SIOUX CITY, Iowa (Iowa Media Wire) – After a weekend of late nights and early mornings, local lawmakers are coming off of a long session that covered many talked-about subjects, including area education agencies.
On March 27, Gov. Reynolds signed the AEA reform bill that gives financial control to school districts while also giving the Iowa Department of Education more power over the agencies.
“The AEA bill was just absolutely disrespectful to the professionals, and ultimately it just hurts the kids,” Iowa State Representative J.D. Scholten said. “Not one person – and we got probably like 5,000 emails altogether – not one person was for it. So that shows you that they’re not listening to the will of the people.”
However, other lawmakers said the AEA bill will continue to see changes.
“I don’t expect it’s going to make a dramatic amount of difference,” Iowa State Representative Bob Henderson said. “There may be more to be done like any organization or reorganization bill. When you put it into effect, you begin to see the things that need to be adjusted. So we’ll probably be working on it again next year.”
Another highly publicized bill that passed allowed school staff to carry a firearm if their school board allows it. The bill was met with feedback from parents over the safety of their children.
“I think a lot of people were misunderstanding and believing that we were simply opening up to allow any staff member to carry a weapon,” Henderson said. “No, the amount of training that goes into it would be very much like the amount of training a sheriff’s deputy takes, so it’s pretty restrictive.”
But the Democratic side believes there are better solutions to protect students.
“You add more to the equation and it doesn’t make things safer all the time,” Scholten said. “Do we have to find a solution to stop these school shootings? Absolutely, but I don’t necessarily believe that this was the only answer.”
Going forward, local representatives continue to have their eye on the people they represent.
“There’s a lot of different things I want to do, you know?” Scholten said. “Just helping working class people improve their lives.”
“I’m certainly satisfied with what we’ve done, but there’s more to be done,” Henderson said.