’s basic reproductive rights,” de Baca said. “How insulting for women who remember what life was like before Roe v. Wade.”

According to de Baca, before 1973 — one in six deaths among pregnant women “were the result of an illegal abortion.” “If you advance this legislation, Iowa will be dragged back into the back alley days,” de Baca said. De Baca and others were cheered by a large contingent gathered outside the hearing room, watching the hearing on a large monitor. Dr. Amy Bingaman, an obstetrician and gynecologist in Des Moines, called the six-week abortion ban an attempt insert politics into the practice of medicine. “I am fighting for my patients, your wives, your sisters, your children,” she said.

The Iowa Senate passed a six-week abortion ban at the end of February. A similar ban attached to another abortion-related proposal and is now eligible for debate in the full House.

(Radio Iowa)