- Professor James Olson recounted his and his wife's 30 year experience as CIA agents, including the trials of coming out from undercover to friends and family.
- Motivational speaker Chip Eichelberger explained that reevaluating your daily routine and taking care of yourself is just as important, if not more so, than taking care of your business. Getting "Switched On" involves working smarter, not harder, and success starts with how engaged you are and how well you respond to adversity.
- John Buhrmaster, ICBA's Immediate Past Chairman, updated attendees on ICBA's regulation policy efforts in Washington. He also outlined past successes and gave notice on future regulatory battles, such as the proposal to reduce Fed stock dividends paid to banks as part of a plan to fund the Highway Trust.
- Speaker Jeff Havens capped off general session events with his entertaining and educational presentation on understanding the differences between "Matures", "Baby Boomers", "Generation X", and "Generation Y" (commonly known as "millennials"). He showed that the older generations are not really as unbending as they seem, and the newest generations are not lazy or unengaged, merely isolated in a global world caused by the advent of the internet. Havens then suggested ways that the generations can meet each other halfway.
Many attendees have called CBI's 44th Annual Convention "the best conference with the best speakers in a long time". Were you with us in Okoboji last week? If you skipped it, here's what you missed:
ATM card skimming is on the rise in the nation, and hit home in Iowa last week. Two men have been charged with using skimmer devices to capture bank account information at three locations around Des Moines. A skimmer device fits over the ATM's card reader slot and has its own memory chip to record the information on the card as it is swiped. Skimmers secretly record bank account data when a user inserts an ATM card into the machine. Criminals then can encode the stolen data onto a blank card and use it to access the customer's bank account. Skimmers also come in different colors like the green one used in Des Moines, or in a grayish color that would look similar to an ATM, making it hard to tell it's fake. Original card readers are usually concave in shape (curving inward), while skimmers are more convex (curving outward). The use of keypad overlays placed directly on top of the factory-installed keypad is a relatively new technique that takes the place of a concealed camera. Instead of visually recording users punching in PINs, circuitry inside the phony keypad stores the actual keystrokes. View the gallery below for examples of skimmers and keypads being used to steal account info from ATMs: by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview / Major Events
The 2015 Session of the Iowa General Assembly ended late afternoon on Friday, June 5 (it was the 145th day of the session) when the Iowa Senate voted to concur with the House in passage of HCR 9, a concurrent resolution to provide for adjournment sine die. At 145 days, this session ran 35 days beyond the soft closing date of 110 days and, in recent memory, was eclipsed only by the June 30 end date in 2011 (the very last day of the fiscal year). Decisions Key to Adjournment - Two key decisions paved the way for final action in 2015: 1. School finance: the House and Senate agreed on a total spending amount for K-12 school spending. This had been at a stalemate since late January with Majority Republicans in the House standing firm for an increase of 1.25% and Majority Democrats in the Senate at 4.0% (though, they did offer to split the difference with the House and settle on 2.62%). The final decision was an increase in base spending on K-12 schools at 1.25% (the House-preferred number) with an additional $55 million in one-time spending on K-12 schools that brought the overall increase for the upcoming fiscal year to 2.62% (the Senate had offered a compromise of a 2.62% increase in the base, but settled on this combination of base and one-time money). by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview / Major Events
Week 19 of the Session: Week 3 of Overtime. This week the Iowa Senate did not act on any legislation, as Senate Democrats lacked a member of their caucus and did not possess the 26 votes necessary to pass any bill that would result on a party line vote (and all budget bills in the Senate this year have been adopted on party line votes). The House did convene on Wednesday for a full day of floor work – passing their version of the final piece of the budget (called the Standings bill) and also passing legislation that would legalize the sale and use of fireworks in Iowa, beginning December 1, 2015 (similar, but slightly more limited, to a bill that sits on the Senate calendar). It appears both the House and Senate will return to work on the Tuesday following Memorial Day. However, lacking an overall agreement on key budget issues, it is unlikely either Chamber will be working the entire week (there simply isn’t enough other work to do until the budget targets are successfully negotiated). As described previously there will be no run for adjournment until two key decisions are made. by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Week 18 of the Session: Week 2 of Overtime. The second week of overtime is now complete and most of the “progress” that was accomplished this week was procedural, rather than substantive.
