Friends and neighbors,
Things in Saint Paul haven’t even slowed down a touch. Here’s what you need to know as we head into the weekend.
Fighting Food Insecurity
Last night, the Minnesota House voted to pass two important bills aimed at addressing food insecurity in our schools and community. HF 5 would create a state program for schools to provide up to two free meals per day to all students, and HF 213 would provide an investment of $5 million for food shelf programs in light of record numbers of visits to food shelves last year.
It's simple: hungry kids can’t learn at their full capacity. We have a real opportunity to make a large quality of life improvement for many struggling Minnesota families. I was proud to support both of these great bills last night.
Increasing Investments to Prosecute Violent Crimes
The House recently passed a bipartisan bill that will boost funding to address violent crime and to provide counties the tools they need to prosecute heinous crimes statewide.
With additional public safety investments, and in partnership with the Minnesota Attorney General’s office, this bill, which has already passed in the Senate, would allow us to hire more prosecutors so they can expand their scope to charge violent crimes. These offenses, including crimes like assault, kidnapping, sexual assault, robbery, burglary, human trafficking, sex trafficking, homicide, and more, are an assault on our communities and our society.
While I’m glad to see folks across the aisle support this bill, it’s frustrating that it took a DFL trifecta to get this done, after self-proclaimed “tough on crime” Republicans refused to provide the Attorney General with the necessary tools and resources to prosecute violent crimes when they controlled the Senate. DFLers have been trying to get this done for the past four years, and every year, the GOP-led Senate refused to include it in their budget. I’m thankful it will finally happen under DFL leadership.
It is up to us to make sure we have working systems in place to hold offenders accountable and ensure safety to all Minnesotans.
Minnesotans deserve to be and feel safe, and whether you live in the suburbs, the metro, or greater Minnesota, this bill will ensure more bad actors and violent criminals are prosecuted and held accountable.
Labor and Industry Finance and Policy Committee Update
We’ve had several big bills come through our committee in the past few weeks. Just to name a few, we heard Paid Family Leave and HF 295, which would deem non-compete agreements non-enforceable. Non-compete clauses in the workplace eliminate competition for employees and lead to lower pay and worse conditions for workers.
We will be looking at the Governor’s budget proposal next week, as well as hearing a bill on refinery safety. As always, worker safety continues to be our committee’s top priority.
Restoring Voting Rights & Recognizing Juneteenth
As we begin Black History Month, I want to highlight two bills that we passed last week. We passed the Restore the Vote Act, which would restore voting rights to individuals convicted of a felony upon completion of any incarceration imposed and executed by a court for the offense.
Restoring voting rights is both an equity issue and a racial justice issue. In Minnesota, 20% of those deemed ineligible to vote are black, while black Minnesotans of voting age make up just 4% of the population.
We also passed a bill to officially declare Juneteenth a state holiday, which was swiftly signed into law by Governor Walz.
I’m glad we were able to move both of these bills forward. This is just the beginning of the work we are committed to doing to rectify racial disparities in Minnesota.
Stay Connected
To stay up to date with our important work at the State Capitol, you can see the Minnesota House of Public Information Services’ nonpartisan recaps of high-profile bills, committee hearings, and floor sessions with their Session Daily publication.
To share your input or ideas, or if I can ever be of assistance, please feel free to reach out at rep.michael.nelson@house.mn.gov or 651-296-3751, and I will be happy to help.
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Have a great weekend.
In solidarity,
Michael V. Nelson