(Des Moines, IA) -- Iowa's cap on county attorney salaries could be stricken. As it stands, counties with a population of less than 200,000 can't pay their attorneys more than district court judges. Additionally, they can't pay assistant county attorneys more than 85% of their judicial counterparts' salary. According to the Secretary of State's office, that applies to 97 of the state's 99 counties.
House File 37 would change that, and it passed a subcommittee meeting on Thursday. would change that, and it passed a subcommittee meeting Thursday afternoon. Ian McConeghey spoke on behalf of the Iowa County Attorneys Association in that meeting, and he says the cap leads to struggles to retain staff in rural areas.
"Story County is having a heck of a time keeping assistants on staff right now because they can come down to Des Moines," McConeghey says. "It's a short commute and they can make a lot more money than Story County is legally allowed to pay them."
In Wednesday's State of the Judiciary address, Iowa Supreme Court Justice Susan Christensen asked for a pay raise for district court judges. Judicial representatives at Thursday's meeting said they aren't opposed to the raises, but a raise for those judges would result in a raise for the county attorneys.
Caitlin Jarzen spoke on the Judiciary's behalf.
"Why not deal with the root issue?" Jarzen says. "Because judges weren't seeing pay increases year after year after year, county attorneys couldn't either."
The bill passed through the subcommittee and is returned to the House's Local Government Committee for review.