Proposed legislationwater and agThe agenda

STREAM Act

Stewardship That Rewards Every Acre Managed

An Act relating to water quality, including nutrient management stewardship payments, nutrient management plans for large farming operations, manure management plan field records, conservation equipment loans, conservation conditions on state conservation assistance, wetlands, water quality monitoring, and the siting of confinement feeding operations, making appropriations, providing penalties, and including effective date and applicability provisions.

Page one

The short version

What's broken, what the bill does, and what it costs, in plain English. If you read one thing, read this.

Protecting our water starts by ensuring conservation makes financial sense for family farms. Farmers are the stewards of our land, and keeping that heritage viable protects resources for the next generation.

The state should reward farmers who are doing things the right way. The STREAM Act (Stewardship That Rewards Every Acre Managed) does that. Farmers told me what my first draft got wrong, so I rewrote it.

A payment worth signing up for. You get $20 an acre a year, on up to 150 acres, for keeping all your ground under a real nutrient management plan: a written plan for how much fertilizer and manure goes on and when, checked by your local conservation district. Pasture counts too, under a grazing plan. It's a check, not a tax credit, so there's no tax return to wait on. Two-page application, sign up any time for the next crop year, and the district can help with a short-form plan.

The biggest operations keep a plan, money or no money. Starting in 2029, every operation farming 1,000 acres or more keeps all its ground under a nutrient plan. In the last farm census, 7,351 Iowa farms were that big, with about half of the farmland. The state doesn't pick their crop or practice, and they don't get the payment.

Check the manure plans. Manure plans get filed electronically, every field mapped, and the state flags fields claimed twice.

Zero-percent financing for modern equipment. Up to $150,000 at no interest for conservation equipment like no-till planters.

Invest in our wetlands. $10 million a year for wetlands that catch tile water and runoff, starting above lakes that supply drinking water.

Counties decide where new factory farms go. Until a county adopts siting rules or votes not to, the state holds off on new confinement permits there. The pause ends statewide July 1, 2029. Cattle on pasture aren't covered.

Take the state's money, do the practice. Take a payment, a loan or state cost-share, and you keep that ground under a nutrient plan as long as the deal runs, up to twenty years. Federal farm payments aren't touched.

What it costs. $37.6 million to $88.0 million a year once payments start, if sign-ups match the farms already planting cover crops or farming no-till. More cost more. The first year costs $30.6 million, mostly the $20 million loan fund, which farmers repay.

How we'll know it worked. The state posts enrolled acres by county every year, and the bill puts $600,000 a year into the university's stream sensors. If the acres go up and the readings don't come down, we'll say so.

Our farmers don't want another handout. They just want a fair shake.

That's the whole bill in brief. The rest of this page is the detail behind it, for anyone who wants to dig in.

See where it goes

Where state conservation money goes, today and under this bill

How to read this Money starts on the left and flows right along the streams; the moving dots show which way. A thicker stream carries more. Point at or tap a box or a stream to see the amounts.

Today's lines are the fiscal year that began in July of this year, from the enacted farm and natural resources budget. The bill leaves them alone and adds the rest. The loan money is paid once, in the bill's first budget year. Under the Pay As You Go Act's scorecard, it is the only part sure to be paid that year. The wetlands and sensor money waits until the bill's second budget year at the earliest. The stewardship payments also start in the second budget year. The loan stream and the payment stream never land in the same year. Don't add them together. The payments are a range because nobody knows how many farms will enroll, and each end is the most it could cost at that enrollment.

The same numbers, side by side

Already in the budget
New each year
One time only

Today

Cost-share and district supportState of Iowa to Soil and water conservation, including cost-share
$8,325,000
WetlandsState of Iowa to Wetlands built under CREP
$1 million
Monitoring, continuous only if DNR choosesState of Iowa to Monitoring grants at DNR's discretion
$300,000

Under this bill

Cost-share, unchangedState of Iowa to Soil and water conservation, including cost-share
$8,325,000
Wetlands, unchangedState of Iowa to Wetlands built under CREP
$1 million
Monitoring grants, unchangedState of Iowa to Monitoring grants at DNR's discretion
$300,000
Depends on how many farms sign upState of Iowa to Stewardship payments to smaller farms with a nutrient plan
$27.0 million to $77.4 million
New wetlands money each yearState of Iowa to Water quality wetlands
$10 million
Set aside for continuous sensorsState of Iowa to University water sensors
$600,000
Paid once in the first budget year, then repaid into the fundState of Iowa to Zero-interest equipment loans
$20 million

The analysis

What it costs, and what we don't know yet

For anyone who wants the costs and the tradeoffs. Every figure is a range where the future is uncertain, and every one links back to where it came from.

The math

What it costs and who pays

Already in the budget

Cost-share, unchanged
$8,325,000
Wetlands, unchanged
$1 million
Monitoring grants, unchanged
$300,000

New each year

Depends on how many farms sign up
$27.0 million to $77.4 million
New wetlands money each year
$10 million
Set aside for continuous sensors
$600,000

One time only

Paid once in the first budget year, then repaid into the fund
$20 million

Under this bill, stream by stream. Each bar starts at zero, and they all share one scale. A pale band is a range; the analysis below says how it was built.

About $37.6 million to $88.0 million a year from the general fund once the stewardship payments are running, if as many farms sign up as already plant cover crops or farm some ground no-till. More farms would cost more. The payments start with the 2028 crop year and go out after the district checks that year's records, by March 31, 2029, so the first state budget year they reach begins July 1, 2028. The bill's first budget year comes before that, from July 1, 2027, through June 30, 2028, and costs $30.6 million: $20 million once to start the loan fund, which farmers repay, plus $10 million for wetlands and $600,000 for the sensors. No stewardship payment goes out that year. The bill doesn't raise a tax to pay for it. Clean water belongs near the front of that line. Under the Pay As You Go Act's scorecard, only the loan fund is sure to be paid that first year, because it is one-time and the scorecard pays it from one-time money. The wetlands and sensor money waits until July 2028, at the earliest, along with every yearly part after it, and is paid from the data center payments that bill sets aside for them, which first arrive in January 2029, or from voucher savings left over after the three education bills.

