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Hello Everyone,
What a week! It was filled with committee meetings as the House swung into action. These first few weeks, committees have informational meetings about their areas of policy, finance and the state agencies of which they have jurisdiction. They also hear from stakeholders that work in that issue area. We did have two floor sessions where we had bill introductions and some discussions on the temporary house rules. I have also introduced my first two bills for this session. One invests in funds to the grant program at the Department of Health & Human Services for the suicide prevention hotline. The other is the bonding bill for St. Louis Park’s Perspectives Inc. program. They work with homeless women/mothers who have addiction by providing housing, job training and therapy. It is a 40 year old program that has had tremendous success.
Even though we just started last week, committees are starting to hear bills. Most of them are non-controversial bills that had been stuck in the large omnibus bill from last session that was vetoed. One example is a bill heard in the Elections Committee. The bill was a statutory change that allows the Minnesota Secretary of State to access federal funds for cybersecurity. Another example is the bill we will be hearing next Tuesday (Jan. 22) in the Transportation Policy & Finance Division. We will be hearing the distracted driving bill that requires hands free cell phone use while driving. This bill was tabled by the Republican majority in the House at the end of last session despite its bipartisan support. It has a much better future this session.
Here is the committee schedule grid for the House. And, if you are interested, you can watch hearings at the House website live or view previous hearings in the archives here.
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