Fireworks sales have been legal in Iowa since June 1st. A businessman whose company has been selling consumer-grade fireworks in four neighboring states for years says the most popular sellers are called “cakes” — that’s because the effects are “layered.” Vince Bellino, of Omaha-based Bellino Enterprises, says “You have one fuse you light. Depending on the cake itself, the multi-effect item, you might have six to eight shots go up in the air. It’ll have an audio effect and it’ll also have a visual effect as well.”

His company has operated 130 fireworks stands in South Dakota, Kansas and Missouri. Just last month the company opened another 55 fireworks stands in Iowa. Bellino says they’re offering customers 200 different types of consumer-grade fireworks. “A smoke item to a novelty item to firecrackers to multi-effect items to fountains to single-shot tubes to artillery shells,” Bellino says.

Iowa’s new law calls for fireworks sales to end July 8th. There’ll be another fireworks sales period at the end of the year, but the fireworks may only be sold from permanent structures, NOT from tents or road-side stands.

(Radio Iowa)

The blue sky and silos on Iowa’s license plates may be giving way to a new design. Andrea Henry of the Iowa Department of Transportation says the agency is exploring some new options. She admits there are always lots of opinions what to put on the plates to best represent the state. “Obviously it’s difficult to encompass all that’s great about Iowa into one simple license plate design. What we do is, we are having our designers work on a variety of different designs and present those to the governor,” Henry says. “And if she is okay with that, then we plan to take that out to the public and have them vote on the ultimate final design.”

The state now has several different specialty plates that let you show your support for your favorite college team, or let everyone know you are a teacher or firefighter. But most Iowans still use the standard state plate. “We have four-point-four million license plates in the state of Iowa on all types of vehicles, and about four-point-two million of those are the standard issue plates,” according to Henry.

The current design for the plates was first used 20 years ago. There was a change in the order of the letters on the plates back in 2011. “That was an issue of having enough combination of numbers. And we also changed the color — that was a production issue — and it also makes it more visible from law enforcement to be able to ready those plates,” Henry says.

The letters went from a blue to a black color. Henry says they are hoping to finish the process this fall. She says they will meet soon with the governor to discuss some draft designs and then would have some finalized designs out for the public to vote on in mid August.

Henry says they’ll announce how the voting process works once they have the final design choices selected. New license plates are made by the prisoners at the Anamosa State Penitentiary.

(Radio Iowa)

The governor’s budget chief confirms the state has a budget dilemma for the fiscal year that ended last Friday, June 30th. Iowa Department of Management director Dave Roderer’s calculations indicate the state’s “cash receipts” for the past 12 months fell 76 million dollars BELOW projections. The state’s budget was based on those projections. The “books” on Fiscal Year 2017 won’t be officially closed until September, so some taxes that were due before by last Friday may be paid, plus some state agencies may have unspent funds. “So there’s still a lot of checking that needs to be done before we will know for certain how the fiscal year has ended,” Roederer says.

A Legislative Services Agency report released Monday indicated “total net receipts” over the past 12 months were 104 MILLION dollars below expectations. Roederer says his analysis is based on “cash receipts” and — for example — does not include estimates of any outstanding tax refunds the state must pay. Governor Kim Reynolds has the authority to withdraw 50 MILLION dollars from the state’s “Economic Emergency Fund” to help balance the state budget.

Roederer says Reynolds “could very well” be able to manage the problem on her own. HOWEVER, If the budget deficit winds up being LARGER than 50-million, she’ll have to call the legislature back into special session to withdraw more money from state savings. Democrats in the legislature say the situation shows Republican budget policy is “out of whack” because of too many tax “give-aways.”

(Radio Iowa)