The pieces:

The stewardship payments: $27.0 million to $77.4 million a year at those levels of sign-up. Each farm under 1,000 acres can get up to $3,000 a year, $20 an acre on up to 150 acres. So the cost turns on how many farms sign up, not how many acres. We don't know that number, so we bracket it by two things Iowa farmers already do on their own. The low end assumes as many farms enroll as planted cover crops in the last Census of Agriculture, 8,994. The high end assumes as many as farmed some ground no-till, 25,796. Each end assumes every one of those farms gets the full $3,000, so each is the most it could cost at that many farms. Farms smaller than 150 acres get less, and the biggest operations get nothing, so at those levels of sign-up the real cost would come in under these numbers. Nothing in the bill caps how many farms can sign up. If the money falls short in a year, the scorecard trims it and every payment shrinks by the same percentage. It's a payment, not a tax credit, so it doesn't run through a tax return, and a farmer with a thin year gets the same check as anyone else.
Wetlands: $10 million a year, a set amount, not a range.
The university's water sensors: $600,000 a year, the same amount House Democrats proposed in House File 2733.
The loan fund: $20 million once. Farmers pay it back into the fund, so it can lend again. What the state gives up is the interest those dollars would otherwise earn, which we haven't estimated. What farmers save is easier to see. Measured against the Farm Service Agency's direct operating loan rate, which ran from 4.625 percent in January to 5.25 percent in September of this year, zero-interest loans from the fund save borrowers $0.6 million to $1.0 million a year. FSA's direct loans are among the cheapest farm credit there is, so a farmer who would otherwise borrow from a bank saves more.
The plan requirement for large operations costs the state the district staff time to take in, review and report the plans of 7,351 or so operations every year. We haven't estimated that, and the bill doesn't put new money into the districts for it. It costs those operations the time or fee for a plan, which some already pay for. Penalties, if any, go to wetlands.
The manure plan field check costs the Department of Natural Resources the work of building the field record and map. Plans already list where manure goes, and section 459.302 already tells the department to process them electronically as far as it can, but we haven't estimated the cost.
The permit pause and county siting cost the state next to nothing. Counties that adopt siting rules take on the work of hearings and decisions. We haven't estimated that.
The conservation condition costs the state nothing. It costs a farmer who takes state conservation help the time and fee for a written plan, which we haven't estimated either. It reaches state cost-share under the soil and water conservation chapter, which would include the pasture fence and water cost-share in our farm bill, the FAIR Act, and water quality initiative payments. Payments to build or restore a wetland are left out, because the wetland is itself the practice and its easement can run far longer than a plan makes sense for.

How the ranges were built: our model, published with the bill, reads the bill's own amounts. The payment range is the most one farm can get times each of the two farm counts, so you can check it by hand, and the yearly total adds the wetlands and sensor money to each end. For the loan savings, the model draws the share of the loan fund out on loan (sixty to one hundred percent) and the rate a borrower would otherwise pay, and reports the middle ninety percent of its runs from a fixed seed. Anyone can re-run it and get the same answer. The farm counts and farm sizes come from USDA's latest Census of Agriculture for Iowa, the loan rates from FSA's monthly announcements.

Open questions

What we don't know yet

We can't say how much cleaner the water gets. A per-acre payment pays for a plan and the records to back it, not for a measured drop in nitrate at the nearest stream. That's why the bill funds the sensors and makes the state post enrolled acres by county. If the acres go up and the readings don't come down, that's a finding, and I'll report it.

We can't say how many farms would enroll. The range above is a bracket built on what farmers already do, not a forecast.

We can't say how many of the largest operations already keep a nutrient plan on every acre. For those that do, the requirement costs little. For the rest, it's new paperwork, and the bill gives them until the 2029 crop year to get it done.

We can't say how many construction permits the pause would hold up, or in which counties. I haven't pulled the Department of Natural Resources' permit records for this bill.

I don't claim that nitrate in drinking water causes cancer in Iowa. Researchers disagree, and the state is paying for a study of why Iowa's cancer numbers look the way they do. This bill doesn't rest on the answer. It rests on farmers being paid for work that keeps soil and fertilizer on the field.

Who gives something up

The tradeoffs

Iowa's rivers aren't the worst in the country by the federal measure that compares states fairly. In EPA's assessment records, 72.6 percent of Iowa's assessed river and stream miles are impaired, against 60.4 percent nationally. That ranks Iowa 30th of 51, counting the fifty states and DC, where first has the smallest share impaired. That's worse than the national figure and still the middle of the pack. Middle of the pack isn't good enough for a state that lives off its soil and water. The state should pay for the conservation work farmers do, then check the water to see whether it's working.

Farmers already do a lot of this on their own, and some of the payments would go to them for work they're already doing. In the last Census of Agriculture, 8,994 Iowa farms planted cover crops, 25,796 farmed some ground no-till, and 27,915 of Iowa's 86,911 farms used precision agriculture. The state already takes $5 an acre off what a farmer pays for crop insurance on fall-planted cover crops, with no acreage cap. It already makes no-interest loans of up to $20,000 for permanent conservation practices under section 161A.71, and the State Revolving Fund lends for practices like terraces and waterways at no more than 3 percent. This bill adds equipment and a reward for a nutrient plan. It doesn't invent the idea. Paying the farmers who got there first is the right call. The state should reward farmers who are doing things the right way, not only the ones who start after the money shows up.