The House and Senate continued work on major budget bills and moved virtually every budget to a conference committee status (meaning both sides are at impasse and each Chamber appoints five members to attempt resolution). Lacking an overall agreement on the total budget number, it is impossible to set the joint target numbers for each individual budget bill. Decisions Key to Adjournment Two key decisions must be made before the House and Senate can make a true run for adjournment: by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview/Major Events
Week 17 of the Session: Week 1 of Overtime. The 2015 Session of the Iowa General Assembly officially entered overtime this week, as today (May 7) is the 116th day of what was scheduled to be a 110-day regular session. What this means is the per-diem stipend legislators are paid to cover their expenses for being in Des Moines have ended and they are technically on their own to cover the cost of hotels and meals from here forward. While this is a soft approach to closing the session, it is nonetheless effective. View the Iowa Legislative Bill Tracker. Decisions Key to Adjournment Two key decisions must be made before the House and Senate can make a true run for adjournment: 1. School finance: the House and Senate must agree on a total spending amount for K-12 school spending. This has been at a stalemate since late January with Majority Republicans in the House standing firm for an increase of 1.25% and Majority Democrats in the Senate at 4.0% (though, they did offer to split the difference with the House and settle on 2.62%). There may have been some progress on the issue this week. It appears House Republicans may accept some additional spending on K-12, as long as it is one time expenditures, funded by one time money in the state’s ending balance. by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview / Major Events
Week 16 marks the unofficial end of session as the per diem paid to legislators runs out on the 110th day since it began back in January. When legislators return to Des Moines on Monday they will be doing so on their own dime. This will be the 4th of the last five years that legislators have worked overtime to conclude their business (perhaps it is a product of split control during that entire time period, with the House controlled by Republicans and the Senate by Democrats). While no budget accords were reached this week, each Chamber did begin the process of producing budget bills based on their wildly different budget targets (see last week’s update to review). At the very least this moves the process forward whereby many of the budget bills will find their way to a conference committee and be positioned for quick action once a negotiated budget settlement is produced. With the various players in the budget debate any where from $166 million to $188 million apart, this process likely has at least a few weeks to go until we see a possible end for the 2015 Session of the Iowa General Assembly. View the Iowa Legislative Bill Tracker. by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group While it might not appear to be major progress, all the players in the budget process have now released some form of a budget document that begins to spell out the differences between the bodies and branches regarding the FY16 budget. Last week Senate Democrats released their budget targets and this week House Republicans released their targets. (Governor Branstad released his entire line item budget recommendations in early January.)
Download the spreadsheet for the Iowa General Fund (the state has a number of other “funds”, such as the Road Use Tax Fund that funds our entire Department of Transportation and road building program). The General Fund represents a large share, but not all, of the state’s budget. The spreadsheet shows current year (FY15) anticipated expenditures for each budget category in the first column. The next three columns show the recommended amounts for each budget category for FY16 (which begins July 1 of this year) for the Governor, Senate and House, respectively. The last three columns show the projected growth (or reduction in the case of some House budget targets) for each budget category from FY15 to recommended FY16 levels. Governor Branstad’s recommendations are a 4.9% increase over FY15. Senate Democrats would grow spending by 5.2% and House Republicans would limit that growth to only 2.6%. Currently, Senate Democrats and Governor Branstad are recommending budget levels that are relatively the same. House Republicans, however, find themselves with budget targets that are $166 million lower than the Governor and $182 million lower than Senate Democrats. The spending gap between the House and Senate/Governor is significant and will not be easily resolved. For this reason, it is reasonable to expect the 2015 Session to extend well beyond the first of May. by CBI Lobbyist Jeff Boeyink - Senior Vice President, LS2 Group Overview/Major Events
Week 14 of the 2015 session of the Iowa General Assembly has concluded and this week Senate Democrats published their budget targets for the upcoming fiscal year (FY16) in an attempt to jump start work on the state budget. To date, neither Chamber has passed even one piece of budget legislation, as House Republicans and Senate Democrats remain deadlocked on school funding. That may change in the coming week as Iowa school districts are required by state law to certify their FY16 budgets by April 15 (yesterday) and many will opt to certify those budgets at either zero growth or at the 1.25% growth level favored by House Republicans and the Governor. In addition, April 15 was also the date by which the Iowa Senate either had to approve or reject all of the Governor Branstad’s appointments to the various state departments, boards and commissions. Senate Democrats Release Budget Targets: in 2014 the House Republicans and Senate Democrats were able to agree on joint budget targets relatively early in the legislative session and this resulted in speedy work on the state budget and adjournment in late April. This year is completely different. Lacking agreement with House Republicans, Senate Democrats released their targets on Tuesday (April 14), proposing to spend $16 million more than Governor Branstad – but offsetting that increase with $16 million in proposed savings from another round of early retirements. View the Iowa Legislative Bill Tracker. |
Community Banking NewsCurrent news, events, regulations and other information in banking, and at Community Bankers of Iowa. Stay Connected.
CBI Blog Archives
April 2024
Categories
All
|