Volume 5, Issue 15                         April 26, 2019

Weekly Review Video

A weekly message from your Senator

Dear Constituents and Friends,

With just over three weeks left of the 2019 session, legislators have worked long hours to debate, discuss, and pass budgets in Finance or on the floor for various issues from agriculture to transportation. All budget bills need to pass the House and Senate by May 1 and head into Conference Committee where differences between the two budgets will be worked out. Because the bills are so different, it is expected to be a drawn-out process.

We worked into the evenings this week to pass multiple omnibus bills including Agriculture and Housing Finance, Environment Finance, Higher Education, Judiciary, and State Government. More are expected early next week.

Several groups came to the capitol this week. Minnesota families gathered outside the House chamber sharing their personal stories and delivering medicine bottles that contained stories of the struggle thousands of Minnesotans are facing due to Big Pharma’s continued price gouging on prescription medicines. There was a Youth Intervention Programs Association Rally where advocates brought attention to the lack of funding for programs to help tens of thousands of Minnesota youth. OutFront MN held their lobby day for LGBTQ equity to raise attention to fairness issues and stop the attacks and discriminatory legislation against LGBTQ people.

I love hearing from you! If you have any questions, feel free to email or stop by my office.

Sincerely,

Melisa

Senate Tax Bill Released

The Senate tax bill was released this week. The main piece of the bill is tax conformity. The state must update its tax code to reflect federal changes passed by Congress at the end of 2017. The Senate bill adopts many of the bipartisan updates that were included in last year’s vetoed bill that protect almost all individual income taxpayers from seeing a state tax increase as a result of Congress’ bill.  (SF 5)

Senate Passes State Government Omnibus Bill

The state government omnibus bill spends a total of $1.08 billion in 2020-2021. This is a $15 million reduction over the base and $90 million under the governor’s recommendation for $1.17 billion. Many state agencies receive between a 5 and 18% cut to their operating budgets, including the Attorney General, the State Auditor, the Department of Administration, MMB, the Department of Revenue, and the Historical Society.

The bill includes policy provisions that freeze the number of state workers, penalizes agencies for unfilled positions, limits the authority of MN.IT Services, impedes the implementation of collective bargaining contracts in the interim for AFSCME and MAPE, and complicates rulemaking relative to the Residential Building Code.

Senator Foung Hawj introduced an important amendment to designate May 14th as Hmong Special Guerilla Units Memorial Day in honor of Southeast Asians, Americans, and their allies who served, suffered, sacrificed, or died in the Secret War in Laos during the Vietnam War in the years 1961 to 1975 in support of the armed forces of the United States, and in recognition of the significance of May 14, 1975, the last day that the overall American-trained Hmong command structure over the Special Guerrilla Units in Laos was operational. (SF 2227)

Senate agriculture and housing finance bill passes

The Senate agriculture and housing finance bill passed this week on a 43-24 vote. The Senate bill contains investments in rural mental health supports for farmers and other agricultural related workers. Additionally, the Senate proposal appropriated $30 million for Border-to-Border Broadband grants.

The bill will be matched up with the House version in conference committee for further negotiations. (SF 2226)

Senate passes the Environment and Natural Resources Finance bill

The Senate approved a  bill this week to fund environment and natural resource agencies this week, on a vote of 35-32. The bill proposes a steep 25% general fund budget cut to the state’s environment and conservation programs.

The bill provides two-year funding for the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA), Department of Natural Resources (DNR), Metropolitan Council Regional Parks, Minnesota Conservation Corps, Board of Water and Soil Resources (BWSR), Science Museum, and Minnesota Board of Tourism. (SF 2314)

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