My first draft paid the same amount per acre as House File 2733, as an income tax credit on every enrolled acre, with no limit. Farmers told me plainly what was wrong with that. It doesn't cover the seed, let alone the paperwork. It was refundable, but it still ran through a tax return, and most farm tax credits do little for a young farmer with interest and depreciation to write off. And a flat per-acre reward pays the biggest operations the most. So the payment is now bigger per acre, capped per farm, paid as a check, and closed to the largest operations, which are required to keep a plan instead.

The line at 1,000 acres is a judgment call. In the last Census of Agriculture, 7,351 of Iowa's 86,911 farms had 1,000 acres or more, and together they had about half of the state's farmland. A requirement on them reaches about half the farmland while leaving most farm families alone. Any line has a cliff. A farm just under it can get paid, and a farm just over it has to keep a plan and gets no payment. Land farmed by a person, a spouse, a parent, child or sibling who shares equipment, labor or management, and the businesses any of them control counts as one operation, and the state writes rules against splitting a farm to get under the line. A son or daughter farming on their own, with their own equipment, is their own operation. Rules like that are never airtight, and some splitting will be tried. Some large operators will say the state is telling them how to farm. It isn't picking their practices. It's asking the farms that work about half of Iowa's farmland to write down how they'll handle nutrients and stick to it.

The Legislature did act on water this year. House File 2771, the farm and natural resources budget signed in June, includes $8,325,000 for soil and water conservation, including cost-share, $1 million for wetlands under the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, and $300,000 for water quality monitoring grants at the Department of Natural Resources, with continuous monitoring left to the department's discretion. In 2018 the Legislature passed Senate File 512, which created a water quality infrastructure fund and cost-share programs for conservation work on farm and city land. That money should stay. The STREAM Act keeps all of it and adds to it: a capped per-acre payment, equipment loans, new wetlands money each year and money set aside for the university's continuous sensors.

Others filed pieces of this first. House File 2733, the House Democrats' Iowa Healthy Water Act, proposed a $5-an-acre property tax credit for landowners, on land the state certifies after its own review of nutrient loads, and no-interest Department of Natural Resources loans and grants for conservation facilities or structures. This bill works differently: it pays a capped yearly amount to whoever carries out the plan, owner or renter, with the local district checking the plan and records, and its loans are for equipment. Representative Turek's House File 2732 proposed tax credits for cover crops and edge-of-field practices. Senate File 2260 proposed the county siting power this bill gives. Earlier bills, House File 2127 in 2020, and Senate File 124 in 2023, would have stopped new confinement permits outright. This bill's pause is narrower: it ends in a county as soon as that county decides, and everywhere on July 1, 2029. Good ideas should pass no matter whose name is on them. The STREAM Act picks up the per-acre reward and county siting ideas, and adds loans for equipment and a plan requirement for the largest operations.

The pause will cost some producers. A young farmer who planned to put up a hog building in a county that hasn't acted would have to wait. It reaches only confinement buildings that need a state construction permit under section 459.303: generally operations of 1,000 animal units or more, and an operation of any size that builds an earthen manure basin or lagoon. Confinement means totally roofed under section 459.102, so open feedlots and cattle on pasture aren't confinement feeding operations, and a cow-calf herd isn't touched. That wait is the price of giving counties a real say. The way to keep it short is for supervisors to take it up early: once a county adopts siting rules or votes not to, and files that with the state, the pause ends there. It ends everywhere on July 1, 2029 no matter what.

Some farmers under 1,000 acres will skip the state's conservation money rather than write a nutrient plan. The commitment can be long: for a permanent practice like a terrace, the plan requirement lasts as long as the owner agreed to keep the practice in place, and current law already lets that agreement run up to twenty years under section 161A.7. The bill caps the plan requirement at twenty years. That shrinks both the cost and the reach of the bill, and it's their call to make. Conservation money with nothing asked in return is how you get a handout instead of results. The bill requires a two-page application, sign-up any time of year for the next crop year and a short-form plan the district can help with, so the plan isn't what keeps a farmer from taking the help.

A court could also be asked whether county siting belongs in a water bill. Iowa's constitution allows one subject per bill. I think where large confinement operations go is part of water quality, since the state regulates them through their manure, but that part can be split into its own bill if that's the safer course. Either way, counties should get that say. The only question is which bill carries it.

The draft text

The draft bill language

For legislators, reporters and anyone who wants the legal wording. This is our draft, written the way Iowa bills are written, so you can see exactly what we mean. If I'm elected, the Legislature's nonpartisan drafting office, the Legislative Services Agency, writes the version that gets filed, and the wording will change. Page one and the costs above are the commitment.

Read the draft bill language

Proposed legislation

A BILL FOR

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF IOWA:

Section 1. NEW SECTION. Nutrient management stewardship payments. This section joins chapter 466B.

