The 87th General Assembly will convene in Des Moines for the second session of full Republican control.

The 2018 session of the Iowa Legislature begins Monday, and with it, lawmakers will find a host of new issues to debate.

Republicans will be in control of the House of Representatives, Senate and governor's office for the second session in a row, but it will be the first session in which Kim Reynolds presides as governor.

Her first Condition of the State Address is Tuesday, serving as a guide to some of the items legislators could check off their list of resolutions for 2018.

When Reynolds was sworn in as governor last May, she outlined four priorities for her administration: reforming the state’s tax structure, innovating energy policy, prioritizing education and investing in workforce training.

Whether those goals are realized will depend in part on the agenda of legislative Republicans who have talked of tax reform, changes to education funding, water quality initiatives and how to combat the opioid epidemic in Iowa, among several other top-line items that could be legislated between now and the end of session this spring.

But first, the budget

The first order of business will be to address slow economic growth state officials say likely will result in budget cuts for the current fiscal year.

"That'll be her biggest challenge, I think, to see what she recommends and if she can get agreement on those things," said state Rep. Dennis Cohoon, D-Burlington, who has served 31 years in the House of Representatives.

Over the next few months, lawmakers will set the 2019 budget, but also may need to make cuts to the existing 2018 budget due to low revenue estimates calculated by Department of Management Director David Roederer and his team of accountants.

Within the next two years, the state also must replenish its emergency reserve funds with about $144 million borrowed last year to help balance the budget.

"I think that's going to be the first thing, is the restoration of what we have borrowed out of the reserves," Rep. Jerry Kearns, D-Keokuk, said of the Legislature's initial priorities for the session.

When mid-year budget cuts were handed out in 2017, Southeastern Community College lost about $126,000 in state funding and the John Bennett Correctional Center in Fort Madison was shuttered last February because of a $5.5 million cut to the Department of Corrections.

"That's going to be their biggest problem, just not having the money to do some positive things that they'd like to do, like water quality," said Cohoon.

Education funding

At the Greater Burlington Partnership's Eggs and Issues legislative forum last month, Sen. Tom Greene, R-Burlington, said prompt funding for kindergarten- through 12th-grade schools would be accomplished again this year.

"On the education side, we're going to do that very early, just like we did last year," Greene said. "Education is a priority for the Republican caucus. We're going to make that one of the first bills that we pass, not one of the last bills like what's happened in the past. We don't want school districts and community colleges waiting until the end of the session to find out how much money the state's going to pass down to them. Those numbers will be coming early."

Last year, then-Gov. Terry Branstad signed a bill Feb. 8 that included $40 million in supplemental aid for K-12 public schools, a 1.1 percent increase from fiscal year 2017.

In addition to public school funding, however, some GOP lawmakers are pushing to free up taxpayer dollars to establish private school vouchers or an education savings account system in Iowa.

The Education Savings Account program proposed last year would allow families to use public funds to help pay for private schooling, tutoring expenses or a home-school curriculum.

Greene, a former Burlington School Board member, has said he was against taxpayers' education funds outside the public school system.

But others in his party, like Rep. Dave Kerr of Morning Sun, have voiced support in the past.

At a legislative forum Thursday with the Mount Pleasant Area Chamber Alliance, Sen. Rich Taylor said he was "terribly afraid" a voucher system or ESA program could be implemented this year.

"The voucher system wouldn't be that bad if it's properly funded," said Taylor, a Mount Pleasant Democrat. "But what I see is it's probably going to be a reduced per-pupil rate, which will devastate a lot of the smaller schools in my district. It's going to force them, if we do go to a voucher system, basically out of business."

School choice advocates argue options outside the public school system encourage competition and allow low-income students who cannot afford tuition costs a chance to enroll in a better school outside their district.

Tax reform

Now that President Donald Trump has signed congressional Republicans' tax package, Iowa Republicans have the chance to pass long-awaited changes to a tax code they argue hinders economic growth.

As Cohoon pointed out in a recent interview, Senate Majority Leader Bill Dix, R-Shell Rock, has advocated for elimination of the state income tax.

Whether that idea could be carried out this year remains an open question.

"Right now, with the lack of revenues, it's going to be difficult to do that and still pay the bills," Cohoon said.

In a December interview on the public television program "Iowa Press," Reynolds was asked about her priorities of bolstering workforce development initiatives while also enacting tax reform.

"We're looking to simplify things," Reynolds said in response to a question about the extensive use of tax credits in Iowa. "The reason they're using the credits right now is because we're not competitive when it comes to our tax rates. So if we can be more competitive, that really reduces the need for some of the tax credits.”

Reynolds has yet to unveil a specific proposal for tax reform, but is expected to bring up the topic in her Condition of the State Address Tuesday morning.

"I think there will be quite a bit of discussion on tax reform," Kerr said. "I think we're going to look to see exactly what the federal tax system allows us to do and not. There are still a lot of unclear items yet to be cleared up before we move forward."