(Des Moines) The Iowa House sent a bill to the governor Thursday that would allow hard roofs over boat docks, slips and lifts in Iowa.
House File 710 advanced from the Senate floor Wednesday, with an amendment that swapped the term “enclosed structure” to “roof” in the bill. The House approved the amendment from senators.
Rep. Josh Turek, D-Council Bluffs, said the legislation would “put Iowa’s boat dock regulations in line with the other 49 states,” which he said do not prohibit hard roofs on docks.
Current law only allows roofs or siding of “soft-sided” materials over boat hoists. The issue has made regulation difficult on Carter Lake, which is in both Iowa and Nebraska.
Turek said he does not own a dock or a boat on Carter Lake, despite an allegation made the day prior on the Senate floor by Sen. Dave Sires, R-Cedar Falls, that the legislation was sponsored by a “House of Representative person who built an illegal dock on Carter Lake.”
Sires opposed the bill, saying hard roofs would cause more damage to an area during flooding or high winds and allow gargantuan docks to be built.
The bill would require that docks with roofs be less than 30 feet wide, and no taller than 20 feet above the surface of the water. Dock owners would also be required to maintain dock liability insurance of at least $1 million per occurrence to be in compliance with the bill.
Rep. Austin Harris, R-Moulton, thanked the people of Carter Lake who he said were “very, very persistent” on the bill.
HF 710 advanced unanimously from the House.