1. For purposes of this section, unless the context otherwise requires:
a. “Certified nutrient management plan” means a written plan for the rate, source, timing, and placement of commercial fertilizer, manure, and other nutrients applied to agricultural land, that meets the nutrient management conservation practice standard of the natural resources conservation service of the United States department of agriculture in effect for this state, that is prepared or approved by a person qualified under rules adopted by the division, and that is reviewed and updated at least once each year. For pastureland, “certified nutrient management plan” includes a written grazing plan that meets the prescribed grazing conservation practice standard of the natural resources conservation service in effect for this state.
b. “Crop year” means a calendar year.
c. “Division” means the division of soil conservation and water quality of the department of agriculture and land stewardship.
d. “Eligible operation” means an operation that farms less than 1,000 acres of cropland and pastureland in this state in the crop year.
e. “Eligible person” means the person who carries out the certified nutrient management plan for an eligible operation, whether that person is the owner or the operator of the land.
f. “Enrolled acre” means an acre of cropland or pastureland in this state farmed by an eligible operation that is managed under a certified nutrient management plan for all of a crop year, and that the soil and water conservation district in which the acre is located has verified as provided in subsection 4.
g. “Operation” means all agricultural land in this state farmed in a crop year by a person; by the person’s spouse; by the person’s parent, child, or sibling who shares equipment, labor, or management with the person; and by any partnership, limited liability company, corporation, trust, or other entity that any of them, alone or together, controls. A person controls an entity if the person holds fifty percent or more of the ownership interest in the entity or has the power to direct its management. All agricultural land farmed by entities under common control is part of one operation. If an acre would be part of more than one operation, it is part of the largest of them only. The division shall adopt rules to treat as one operation agricultural land that is divided among persons or entities in order to qualify for a payment or to avoid the requirements for large operations.
2. The division shall pay an eligible person a nutrient management stewardship payment of $20 for each enrolled acre, for not more than 150 acres for each eligible operation in each crop year. A payment shall be made only if the eligible operation’s certified nutrient management plan covers all of the cropland and pastureland the operation farms in this state in the crop year. Only one payment shall be made for the same acre for the same crop year. Payments shall be made only for crop years through the crop year beginning January 1, 2037. If the moneys available for payments in a fiscal year, after any reduction under the pay-as-you-go scorecard, are less than the payments due, the division shall reduce each payment by the same percentage.
3. The division shall adopt a single application form for the payment that is not more than two pages in length. A soil and water conservation district shall accept applications at any time of year. The division shall adopt by rule a short-form certified nutrient management plan for eligible operations that meets the standard in subsection 1, paragraph “a”, and that an eligible person may complete with the assistance of the soil and water conservation district.
4. An eligible person shall submit the certified nutrient management plan, and a record of the nutrients applied under it during the crop year, to the soil and water conservation district in which the acres are located not later than January 31 following the crop year. The district shall verify that the acres were managed under the plan and shall certify the number of enrolled acres to the division. The division shall make the payment not later than March 31 following the crop year. The division may review any plan, record, or certification.
5. The division shall not require an eligible person, as a condition of the payment, to plant any particular crop, to follow any particular rotation or tillage system, or to establish any practice other than managing nutrients according to the eligible person’s own certified nutrient management plan.
6. Receiving the payment does not make an acre ineligible for any other state or federal conservation payment, cost-share, or premium discount.
7. If the division determines that a payment was made for an acre that was not managed under a certified nutrient management plan, the division shall recover the payment for that acre from the eligible person.
8. Chapter 22 shall not apply to an individual plan or record submitted under this section. The division shall publish on its internet site, not later than June 30 of each year, the number of eligible operations paid, the number of enrolled acres, and the total payments, by county, for the previous crop year.
9. For each fiscal year beginning on or after July 1, 2028, there is appropriated from the general fund of the state to the department of agriculture and land stewardship the amount necessary to make the payments under this section.
10. The division shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to administer this section.
11. Subsections 2 through 6, 8, and 9 of this section are repealed July 1, 2038. Subsections 1 and 10, and subsection 7 as it applies to payments made before that date, remain in effect.

Sec. 2. NEW SECTION. Conservation equipment revolving loan fund. This section joins chapter 161A.

1. For purposes of this section, unless the context otherwise requires:
a. “Division” means the division of soil conservation and water quality of the department of agriculture and land stewardship.
b. “Eligible borrower” means a person who farms agricultural land in this state.
c. “Eligible equipment” means new or used equipment that the division determines by rule reduces soil erosion or nutrient loss from agricultural land in this state, including but not limited to no-till and strip-till planters and drills; equipment for seeding cover crops; equipment that applies commercial fertilizer or manure at variable rates guided by soil testing and satellite positioning, including by injection; guidance and section-control systems that prevent overlapping applications; and equipment used to establish or maintain soil and water conservation practices as defined in section 161A.42.
2. A conservation equipment revolving loan fund is created in the state treasury under the control of the division. The fund consists of moneys appropriated by the general assembly, repayments of loans made from the fund, and any other moneys available to and obtained or accepted by the division for placement in the fund. Moneys in the fund are appropriated to the division to make loans under this section.
3. The division may make a loan from the fund to an eligible borrower for the purchase of eligible equipment. Each loan shall bear no interest, shall be for a period not to exceed seven years, and shall be repayable to the fund in equal yearly installments. An eligible borrower shall not have more than $150,000 in loans outstanding at any time under this section. The interest rate upon a loan for which payment is delinquent shall accelerate immediately to the current legal usury limit. A loan shall come due for payment upon the sale of the equipment purchased with it.
4. The division may contract with soil and water conservation districts and financial institutions to take applications for and service loans made under this section.
5. Notwithstanding section 8.33, moneys in the fund that remain unencumbered or unobligated at the close of each fiscal year shall not revert but shall remain available for expenditure. Interest or earnings on moneys in the fund shall be credited to the fund.
6. The division shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to implement and administer this section.

Sec. 3. NEW SECTION. State conservation assistance —— conservation conditions. This section joins chapter 161A.

