Iowa Local Income Tax: School District and EMS Surtaxes

Iowa does not have a general local income tax the way some neighboring states do. What exists instead are two narrow surtaxes at the local level: a school district income surtax collected in roughly 87% of Iowa school districts, and an emergency medical services (EMS) surtax collected in a smaller number of counties. Both are calculated as a percentage of your Iowa state income tax liability rather than your income, so the dollar amount is usually modest. With Iowa’s individual income tax rate at a flat 3.8% for 2026, the base those surtaxes apply to is already small compared to higher-tax states.¹

School District Surtax

Most Iowa residents owe this one. It funds two kinds of local school spending: the Physical Plant and Equipment Levy, which pays for building repairs, technology, and equipment, and the Instructional Support Program, which supplements classroom funding.²

Rates vary a lot by district. The school board sets the percentage each year based on how much revenue it needs, and the Iowa Department of Management calculates the final rate. Some districts set it at 1% or 2%. Others push higher. State law caps the combined total of all surtaxes within a single school district at 20%, and that cap includes any EMS surtax collected in the same area.³ Fewer than half of districts fall in the 5% to 10% range, and only a handful exceed 15%.

EMS Surtax

The EMS surtax works at the county level, not the school district level, and pays for ambulance equipment, paramedic training, and the day-to-day costs of running local emergency medical services. The maximum rate is 1% of your state income tax liability.⁴ Not every county has adopted one, so whether you owe it depends entirely on where you live.

Who Owes These Surtaxes

Your obligation hinges on a single date: the last day of your tax year. For calendar-year filers that means December 31. If you live in a school district with an active surtax on that date, you owe the full year’s amount regardless of when you moved there.² Someone who moves into the district on December 15 pays the same rate as a lifelong resident. The same logic applies to the EMS surtax for county residency.⁴

Whether you have children in the school system makes no difference. The surtax applies to every resident of the district, including retirees, renters, and households with no school-age children.⁵

Part-Year Residents

If you moved into Iowa during the year and lived in a surtax district on December 31, you owe the surtax. If you moved out of Iowa before December 31, you enter district code “9999” on your return and owe no school district surtax for that year.⁶

Military Members

Active-duty military personnel who keep a permanent home in an Iowa school district with a surtax owe the tax even if stationed elsewhere on December 31. The reverse is also true: a service member passing through an Iowa surtax district on temporary leave or between duty stations is not subject to the surtax just because they happened to be physically present on the last day of the year.²

How to Calculate What You Owe

The math takes two numbers: your Iowa income tax liability and your district’s surtax rate.

Start with your computed Iowa income tax (figured at the flat 3.8% rate for 2026), then subtract any nonrefundable credits you qualify for. That result is your surtax base.² Multiply by your district’s surtax rate.

Say your Iowa tax after nonrefundable credits is $1,500 and your school district’s rate is 8%. You owe $120 in school surtax. If your county also has a 1% EMS surtax, add $15. Total surtax: $135.

To find your school district’s four-digit code and current surtax rate, the Iowa Department of Revenue offers two tools. The Tax Mapper at tax-mapper.iowa.gov lets you search by home address to identify your school district number.⁷ The Department also publishes Form 41-027, a table listing every district’s code and surtax rate, updated each year.⁵ Rates change annually, so pull the table for the tax year you are filing, not the year you happen to be sitting at your desk.

How to Report and Pay

Both surtaxes are reported on Line 19 of the IA 1040 Individual Income Tax Return. There is no separate local tax form. You enter your four-digit school district code, multiply your tax liability by the applicable rate, and add the result to your total tax due. If you use electronic filing software, the surtax fields usually populate automatically once you enter the district code.

Payment goes to the Iowa Department of Revenue along with the rest of your state tax. The GovConnectIowa portal accepts credit card, debit card, and direct bank transfers.⁸ You can also mail a check or money order with your payment voucher.

Penalties for Paying Late

Iowa imposes a 5% penalty on any tax, including surtaxes, not paid by the due date. If you paid less than 90% of what you owed, that 5% penalty kicks in automatically. Unpaid balances also accrue interest at 10% annually for 2026, which works out to about 0.8% per month.⁹

Willfully failing to file or filing a false return to dodge the tax is treated far more harshly: the penalty jumps to 75% of the unpaid amount.¹⁰ Because surtaxes ride on the state return, any penalty or interest on your state liability pulls the surtax along with it. Confirm your district code and rate before you file rather than guessing.

Federal SALT Deduction

Iowa’s local surtaxes count as state and local income taxes for federal purposes, so they fall under the SALT deduction if you itemize. For the 2026 tax year, the SALT cap is $40,400 for most filers and $20,200 for married-filing-separately. The cap begins phasing down once modified adjusted gross income exceeds $505,000, shrinking by 30 cents for every dollar above that threshold, and cannot drop below a $10,000 floor.

For most Iowa taxpayers, the surtax adds only a small amount to the overall SALT picture. A $120 school surtax is unlikely to be what pushes you over the cap. If you already pay substantial Iowa income tax and local property taxes, though, every dollar counts toward that ceiling.

If you receive a surtax refund in a later year because you overpaid, that refund may be federally taxable in the year you receive it, but only if you itemized and claimed the SALT deduction in the year you originally paid the tax. If you took the standard deduction, the refund is not federally taxable.¹¹

1
Iowa Department of Revenue. IDR Announces 2026 Individual Income Tax and Interest Rates
2
Legal Information Institute. Iowa Admin Code r 701-304.1 – School District Surtax
3
Justia. Iowa Code 298.14 – School District Income Surtaxes
4
Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 422D.2 – Local Income Surtax
5
Iowa Department of Revenue. Iowa Individual Income Tax 1040 Expanded Instructions – Line 19 School District Surtax/Emergency Medical Services Tax
6
Iowa Department of Revenue. Intro 2 – Before You Begin
7
Iowa Department of Revenue. Iowa Tax Mapper
8
Iowa Department of Revenue. EasyPay Iowa
9
Iowa Department of Revenue. Penalties and Interest Rates
10
Justia. Iowa Code 421.27 – Penalties
11
Internal Revenue Service. Taxable Refunds, Credits or Offsets of State or Local Income Taxes