Second Funnel Week: Where SF 2458 and the Surcharge Stand

This week marks the second funnel week at the Iowa Capitol. The second funnel is one of the major legislative deadlines and is used to narrow down which bills remain eligible for the remainder of the session. By this point, most policy bills must have passed out of a committee in the opposite chamber to stay alive. Appropriations bills, Ways and Means bills, and Leadership bills are exempt, but everything else must clear this hurdle or it is done for the year. The funnel helps focus the Legislature on the bills with enough backing to keep moving and signals which issues still have momentum.

SSB 3008, now renumbered as SF 2458, cleared the Senate Local Government Committee on February 19 after being recommended for amendment and passage at the subcommittee level on February 11. It was then placed on the Senate calendar and referred to Ways and Means for further review. Because it is now a Ways and Means bill, it is exempt from the second funnel deadline. That means SF 2458 remains eligible for consideration even if it does not advance this week. However, being exempt from the funnel does not guarantee action. If Ways and Means does not pick it up, the bill can still stall and effectively run out of time.

The bill continues to include major changes to Iowa’s 911 governance structure. It shifts responsibilities from joint 911 service boards to local emergency management commissions, adds new planning and reporting mandates, creates limitations on the number of PSAPs within a county, and sets expectations for interoperability and criminal justice information compliance. These changes would significantly alter how 911 services are managed across the state and how local agencies plan for future system needs.

Our surcharge language, which did not advance as a standalone bill, has been added into SSB 3008 through an amendment. However, the version that exists in the bill today represents only a fraction of our original surcharge proposal. It keeps the surcharge issue present in the larger discussion, but it does not reflect the full policy approach we initially brought forward. As SF 2458 sits in Ways and Means during second funnel week, its future depends on whether the committee decides to take it up. We will continue to monitor the bill closely and keep stakeholders updated as discussions develop.