1. For purposes of this section, unless the context otherwise requires:
a. “Certified nutrient management plan” means the same as defined in the section of chapter 466B enacted by this Act that provides for nutrient management stewardship payments.
b. “State conservation assistance” means any of the following, when received on or after July 1, 2028:
(1) A nutrient management stewardship payment.
(2) A loan from the conservation equipment revolving loan fund.
(3) Cost-share moneys or other financial incentives allocated under section 161A.73, under any other section of chapter 161A other than a loan described in subparagraph (2) or a loan under section 161A.71, or under the water quality initiative administered pursuant to chapter 466B.
c. “State conservation assistance” does not include moneys provided for the restoration or construction of a wetland, including moneys from the water quality wetlands fund created in the section of chapter 466B enacted by this Act that establishes that fund, and moneys provided under section 466B.43 for a wetland.
2. A person who receives state conservation assistance shall manage the agricultural land for which the assistance is received under a certified nutrient management plan, for the following period:
a. For a stewardship payment, the crop year for which the payment is made.
b. For a loan, the term of the loan.
c. For cost-share moneys or other financial incentives, the period for which the person is required to maintain the practice under the agreement for the assistance, but not longer than twenty years after the assistance is received.
3. This section applies only because of assistance provided by this state. It does not attach any condition to any payment, loan, or program of the United States, including federal moneys combined with state moneys for the same practice.
4. This section does not require a person who receives no state conservation assistance to establish any practice or to adopt a nutrient management plan. This subsection does not limit the section of chapter 466B enacted by this Act that provides for nutrient management plans for large operations.
5. The division of soil conservation and water quality of the department of agriculture and land stewardship shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to administer this section, including a reasonable period for a person to come into compliance and the recovery of assistance from a person who does not comply.

Sec. 4. NEW SECTION. Water quality wetlands fund. This section joins chapter 466B.

A water quality wetlands fund is created in the state treasury under the control of the division of soil conservation and water quality of the department of agriculture and land stewardship. Moneys in the fund are appropriated to the division for the purposes of this section.
The division shall use moneys in the fund to provide financial incentives, including cost-share payments, easement payments, and technical assistance, to persons who restore or construct wetlands that intercept tile drainage water or surface runoff in order to reduce nutrient loss and trap sediment, consistent with the practices described in the Iowa nutrient reduction strategy as defined in section 455B.171. The moneys may be used for the conservation reserve enhancement program and to match federal moneys available to this state for wetlands.
In awarding moneys, the division shall give priority to wetlands in the watershed of a lake or reservoir that is a source of water for a public water supply system.
For each fiscal year beginning on or after July 1, 2027, there is appropriated from the general fund of the state to the department of agriculture and land stewardship $10 million for deposit in the water quality wetlands fund.
Not more than ten percent of the moneys deposited in the fund in a fiscal year may be used for costs of administration.
Notwithstanding section 8.33, moneys in the fund that remain unencumbered or unobligated at the close of each fiscal year shall not revert but shall remain available for expenditure.
The division shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to implement and administer this section.

Sec. 5. NEW SECTION. Continuous water quality monitoring network. This section joins chapter 466B.

For each fiscal year beginning on or after July 1, 2027, there is appropriated from the general fund of the state to the state board of regents $600,000 for the state university of Iowa to operate a statewide network of in-stream sensors that measure nitrate and other water quality conditions continuously.
The state university of Iowa shall publish the readings from the network on an internet site available to the public without charge, as they are recorded.
Moneys appropriated under this section are in addition to, and shall not replace, any other moneys appropriated for water quality monitoring.

Sec. 6. NEW SECTION. Confinement feeding operations —— county siting authority —— permit pause. This section joins chapter 459.

1. For purposes of this section, unless the context otherwise requires:
a. “Covered structure” means a confinement feeding operation structure for which a construction permit is required under section 459.303.
b. “Siting ordinance” means a confinement feeding operations siting ordinance adopted by a county board of supervisors under this section.
2. Notwithstanding section 331.304A and section 335.2, a county board of supervisors may adopt a siting ordinance. In a county that has adopted a siting ordinance, all of the following apply:
a. A person shall not construct, including expand, a covered structure until the board has approved its location, in addition to obtaining a construction permit from the department under section 459.303.
b. The board may approve a location subject to conditions on the construction or operation of the covered structure or on the application of manure originating from the confinement feeding operation.
c. The board may base its decision on factors other than those the department considers and other than the master matrix adopted under section 459.305.
d. The board may require a separation distance greater than the separation distance required under section 459.202.
e. The board shall hold a public hearing on each application and shall approve or disapprove the location within ninety days after receiving a complete application.
f. The provisions of section 459.304 relating to a construction evaluation resolution and the master matrix do not apply.
3. Notwithstanding section 459.303, beginning on the effective date of this Act, the department shall not approve an application for a construction permit for a covered structure in a county until the board of supervisors of that county has done one of the following and filed a copy with the department:
a. Adopted a siting ordinance.
b. Adopted a resolution stating that the county will not adopt a siting ordinance at that time.
4. Subsection 3 does not apply to either of the following:
a. The construction of a covered structure that does not increase the animal unit capacity of the confinement feeding operation.
b. An application that the department determined was complete before the effective date of this Act.
5. Subsection 3 is repealed July 1, 2029.

Sec. 7. NEW SECTION. Nutrient management plans for large operations. This section joins chapter 466B.

