Iowa lawmakers ask whether nurses got intended pay

Des Moines Register, February 25, 2009

Registered nurses who provide bedside care in Iowa were supposed to see extra money in their paychecks, provided by nearly $3 million from the state last year. But some lawmakers are now questioning whether all 34 designated hospitals actually paid nurses the bonuses, or whether they simply rolled the money into ordinary cost-of-living raises. Hospital officials say that the budget bill approved in 2008 that designated a portion of Medicaid money for nurses' pay didn't specify that the money had to be above normal raises.