For more information contact: Austin Bleess 651-296-5529

NEWS COLUMN

LEGISLATIVE UPDATE: ENVIRONMENT

Fellow District 32B residents,

This year over 2,500 bills were authored by members of the legislature. Some of these bills become laws, but many do not. In an effort to wade through all of these bills and give you an idea of what became law and what was vetoed by the Governor, I will start a series of email updates on the major issue areas. Some of these areas will include education, environment, transportation, healthcare, taxes, and public safety, just to name a few. As we go through this series I would encourage you to contact me with any questions you might have about these topics. And please contact me if you have a question or suggestion for a future email update.

This week’s email update is a recap of action taken to protect our environment.

An important part of Minnesota is its great outdoor heritage. Many people from our district enjoy weekend trips to the cabin, spending time in the great outdoors, or enjoying our great local parks and trails system. We all have a duty to help keep these areas clean and to protect our environment. This year the legislature passed numerous bills aimed at protecting our Minnesota’s great outdoors.

E-Waste
One way to keep our environment clean is to make sure people aren’t leaving their trash along the side of the road. Many counties around the state have seen an increase in old technology equipment such as televisions and computers and have been looking for solutions to dispose of this new ‘e-waste’. These out dated pieces of equipment are sometimes very large and add a great deal of expense to the usual disposal process. The legislature passed a bill this year that requires technology manufacturers to recycle, or arrange for recycling, old televisions and computer monitors at a rate based upon how many new televisions and computer monitor they sell.

I voted for the compromise proposal in the end, but I am going to continue to monitor the requirements put forth by the Legislature to make sure we are not asking the manufacturers to pay fines for waste that they cannot collect. Because we all know where those fines will end up being collected – from each of us on our next computer or television purchase. Computers, televisions and monitors are all built better and last longer, and that is a very positive outcome for consumers. However, how many of you have one or more TVs that are over 10 years old? Or a computer that is 5 years old? We all have them and should dispose of them properly, but we should not require manufacturers to collect waste that is not there and then pay a fine when they cannot find any additional e-waste. In that circumstance, all we are doing is adding to the cost for new products and creating a government slush fund.

Mercury restrictions
The legislature also passed tough restrictions on the use of mercury in products. We constantly hear about the dangers of mercury and lead in various products. It seems almost daily we hear of a new recall on products that contain too much lead. The legislature banned the sale of ovens, over-the-counter drugs, cosmetics, and numerous other items that contain mercury.

Funding Our Outdoor Heritage
We also took great strides in protecting our lakes and streams. As part of the omnibus 2007 Environment, Energy and Commerce Bill, the legislature appropriated $7.3 million to fight against invasive species such as zebra mussels, Eurasian water milfoil, spiny waterfleas, and Asian carp. Law enforcement agencies will receive funds to provide them with the tools and training required to do inspections at water access points. Grants will also be provided to help manage invasive species that are already in public waters. We are bringing together the local communities with the DNR with these grants, in an effort to share the responsibility to keep public waters clean.

The legislature also increased access to Minnesota’s Great Outdoors. The DNR will submit a plan to the legislature before next session for a walk-in public access program to encourage landowners to voluntary make their land available for walk-in access by the public for hunting and fishing under programs administered by the DNR. We also increased funding for State Parks and trails, along with many metro area parks.

Dedicated funding for Outdoor Heritage
One thing that did not get through the legislative process this session was a dedicated funding bill for our Outdoor Heritage. Dedicating funding for the outdoors has been discussed at the Capitol for nearly 10 years. The amendment that many of us outdoors enthusiasts have been working on over the years would take a small sliver of the state sales tax, the original fraction was 3/16th of 1%, and put it back into enhancing and maintaining our natural resources. The fraction of the percentage was calculated based on the products and expenses outdoors men and women spend when they participate in their favorite activity or activities. You buy a fishing rod, you pay sales tax. You buy a tent for camping, you pay sales tax. And so on. This was in addition to the liceneses and fees that they already pay for a particular season or park entrance.

I have been an co-author on this bill since I was elected in 2003, and it was really disappointing to me to have to vote against something I have worked so hard on over the past 4 years. See, the House Democrats decided to get greedy and include a lot more groups: arts, humanities, Public Television. And, on top of that, they decided to make this another NEW tax. That was never, ever the intent of this common sense legislation. We didn’t want to force people to vote on a new tax increase or pit one group against another; we simply wanted to take a small portion of what we were paying in sales tax and put it back into that natural resource. Stock a lake with fish so that our kids or grandchildren will have a lake to fish in 50 years from now.

But nope, it had to be their way or no way. And in the worst possible case of salt in the wound, the last proposal that we voted on had the outdoors getting the smallest percentage of the funding. So not only did they steal our good idea and try to capitalize on the hard work of many good people – they gave us the smallest portion of the sales tax. I described this horrible deal on the House floor similar to when you go on a long fishing trip. Everyone pitches in, cleans fish, cooks meals, helps with camp clean-up, fills the bait buckets for the next day and gases up the boats. But then there’s always that one guy (or gal) who just doesn’t feel the need to do all that ‘little stuff’ and sits around or sleeps in; but come time to fish or even better, eat some shore lunch – he’s the first one in line with his fork and his big mouth.

So if this bill does end up passing during the next session, voters will be left with a horrible false choice; vote for a tax increase to fund the arts and Public Radio and maybe a little for stocking fish in a lake. Or, say no to yet another new tax increase by the Minnesota Democrats that are running the State Legislature. What a horrible thing to do to people who were working on something so near and dear to their hearts.

These just a few of the many highlights on what the legislature do for the environment and natural resources this year. If you have any questions about specific areas that are not mentioned or if you would like a more detailed explanation of some of the areas I discussed – please feel free to contact me by replying to this email or calling my office.

Thank you again for signing up for these Legislative Updates! And, please email me with any questions or policy areas that you would like to see explained or discussed in a future Legislative Update. Thank you, again, for the privileged of representing you in St. Paul!

Best personal regards,

Kurt

P.S. Please feel free to pass this along to fellow 32B residents, family or friends.