For purposes of this section, unless the context otherwise requires:
a. “Certified nutrient management plan”, “crop year”, “division”, and “operation” mean the same as defined in the section of this chapter enacted by this Act that provides for nutrient management stewardship payments.
b. “Large operation” means an operation that farms 1,000 acres or more of cropland and pastureland in this state in a crop year.
Beginning with the crop year that begins January 1, 2029, each person who farms land as part of a large operation shall manage all of the cropland and pastureland the large operation farms in this state under a certified nutrient management plan, and shall submit the plan and a record of the nutrients applied under it during the crop year to the soil and water conservation district in which the land is located not later than January 31 following the crop year. The district shall review the plan and record and shall report to the division, in a manner the division prescribes, each large operation that submitted a plan and the acres the plan covers.
The division shall not require a person, under this section, to plant any particular crop, to follow any particular rotation or tillage system, or to establish any practice other than managing nutrients according to the person’s own certified nutrient management plan.
A large operation is not eligible for a nutrient management stewardship payment. This section does not affect a large operation’s eligibility for any other state or federal conservation payment, cost-share, or loan.
The division may require a person whom the division has reason to believe farms land as part of a large operation to provide records showing the acres the operation farms in this state.
The persons who farm land as part of a large operation that fails to comply with subsection 2 are jointly and severally liable for a civil penalty of not more than $25 for each acre not managed under a certified nutrient management plan, for each crop year, assessed only once for each acre for each crop year regardless of how many persons are liable. An acre for which the plan and record were not submitted as required by subsection 2 is considered not managed under a certified nutrient management plan. The division shall not assess a penalty until it has given each person written notice and a reasonable period, set by rule, to come into compliance. Penalties collected shall be deposited in the water quality wetlands fund created in the section of this chapter enacted by this Act that establishes that fund.
Chapter 22 shall not apply to an individual plan or record submitted under this section. The division shall publish on its internet site, not later than June 30 of each year, the number of large operations that submitted plans and the acres covered, by county, for the previous crop year.
The division shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to administer this section.

Sec. 8. NEW SECTION. Manure management plans —— field records. This section joins chapter 459.

Beginning July 1, 2028, a person submitting an original or updated manure management plan under section 459.312, including a statement that a plan has not changed, shall submit it electronically, in a format the department prescribes, and shall identify the location and acreage of each field on which manure from the confinement feeding operation is to be applied.
The department shall keep a record of every field identified in a current manure management plan. Upon receiving an original or updated manure management plan, the department shall compare each field it identifies with that record and shall flag any field identified in more than one current manure management plan.
For each flagged field, the department shall determine whether the manure to be applied to the field under all of the plans together exceeds the application rates allowed under the plans. If it does, notwithstanding section 459.312, subsection 9, the department shall not approve the original or updated plan that caused the excess until the persons who submitted the plans have corrected them, within a period set by rule. While approval is withheld, the most recently approved plan for that confinement feeding operation continues to govern the removal and application of its manure. For a plan approved as part of a construction permit application, the department may issue the permit only on the condition that the plans are corrected.
The department shall publish on its internet site, and update at least once each year, a map showing the location of each field identified in a current manure management plan and the number of plans that identify it. Not later than January 15 of each year, the department shall publish the number of fields flagged during the previous year, by county, and the number for which plans were required to be corrected.
This section does not make public any record that section 459.312, subsection 12, requires to be kept confidential.
The department shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to administer this section.

Sec. 9. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND LAND STEWARDSHIP —— CONSERVATION EQUIPMENT REVOLVING LOAN FUND —— APPROPRIATION. There is appropriated from the general fund of the state to the department of agriculture and land stewardship for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2027, and ending June 30, 2028, the following amount, or so much thereof as is necessary, to be used for the purposes designated:

For deposit in the conservation equipment revolving loan fund, as created by this Act:

$20 million

Sec. 10. PAY-AS-YOU-GO SCORECARD. This Act is subject to the pay-as-you-go scorecard.

Sec. 11. EFFECTIVE DATE. This Act, being deemed of immediate importance, takes effect upon enactment.

Sec. 12. APPLICABILITY. The nutrient management stewardship payments enacted by this Act apply to crop years beginning on or after January 1, 2028.

EXPLANATION

The inclusion of this explanation does not constitute agreement with the explanation’s substance by the members of the general assembly.

This bill relates to water quality.

NUTRIENT MANAGEMENT STEWARDSHIP PAYMENTS. The bill creates a yearly payment of $20 an acre, on up to 150 acres per operation, to farm operations of less than 1,000 acres that manage all their cropland and pasture for the whole year under a written nutrient management plan that meets the federal conservation standard, or, for pasture, a written grazing plan. Land farmed by a person, the person’s spouse, a parent, child or sibling who shares equipment, labor or management, and businesses any of them control counts as one operation. Land farmed by related people or businesses that is split up to qualify is counted together. If the money available in a year falls short, every payment is reduced by the same percentage. The person who carries out the plan, owner or renter, receives it. It is a payment from the state, not a tax credit, so it does not run through a tax return. The application is no more than two pages, the local soil and water conservation district takes it at any time of year, and the state must offer a short-form plan the district can help a farmer complete. The district checks the year’s records, and the state pays the following spring. The state may not require any particular crop, rotation, tillage system or practice beyond following the farmer’s own plan. The state publishes operations paid, enrolled acres and payments by county each year. The payments cover the 2028 through 2037 crop years, and the payment provisions are repealed July 1, 2038.

CONSERVATION EQUIPMENT LOANS. The bill creates a revolving loan fund that makes zero-interest loans to farmers for equipment that reduces soil erosion or nutrient loss, including no-till and strip-till planters, cover crop seeders, variable-rate fertilizer and manure equipment, and guidance systems. A borrower may have up to $150,000 outstanding, repaid over up to seven years. The bill appropriates $20 million to start the fund. Repayments go back into it.

CONSERVATION CONDITIONS. A person who takes state conservation money on or after July 1, 2028, meaning a stewardship payment, an equipment loan, or state cost-share or other incentive money under the soil and water conservation chapter or the water quality initiative, must manage that land under a nutrient management plan: for the crop year of a payment, for the term of a loan, and for cost-share, for as long as the person agreed to maintain the practice, up to twenty years. Money to build or restore a wetland, from the bill's wetlands fund or any other state source, does not carry the plan requirement. The condition applies only to state money. It does not touch federal farm payments, and the condition does not apply to a person who takes no state conservation money. Large operations have a separate plan requirement, described below.

WETLANDS. The bill creates a water quality wetlands fund, with $10 million a year, to help landowners build or restore wetlands that catch tile water and runoff. Wetlands above lakes that supply drinking water come first.

