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State Representative Michael Beard
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
651-296-8872
For more information contact: Jodi Boyne 651-296-0640
NEWS COLUMN
LOOKING BACK OVER THE 2007 SESSION
By Mike Beard
Shakopee & Prior Lake, State Representative
The 2007 legislative session was different than any I’ve had the privilege to serve in. When I took office, the state faced the deepest budget deficit in our history. Two years later, we still faced a deficit but it was much smaller. This year, my fifth representing you, we had a budget surplus of more than $2 billion. That makes for quite a change in the tone and direction of our work. Add to that the voter’s choice to elect a majority of Democrats last year and you can see how 2007 was a whole new experience compared to my first two terms.
Being in the minority caucus presents less opportunity to get bills heard and passed. Nevertheless, with the help of fellow minority Republican Senator Claire Robling, I was able to successfully guide a few bills through at the request of Scott County. One will allow the county to change the way it oversees our public libraries, another will allow Scott County to streamline the hiring process for new employees. The other could result in a new, experimental form of fuel production to power the biomass heat and power facility in Shakopee.
Because the majority controls the agenda for all the committees, our job in the minority was to try to pull their agenda in what we think is a better direction. You can look to this year’s renewable energy legislation as an example. The original proposals were very far from the mainstream and, in my opinion, potentially disastrous for our economy and the electric energy grid. With some unfortunate exceptions, we were able to bring a lot of those bills back from the radical edge and at the very least prevent serious harm to the forces that power our lifestyles.
The significant disadvantage to the change in power from Republican to Democratic hands was what I believe to be the over-emphasis on Minneapolis and St. Paul. Nowhere was this more evident than in the way the new leaders chose to fund schools. Instead of continuing the tradition of adding money to the per-student formula that treats all students equally, House and Senate leaders (from Minneapolis and Saint Paul) decided instead to put the money into programs that send more money to their home districts and less to suburban and rural districts.
The result speaks for itself. Minneapolis is inline to get an $804 increase for every student. Compare that to $487 for Prior Lake and $526 for Shakopee and you can see why a number of my colleagues joined my frustration. Even worse, this is on top of the already grossly-disproportional amounts Minneapolis already receives - $12,300 for next year per student – as opposed to $7,800 and $8,200 for each student in Prior Lake and Shakopee, respectively. It’s not only unfair, it’s an abuse of power and shows, I think, the new leaders’ lack of concern for schools outside their own legislative districts.
Despite that disappointment, I find a lot of good to come from the session. Tuition increases for higher education should slow or stop all together thanks to more than $300 million of new funding. We’re also preparing for the return of our men and women from the Middle East with new and expanded veterans assistance programs.
So like any legislative session, there are some things I am very pleased with and some things that I wish would have turned out different. The key, then, is finding the right balance. That is an outcome that, hopefully, will always stay the same.
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