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).