MONITORING. The bill appropriates $600,000 a year to the University of Iowa to run continuous in-stream water quality sensors and publish the readings as they come in.

CONFINEMENT FEEDING OPERATIONS. The bill lets a county board of supervisors adopt a siting ordinance for confinement feeding operation structures that need a state construction permit, which generally means operations of 1,000 animal units or more, or an operation of any size building an earthen manure basin or lagoon. Confinement means totally roofed, so cattle on pasture and open feedlots are not covered. In a county that does, the board must approve the location as well, may attach conditions and set larger separation distances, and must decide within ninety days after a public hearing. Until a county has either adopted an ordinance or voted not to, the department of natural resources may not approve new construction permits there, except for work that does not add capacity and applications already complete when the bill takes effect. That pause ends statewide July 1, 2029.

LARGE OPERATIONS. Beginning with the 2029 crop year, every farm operation of 1,000 acres or more must keep all its cropland and pasture under a written nutrient management plan and file the plan and the year’s records with the local district, whether or not it takes any state money. The plan is the operation’s own: the state may not require any particular crop, rotation, tillage system or practice. A large operation receives no stewardship payment for the plan but stays eligible for other conservation programs. An operation that does not comply, after notice and time to fix it, faces a civil penalty of up to $25 an acre a year, counted once per acre, deposited in the wetlands fund. Acres with no plan filed count as acres without a plan.

MANURE MANAGEMENT PLAN FIELD RECORDS. Beginning July 1, 2028, manure management plans for confinement feeding operations must be filed electronically and must identify the location and acreage of each field where manure will be applied. The department of natural resources checks each plan against every other current plan, flags any field claimed by more than one, and does not approve a plan that pushes a field over the allowed rates until the plans are corrected. The operation's last approved plan still governs its manure in the meantime, and a construction permit can issue only on the condition that the plans are fixed. The department publishes a map of the fields named in current plans and a yearly count of flagged fields by county. Records that current law keeps confidential stay confidential.

The bill is subject to the pay-as-you-go scorecard, which a separate bill would create. In any fiscal year, the bill’s cost to the general fund is limited to the savings the scorecard counts against it.

The bill takes effect upon enactment.

Sources

Where every number comes from

For anyone checking our work. Each figure with the site it came from and the day we checked it, and each law the bill cites.

Show every source

Figures

72.6 percentIn EPA's assessment records, 72.6 percent of Iowa's assessed river and stream miles are impaired, against 60.4 percent nationally.owapps.epa.govchecked 2026-09-27
60.4 percentIn EPA's assessment records, 72.6 percent of Iowa's assessed river and stream miles are impaired, against 60.4 percent nationally.owapps.epa.govchecked 2026-09-27
30th of 51That ranks Iowa 30th of 51, counting the fifty states and DC, where first has the smallest share impaired.owapps.epa.govchecked 2026-09-27
1,282,608nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
8,994The low end assumes as many farms enroll as planted cover crops in the last Census of Agriculture, 8,994.nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
8,452,461nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
25,796The high end assumes as many as farmed some ground no-till, 25,796.nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
27,915In the last Census of Agriculture, 8,994 Iowa farms planted cover crops, 25,796 farmed some ground no-till, and 27,915 of Iowa's 86,911 farms used precision agriculture.nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
86,911In the last Census of Agriculture, 8,994 Iowa farms planted cover crops, 25,796 farmed some ground no-till, and 27,915 of Iowa's 86,911 farms used precision agriculture.nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
7,351In the last farm census, 7,351 Iowa farms were that big, with about half of the farmland.nass.usda.govchecked 2026-10-13
about halfIn the last farm census, 7,351 Iowa farms were that big, with about half of the farmland.nass.usda.govchecked 2026-10-13
25,881,597nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
1,687,658nass.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
$5The state already takes $5 an acre off what a farmer pays for crop insurance on fall-planted cover crops, with no acreage cap.iowaagriculture.govchecked 2026-09-27
$20,000It already makes no-interest loans of up to $20,000 for permanent conservation practices under section 161A.71, and the State Revolving Fund lends for practices like terraces and waterways at no more than 3 percent.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
3 percentIt already makes no-interest loans of up to $20,000 for permanent conservation practices under section 161A.71, and the State Revolving Fund lends for practices like terraces and waterways at no more than 3 percent.opportunityiowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
4.625 percentMeasured against the Farm Service Agency's direct operating loan rate, which ran from 4.625 percent in January to 5.25 percent in September of this year, zero-interest loans from the fund save borrowers $0.6 million to $1.0 million a year.fsa.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
5.25 percentMeasured against the Farm Service Agency's direct operating loan rate, which ran from 4.625 percent in January to 5.25 percent in September of this year, zero-interest loans from the fund save borrowers $0.6 million to $1.0 million a year.fsa.usda.govchecked 2026-09-27
$8,325,000House File 2771, the farm and natural resources budget signed in June, includes $8,325,000 for soil and water conservation, including cost-share, $1 million for wetlands under the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, and $300,000 for water quality monitoring grants at the Department of Natural Resources, with continuous monitoring left to the department's discretion.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
$1 millionHouse File 2771, the farm and natural resources budget signed in June, includes $8,325,000 for soil and water conservation, including cost-share, $1 million for wetlands under the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, and $300,000 for water quality monitoring grants at the Department of Natural Resources, with continuous monitoring left to the department's discretion.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
$300,000House File 2771, the farm and natural resources budget signed in June, includes $8,325,000 for soil and water conservation, including cost-share, $1 million for wetlands under the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, and $300,000 for water quality monitoring grants at the Department of Natural Resources, with continuous monitoring left to the department's discretion.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
$5House File 2733, the House Democrats' Iowa Healthy Water Act, proposed a $5-an-acre property tax credit for landowners, on land the state certifies after its own review of nutrient loads, and no-interest Department of Natural Resources loans and grants for conservation facilities or structures.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
1,000 animal unitsIt reaches only confinement buildings that need a state construction permit under section 459.303: generally operations of 1,000 animal units or more, and an operation of any size that builds an earthen manure basin or lagoon.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
twenty yearsThe commitment can be long: for a permanent practice like a terrace, the plan requirement lasts as long as the owner agreed to keep the practice in place, and current law already lets that agreement run up to twenty years under section 161A.7.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27

