Dear Neighbors,
There’s an importation nationwide event tomorrow, April 28, as it’s National Prescription Drug Take Back Day. This is a chance to safely dispose of unused medications to help keep them off the street. This is one tool in curbing the opioid epidemic. By bringing unused prescriptions to a local take back event (our nearest location is the Albert Lea Police Department), we can take a small step in fighting opioid addiction and abuse. This event will take place tomorrow from 10am-2pm, and I hope you’ll take this chance to safely dispose of any unused prescription in your medicine cabinet. For more information, please click here.
Improving Rural Health Care
This week, we released our tax conformity plan for this session. There’s lots of great provisions including a tax cut for the middle class. One item I'm very excited to see in this bill is my legislation to create tax incentives for health care facilities that locate in medically underserved areas in rural Minnesota.
Access to health care in rural Minnesota is a huge issue. My language in our larger tax bill is a 'tool in the toolbox' for rural communities to help encourage more health care providers, such as birthing centers, hospitals, and clinics, to locate in their area. We’ve seen a reduction of services in cities like Albert Lea, Blooming Prairie, and others and we want to make sure our residents continue to have access to the care they need. I’m thankful my tax incentive provision was included in our tax omnibus bill, and will continue to advocate for this language to be included in our final agreement with Governor Dayton and the Senate.
School Safety
As you know, a main area of concern coming into this session was how to improve safety in schools. This topic is rightly at the forefront of our discussions in St. Paul, and I’m happy to say we took a big step in that direction yesterday.
During our floor session, we passed our education and school safety plan. Our bill represents a common sense approach to keeping students, teachers, and staff safe in our classrooms. Not only will this legislation help improve school safety throughout the state, I believe it will also work toward improving outcomes for our young learners in Minnesota.
Some of the bill highlights include:
- Championing a multifaceted approach to give school districts the resources and flexibility they need to address student safety and security. That includes expanding the use of long-term facilities maintenance revenue for facility security upgrades, strengthening the state’s commitment to school-linked mental health grants, supporting suicide prevention training for teachers, increasing funding for Safe Schools Revenue, and more
- Strengthening and clarifying state law to address teacher misconduct and teacher licensure including prohibiting sexual relationships between educators and students, even if that student is 18; requiring periodic teacher background checks; and prohibiting the issuance or renewal of a teacher/administrative license or bus driver endorsement for certain felonies or gross misdemeanors involving a minor
- Requiring the Minnesota Department of Education to create a School Report Card —a one-stop-spot for summative and easily accessible school and district ratings that will provide families with a place to research, compare and help determine which school will work best for their child
- Enhancing the transparency of school funding and our commitment to tackling our state’s achievement gap by doubling the number of school audits each year. These audits will discern whether or not education dollars allocated to school districts and dedicated to special education, English-learner and low-income students are reaching the students intended
- Ensuring students are exposed to a wide variety of post-secondary options including the trades and branches of the military
- Strengthening laws that protect kids from school lunch shaming
- Creating a Special Education Working Group to engage stakeholders and examine the factors that are driving rising costs
Also included in the bill is my provision to enrich vocational education throughout the state. The legislation allows students to take vocational classes outside of school hours and was modeled after a program at the Fairmont Public Schools where they offer vocational classes on Saturdays.
The expansion of vocational education in schools is critical in helping our students gain the skills necessary to enter high-demand fields when they graduate. With a demand for skilled workers, we can help fill this jobs gap while also helping Minnesota students find good-paying careers that fit their strengths and interests.
Please Contact Me
With just a few weeks left in the legislative session, I hope you’ll continue to contact me to share your thoughts on any issue. As we’re discussing our larger bills, it’s extremely helpful for me to hear your opinion.
Enjoy your weekend,
Peggy