Dear Neighbor,
We are wrapping up another busy week in St. Paul, where nitrates, supplemental budget work and a court case between the state auditor and multiple counties all made news.
Before we get to those subjects, I want to pass along a couple of notes on bills I have authored:
Legislation I authored to provide a $600,000 Public Finance Authority Grant to the Alexandria Lake Area Sanitary District for reducing phosphorus levels in Lake Winona is included in the House’s jobs and energy omnibus package. This grant could save taxpayers in the sanitary district an estimated $14 million.
Also, a bill I authored related to farm homesteads remains in the mix for enactment. My proposal allows farms owned by two different entities made up of members from the same family to be eligible for homesteading, which could mean a considerable savings on property taxes.
On nitrates, the House approved a bill which would prevent the Minnesota Department of Agriculture from adopting mandatory rules, or “water resource protection requirements,” for nitrogen fertilizers unless the proposed rules are approved by the Legislature.
While we all share the governor’s goal of protecting our state’s groundwater, the timing of new rule proposals has not allowed sufficient public discussion and vetting by the Legislature. All interested parties deserve to participate in these discussions and the bill we passed will make sure a transparent process takes place.
Budget proposals are in the news as supplemental bills take shape. The governor recently came out with a proposal and the Department of Revenue reports it would raise taxes on every income bracket. The report, - again, from the governor’s own Department of Revenue – also says households making less than $32,000 would be hit hardest. In total, it would make Minnesota's tax code more regressive in nature. Governor Dayton has proposed reinstating more than $1 billion in health care tax increases, repealing tax reductions enacted last session, and numerous changes reacting to tax changes at the federal level.
That report from Revenue tells quite a different overall story than the message the governor has been pushing. Click here for more details from the tax incidence report. The House soon will be unveiling its own supplemental tax bill and, while some of the details are still coming together, the overall focus will be on returning state surplus dollars to Minnesotans in the form of tax relief as we also look to hold as many Minnesotans harmless as possible as we adjust to significant changes in the federal tax code.
Have a good weekend and look for more news from the Capitol soon. Only four full weeks remain before we are scheduled to adjourn, so long days in the House chamber are in our near future.
As for the court case, the Minnesota Supreme Court this week sided with legislation put into law two years ago allowing counties to contract with private accounting firms to conduct their required audits.
State Auditor Rebecca Otto sued multiple Minnesota counties over the constitutionality of hiring private firms to perform audits instead of sticking with the default practice of running audits through the auditor’s office. The court’s ruling against Otto is good news for counties in terms of upholding their flexibility and local options and also is a win for taxpayers.
Sincerely,
Paul