The Sioux City Council on Monday will likely reverse policies surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion, in order to keep getting federal funding.
The council meeting will take place at 4 p.m. at City Hall.
The council members will consider a proposal to dissolve a 12-member Inclusive Sioux City Advisory Committee formed in 2020 and to reclassify the city’s diversity and inclusion coordinator position.
Officials say making those changes will maintain Sioux City’s eligibility for federal transportation funding.
The Trump administration said states and other grant recipients could lose funding if they fail to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement or if they don’t halt DEI programs. The latest piece regarding that came to the city in a letter on April 24.
The Sioux City Council will also consider rescinding a prior resolution adopting an affirmative action program.
*Additionally, Iowa’s legislative session has moved into overtime, and it is the budget fight that’s keeping the session from ending.
The session was supposed to end on May 2.
It’s not clear how many lawmakers will return to the state capitol this week. Statehouse leaders sometimes have rank-and-file members stay home until they make progress on a budget deal. Lawmakers will no longer get per diem payment to cover their expenses for traveling to Des Moines.
House Republicans have proposed spending $36 million more on state services than Senate Republicans and the governor.
Governor Kim Reynolds has made multiple media appearances, saying the House Republican budget plan isn’t fiscally responsible.
House Speaker Pat Grassley says one of the big sticking points is the whether to approve $14 million for a pay bump for paraeducators. The legislature approved that amount last year.
Grassley is urging the Senate and governor to support it again, because either local school districts will have to find money for paraeducators or those workers will see that pay raise go away.
*In other news, the trade war with China and the possibility of retaliatory tariffs from more countries is weighing on the minds of many farmers and producers.
Chad Hart is an Iowa State University Extension economist.
“Everybody's been watching, trying to read the tea leaves to see, you know, what impacts the tariffs are having. And I would argue it's a mixed bag right now,” Hart said.
Hart says corn exports have been up despite the tariff chatter.
But countries have pulled back purchases of U.S. pork since January.
Weekly export sales for pork recently hit a marketing year low, in part because China cancelled shipments of 12,000 metric tons in early April.
Hart says the majority of soybean export sales have already been made and delivered for the current marketing year, which ends in August.
The US-China trade war could have a much greater impact on the soybean industry if retaliatory tariffs are still in place this fall.
Tariffs and prices are on the minds of average American consumers, but also employers and manufacturers. A new economic report says it's a mixed bag for the Midwest.
The Mid-America Business Conditions Index declined due to lost jobs and wholesale price rises, however growth remained neutral overall.
Creighton University economics professor Ernie Goss compiles the monthly report. Goss said there’s the one policy that’s to blame for the current state of economic worry is “the uncertainty surrounding tariffs.”
On Monday, the White House communications office sent out an email, stating that the tariffs this year are helping some manufacturing businesses.
