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State Representative Tom Hackbarth
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
651-296-2439
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Email update
Budget work remains as end of session approaches
Email Update – Budget
State Representative Tom Hackbarth
May 19, 2011
The constitutional deadline for the Legislature to adjourn is Monday and Gov. Dayton still won’t get off his plan to tax us more in order to grow government.
What’s worse? He’s spinning the facts to accuse the Legislature of being unwilling to compromise. The reality is we already offered significant compromise by raising our proposed spending total to account for an updated state revenue projection.
Minnesota has a budget of approximately $30.2 billion this biennium, $32.5 billion if you count one-time stimulus money from Washington. Many of us in the Legislature wanted to keep state spending flat into the next biennium because our taxpayers already are paying too much, especially during a recession.
When our latest budget forecast came out in February, it indicated state revenue would rise to $34 billion in the upcoming two-year cycle. The House compromised by increasing its budget to that level. Many of us are not delighted with that increase, but we can tolerate it since it remains within our projected revenue.
Meantime, the governor proposed billions of dollars in new taxes in order to increase spending to $37 billion. He is still proposing approximately $36 billion in spending and now is throwing stones in the media, saying the Legislature is unwilling to compromise.
It would be nice if the governor would quit the narrow-minded approach of telling our successful business owners they need to pay more to support his spending. Taxes imposed on businesses mean higher prices for consumers and lower wages for workers and the Minnesota Dept. of Revenue agrees. Click here to read more.
Floor sessions have lasted well past midnight (and even into daybreak) this week in order for us to finalize our budget package and get it to the governor for his action. We got our work done to balance the budget without raising taxes and now it is Dayton's move. I urge him to acknowledge the Legislature already has made a significant compromise and get off his plan to tax us more to feed government growth.
Sincerely,
Tom Hackbarth
State Representative, District 48A
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