“Is this heaven?”
“It’s Iowa.”
“Iowa? Could have sworn it was heaven…” – “Field of Dreams” (1989)
While the specters of baseball players past may have confused Iowa for heaven in the movie, you wouldn’t blame Hawkeye laundry owners for thinking they’re living in the field of dreams these days. This month marks just the second month in more than 20 years that laundry owners in Iowa aren’t sending up to 9 percent of their gross sales revenues to the state. This remarkable turn of fate is the net result of an unlikely and extraordinary lobbying effort to repeal the sales tax in Iowa; removing it from the list that now counts just three states assessing sales tax on self-service laundry.
A legislative victory of this magnitude doesn’t come along every day, so it’s worth taking both a victory lap as well as a closer look at how this came about. In my time with the Coin Laundry Association, I’ve had the pleasure of observing several important legislative wins, but this sales tax repeal in Iowa ranks near the top, based on how it came about as well as its degree of difficulty.
In a way, the origin of the effort was very similar to that of the successful sales tax repeal in the state of Washington almost 10 years ago. It began with a call from a single CLA member expressing a visceral disgust at cutting the check for the quarterly sales tax payment. This initial phone conversation eventually led to the formation of the Iowa Self-Service Laundry Association – a group formed with the mission of repealing the existing sales tax.
Soon after, the ISSLA began to hold meetings and gather information. They identified legislative contacts and assembled a small but tenacious task force of volunteers willing to reach out to legislators – and reach into their pockets to fund the engagement of a lobbyist. This core group of laundry owners was rounded out with several distributors and manufacturers who spread the word, made financial contributions and leveraged their own relationships with legislators.
The effort gained further momentum with a memorable meeting in Ames, attended by Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad himself. How a tiny group of laundry owners made this happen, I’m still not sure. With the professional lobbyist working behind the scenes and our members taking dozens of meetings with legislators in Des Moines (as well as in their laundries back home!), the path toward repeal began to take shape. Our intrepid volunteers educated legislators and simply wouldn’t give up the effort – it began to seem possible that the sales tax could be overturned. A tense several weeks this past spring culminated in landslide votes in both the House and Senate to exempt self-service laundry from the sales tax. What began with “not a chance” has ended with “done deal.”
Of course, there are thank-you’s due to many more volunteers and donors than can be mentioned in this space. Suffice it to say, there was a small group brought together by a common purpose that was able to achieve the impossible. In a political climate in which more than a dozen states have threatened to expand the sales tax to include self-service laundry, somehow this group was able to convince its legislature that repealing the sales tax on laundry was the right thing to do. I’m beyond impressed with the collective effort and reminded of the power of association.
So, this month those sales tax dollars remain in the pockets of these small-business owners who can now reinvest in their laundries, hire the help they need to grow their businesses and compete on a level playing field with those in neighboring states.
Talk about a Hollywood ending…
[Editor’s Note: The final step of the Iowa tax battle is to pay the bill for the lobbying effort so critical to this victory. Understanding that what happens in one state regarding sales tax impacts all others, please visit http://www.coinlaundry.org/advocacy/stop-laundry-tax to learn more about the issues and to make a donation toward keeping your state and your business exempt from sales tax on self-service laundry.]
