DES MOINES, Iowa — Iowa Senate Republicans passed the caucus’ proposed 2% increase to public school funding for FY 2026 earlier this week; and to end the fourth week of the session House Republicans cleared a 2.25% increase through the chamber.

In a vote down party lines, the bill passed 58 to 35. Outside of the 2.25% state supplemental aid (SSA) increase and the second phase of teacher salary increases, the House Republican bill includes millions for increasing school transportation, operational sharing budget and a one time SSA of $22.6 million to account for inflationary costs.

“I think different school districts have different demands that are needed upon them. That’s why we looked at things like operational sharing. What are some things that we hear back in our districts? Schools want to be able to have flexibility to share staff, that’s why we put it in the bill, we didn’t just focus on SSA,” said Speaker of the Iowa House Pat Grassley (R) District 57, from New Hartford. “… That’s why we built the proposal the way we did, so we’d have different impacts to different needs within the state.”

The bill is now kicked back over to the Iowa Senate chamber as leadership in the Iowa Republican party will need to come to an agreement on a final proposal to send to the governor.

House Democrats proposed a 5% increase in SSA in an amendment, but that failed in a floor vote. Many state representatives in the party spoke about their concerns of the 2.25% increase.

“Our menu of services is reducing due to the lack of funding to maintain our current programming and services,” said State Representative Elinor Levin (D), District 89 from Iowa City.

“Now we’re directly responsible for raising property taxes for over half of Iowans across the state,” said State Representative Larry McBurney (D) District 44 from Urbandale.

“The cost keeps going up and we’re getting behind. Good teachers are leaving the profession because they keep getting asked to do more with less,” said House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst (D) District 32 from Windsor Heights.

Democrats discussed a lot about how school districts in their district would be forced to increase the tax levy, raising property taxes if 2.25% is the final proposal.

House Republicans consider the proposal an increase of 3.9% year-to-year with the extra provisions added on.

Leadership in both chambers will have to come to an agreement with both Republican proposals clearing the Iowa House and Senate floor. Gov. Reynolds’ proposal for SSA funding was a 2% increase she announced in her Condition of the State speech.

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