Laws cited

161A.7Soil and water conservation district powers. As a condition of state cost-sharing for a permanent practice, the landowner agrees not to remove or weaken it, for a period not to exceed twenty years after payment.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 466BWater protection and watershed management, including the water quality initiative (subchapter IV). Sections 1, 4, 5 and 7 of the bill join it.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 161ASoil and water conservation, including soil and water conservation districts, state cost-share and the no-interest conservation practices loan fund. Sections 2 and 3 of the bill join it.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 459The Animal Agriculture Compliance Act, which regulates confinement feeding operations. Sections 6 and 8 of the bill join it.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 22Iowa's open records law. Sections 1 and 7 of the bill keep individual nutrient plans and records out of it; only county totals are published.legis.iowa.gov
459.312Manure management plans. Required of confinement operations other than small ones (500 animal units or fewer, 459.102), updated every year, copied to the county board of supervisors where manure is applied (sub. 4), and listing the location of manure application (sub. 10(c)) and landowner agreements (sub. 10(d)). Records showing compliance are confidential (sub. 12). Section 8 of the bill adds electronic filing with field locations and a cross-check between plans.legis.iowa.gov
459.302DNR must provide for electronic filing of documents and, "to every extent feasible", electronic processing of permits and manure management plans. The analysis cites it; Section 8 of the bill makes electronic filing of plans, with field locations, a requirement.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 17AThe Iowa administrative procedure act, under which the departments adopt rules.legis.iowa.gov
8.33Unspent appropriations revert at year end unless the law says otherwise; the bill's loan and wetlands funds say otherwise.legis.iowa.gov
161A.42Definitions for soil and water conservation practices, cost-share and farm units.legis.iowa.gov
161A.71The conservation practices revolving loan fund, which makes no-interest loans of up to twenty thousand dollars for permanent soil and water conservation practices. It does not cover equipment.legis.iowa.gov
161A.73Voluntary cost-share and other financial incentives for soil and water conservation practices, generally up to half the cost.legis.iowa.gov
466B.43Water quality agriculture infrastructure programs run as part of the water quality initiative, including an edge-of-field program, financed on a cost-share basis, whose projects include wetlands, bioreactors and saturated buffers. The bill's conservation condition leaves out money from it for a wetland.legis.iowa.gov
455B.171Water quality definitions, including the Iowa nutrient reduction strategy developed by the Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, the Department of Natural Resources and Iowa State University.legis.iowa.gov
459.102Definitions. An animal feeding operation confines and feeds animals for forty-five days or more a year; a confinement feeding operation is one in which the animals are confined to areas that are totally roofed.legis.iowa.gov
459.202Minimum separation distances between confinement feeding operation structures and homes, businesses, churches, schools and public use areas.legis.iowa.gov
459.303The Department of Natural Resources approves construction permits for confinement feeding operation structures; a permit is needed when the operation would have an animal unit capacity of at least one thousand animal units, or for an unformed manure storage structure.legis.iowa.gov
459.304A county board of supervisors receives each permit application, may comment, and, if it has adopted a construction evaluation resolution, may score it on the master matrix and recommend approval or disapproval. The department makes the decision.legis.iowa.gov
459.305The master matrix, a points system the department adopts by rule for scoring permit applications; it scores positive points only and must be structured so an application can feasibly pass.legis.iowa.gov
331.304AA county may not adopt or enforce local legislation regulating the construction, operation or management of an animal feeding operation unless state law expressly authorizes it.legis.iowa.gov
335.2County zoning ordinances do not apply to land and buildings primarily adapted for agricultural purposes.legis.iowa.gov
HF 27332026 House Democratic water quality bill (introduced; Judge, Baeth, Levin and others), described by its sponsors as the Iowa Healthy Water Act. Money for a university water quality monitoring network, the water quality initiative, a refundable practice tax credit, a five-dollar-an-acre Iowa clean water farm property tax credit, and no-interest loans for water quality practices. legis.iowa.gov
HF 27322026 bill by Rep. Turek (introduced) for edge-of-field and cover crop practice tax credits of up to half the cost, capped statewide each year.legis.iowa.gov
SF 22602026 bill by Sen. Staed and seven other Democrats (introduced) for county control of the siting and management of confinement feeding operations of one thousand animal units or more, through a county siting ordinance. The bill's county siting section follows it. legis.iowa.gov
HF 27712026 agriculture, natural resources and environmental protection budget (enrolled), which the governor's office and IDALS called the Farm to Faucet package. Funds soil and water conservation, CREP wetlands, the water quality initiative and DNR water quality monitoring for the year that began July 1, 2026. legis.iowa.gov
SF 512The 2018 water quality law (enrolled). Created a water quality infrastructure fund, a water quality financing program, and cost-share programs for infrastructure on agricultural and urban land under the water quality initiative.legis.iowa.gov
HF 21272020 bill by Rep. Steckman and others (introduced) that would have barred the Department of Natural Resources from approving any construction permit for a confinement feeding operation structure, with an interim study.legis.iowa.gov
SF 1242023 bill by Sen. Jochum (introduced) that would have barred building or expanding confinement feeding operation structures, other than small operations.legis.iowa.gov