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Minnesota House of Representatives

State Representative Denny McNamara

359 State Office BuildingState Office Building
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
651-296-3135

For more information contact: Jason Wenisch 651-296-2317

Posted: 2007-05-24 00:00:00
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OP/ED COLUMN

NEWS AND VIEWS FROM REP. DENNY McNAMARA

Hi everybody,

The 2007 Legislative Session has ended on time, with the bulk of our major funding bills debated during the final hours. I thought I'd share a few highlights of the final legislative day.

I voted against the K-12 Education bill as funding is skewed and there is a great funding disparity between Minneapolis schools and those in Hastings and South Washington County. This bill gave Minneapolis schools a $1,416 increase and only $936 for District 200 in Hastings. The numbers are comparable for District 833.

The tax bill puts state government on auto-pilot, which is simply bad business. It is the job of the Legislature to prioritize and decide how to spend the taxpayer's money, and it should remain that way. On the other hand, the environment legislation has many great provisions that will protect our land, waterways, and air and I was happy to support it.

I thought two bills really had misplaced priorities. Our state government bill increases legislative funding by 19 percent. This is after the majority raised per diem (meal money) and offered lawmakers year round housing even though we're a part time legislature. That's just wrong. FYI: I did not accept any increase in my daily per diem payments.

Our health and human services legislation also increased spending by 19 percent, yet only offers our nursing homes a two percent annual funding increase. Again, with a $2.2 billion surplus, we should have been able to give our long-term care facilities and their workers a needed raise, especially after significantly increasing funding in the health area.

The good news is, the work is finished. The bad news is we could have prioritized better.

As always I will continue to do my best on your behalf. Have a great summer and stay in touch!

Denny

P.S. Please feel free to contact me at any time regarding legislative issues. Either drop me an email at rep.denny.mcnamara@house.mn, or call me at home 651-437-2597.

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