Hundreds of opponents and supporters of the Iowa Supreme Court's Varnum v. Brien decision legalizing same-sex marriage descended Thursday on the Iowa Capitol and watched as House Speaker Pat Murphy declined twice to call up a constitutional amendment defining marriage as a legal union between a man and a woman.

"Let us vote! Let us vote! Let us vote!" supporters of the Iowa Marriage Amendment shouted after the first attempt to bring the issue to the House floor was ruled out of order.

Advocates on both sides of the issue watched at about 9:30 a.m. as House Minority Leader Kraig Paulsen made an attempt to bring House Joint Resolution 6 to the House floor.

The Iowa legislature's budget subcommittees worked this week to craft budgets for various areas of state government that would cut an average of 12 percent after state revenue estimates were lowered by $269.9 million next fiscal year, making layoffs almost a certainty.

Iowa Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal called the decline in state revenues "the worst I've ever seen" in 27 years in the legislature and said everything is at risk of being cut.

"I wouldn't say there's anything off the table," said Gronstal (D-Council Bluffs). "These are incredibly challenging times. ... We will do, probably in some cases, across-the-board stuff. We will also make selective cuts."

More budget cuts are on the way in Iowa after the three-member Revenue Estimating Conference (REC) on Friday lowered estimates of state revenues by $129.7 million this fiscal year and $269.9 million next fiscal year.

"The economy continues to falter," said Holly Lyons, director of the Legislative Services Agency's fiscal services division. "We're witnessing more layoffs. We're witnessing reduced hours and furloughs. We may not even be halfway through this recession."

The lowered revenue estimates, combined with the $700-million budget gap the state already had for Fiscal Year 2010, make for a $1.1-billion gap between expenses and revenues over the next 15 months, according to Representative Scott Raecker (R-Urbandale), ranking member of the House Appropriations Committee.

Officials with the Iowa Public Employees Retirement System (IPERS) attempted to ease concerns this week about its $339-million investment with Westridge Capital Management that's been frozen during the investigation of Westridge owners Paul Greenwood and Stephen Walsh for securities fraud.

Donna Mueller, IPERS' chief executive officer, told the legislature's joint Government Oversight Committee that the frozen assets represent just 2 percent of the pension fund that serves about 300,000 current and former employees in state government, cities, counties and school districts.

"We're going to aggressively pursue every last dollar," Mueller said. "We maintain an additional cash balance so that we do not have to unnecessarily cash out investments. We are managing cash so we have a cash reserve to pay monthly benefits. It's only 2 percent, so we have other assets that are available to manage and to pay benefits. A greater concern, almost, is what's happening in the economy and impacting the entire portfolio."