Veto saves Leopold Center, but maintains funding cut

A line-item veto by Gov. Terry Branstad on May 12 means the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University remains alive, but it has no money. Officials at Iowa State University and at the Leopold Center were left scrambling to figure out what happens next and how the center will change in the coming months and years.“It’s better than what it was before (the veto),” says Doug Gronau, a farmer who represents the Iowa Farm Bureau on the Leopold Center’s advisory board. “I think there definitely is going to be a reorganization. I guess we’ll see what that means.”Branstad took action late on Friday, May 12, issuing a line item veto that cut wording passed by the legislature that would have repealed the Iowa Code sections authorizing the Leopold Center. The governor did not veto other changes that essentially eliminate funding for the center.Last year, the center received about $397,000 from the state’s general fund for staffing and administration as well as about 35 percent (or about $1.5 million) of the Agriculture Management Account, which was a pool of funds created by the 1987 Groundwater Protection Act. That money came from fees on fertilizer sales and pesticides.The legislature eliminated the general fund allocation and moved the money from the other fees to the Iowa Nutrient Research Center, which saw its funding from other sources cut.