Dear Neighbor,
It has been omnibus bill week in the Legislature, with both the House and the Senate taking up their respective packages for votes on preliminary approval. This will set the stage for final negotiations in the hopes agreements are reached before the Legislature is schedule to adjourn May 23.
Here is a look at that and more:
Unemployment insurance bill update
The House is expected later today to take a vote on final passage of legislation to repay the deficit in Minnesota’s unemployment insurance trust fund and turn back an unnecessary tax hike on Minnesota employers. I hope to see this issue finally be resolved after languishing in the House for months. The House majority added additional spending in other areas to the Senate’s clean UI bill, which complicated matters. We will see how today’s session goes and I may address this issue in greater detail in another newsletter.
Education package
A package of education and early childhood provisions was among the first omnibus bills to reach the House floor. As a member of House committees on both subjects, it also is a bill of great interest to me.
In a nutshell, this omnibus bill doesn’t do enough to help our children overcome the extraordinary setbacks they have experienced the last couple of years. Overall, the package places too much emphasis on imposing new mandates on our schools, with bureaucrats – not parents – deciding what is best for our kids.
The bill also increases education spending by $1,400 per pupil in Minneapolis St. Paul, compared with a $775 increase for kids in Greater Minnesota. The disparity in funding between rural and Twin Cities-area schools has been a growing problem and this bill exacerbates that divide.
I also have strong concerns that changes to early childhood learning proposed by the House majority proposes in its bill would decimate family childcare providers by pulling 4-year-old preschoolers into public schools. There are numerous flaws in the House legislation as written, from potentially causing upheaval in the private childcare providers – both family child care and child care centers, to local school districts picking winners and losers by determining allotments for children allowed to enroll in the “mixed delivery systems” – state funding in tow.
Upcoming omnibus bills
Omnibus packages related to taxes, health and human services and public safety are among those yet to be received on the House floor. With a $10 billion state surplus, there is much room for tax relief. Public safety is another area where we need to capitalize on this session’s opportunity to get a grip on violent crime in our state. And, in health and human services, I hope we are able to address long-term care and direct care provider funding.
We’ll take a closer look at what the House majority brings to the floor in an upcoming message. The Legislature’s deliberate pace sometimes can make it seem as though progress is out of reach at the Capitol, but we still have time to deliver on these issues and more. I hope we are able to have a strong finish to accomplish positive results on the session’s most pressing issues.
Sincerely,
Lisa