The legislative session for 2025 began on January 13th. For me, this has become a familiar event, but for the newly elected legislators, it marks a change of lifestyle for the next 110 days. I look forward to the fresh ideas that come from new members of the Senate and helping them become a part of the team working to make Iowa a great place to live with righteous laws.
The Governor sets the tone for the session with her annual Condition of the State speech, which she delivered on Tuesday evening. Governor Reynolds began her speech by telling us Iowa is the number one state in the nation for retirement, millennial home ownership, and is ranked number one for the third consecutive year for fiscal responsibility. Iowa ranks high in many other important metrics like being second in cost of living, third for opportunity, and fourth for health care and educational choice nationwide.
Because of tax cuts over the past several years, Iowa is making significant strides to become one of the most prosperous states in the country. As Governor Reynolds put it, “Iowa is a state with endless opportunity, and timeless charm.” There is much left to do, but Iowa stands as a beacon of freedom and opportunity for Iowans to enjoy and for the world to see.
I saw signs of this leadership in opportunity as I knocked doors during my election campaign this summer. I met people who moved to Iowa from California, Hawaii, Minnesota, Maine and West Virginia because of our policies. Just the week before the session, I met a recent graduate from Iowa State University who came to Iowa from Illinois because Covid had eliminated his opportunity for in-person education there. He liked what he found in Iowa so much he decided to stay.
Education is always key to the future of any society and I am dismayed at the decline in educational achievement test scores since 1963. It is not surprising that the 1960s marked the time when we banned prayer and the Bible from our schools. Since then, not only has our school achievement declined, but the moral core of our society has collapsed.
I am promoting two things that I hope will help reverse that trend. The first is including an elective in our public schools to teach the Bible as it relates to social studies. American history and its government were based on Biblical principles, and we cannot understand our current system unless we know what it is based on.
The second is promoting release time during school hours when a student may go off campus for an hour to receive religious instruction. Current law allows for this and there is a great organization called LifeWise that has produced a curriculum and an easily reproduced system to organize release time in any school. Two LifeWise programs are operating in Iowa now, and six more programs are organizing in our state. If you would like to get involved, go to lifewise.org to find out more. You can even search for your local school district and sign a petition to start a local chapter.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge;
Fools despise wisdom and instruction
Proverbs 1:7
