State Sen. Ken Rozenboom of District 19 knew almost a year ago that Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds was going to take a hard look at the structure of Area Education Agencies, but the chairman of the Senate Education Committee had hoped he would have been given an advanced copy of the bill prior to its announcement.
“I will tell you I had hoped to have a sneak preview of the governor’s proposal before she went public with it,” he said. “I did not have it. Those of you who watched her Condition of the State address 13 days ago saw it just as quickly as I did. The next morning, the bill, all 123 pages of it, was on my desk.”
While giving a legislative update with House Rep. Jon Dunwell at the Newton school board meeting on Jan. 22, Rozenboom held up a thick, black folder.
“I knew almost a year ago that the governor was going to look at the AEA structure, and because I knew that I started about four months ago visiting with superintendents and school boards and teachers and parents, and this notebook is kind of my own research,” he said, displaying the notebook in one hand.