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State Representative Andrew Falk
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
651-296-4228
For more information contact: Sandy Connolly 651-296-8877
NEWS COLUMN
Governor once again passes the buck to local governments
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
On Thursday (Jan. 15), I attended the Governor’s State of the State address. This time-honored event has allowed the standing governor to offer his vision and ideas about what Minnesota is and what Minnesota can aspire to be in both times of good and bad. I felt very fortunate to experience this tradition and was truly optimistic that the governor would offer meaningful and reasonable recommendations for addressing our state’s budget deficit. While he began on a high note of calling for bipartisan cooperation, I soon found his speech to be long on glitz, but short on content. I was the most insulted by his seemingly earnest plea to legislators to not raise taxes while in the same breath proposing deep and significant cuts to local governments. Once again, our governor is passing the buck to our local units of governments. He is attempting to preserve his pledge of “no new taxes" while forcing our local units of governments to continually raise property taxes just to provide essential services. In fact, instead of offering a clear plan for economic recovery for our state, the Governor actually proposed adding to the deficit by proposing new spending. While we in the House may also include new spending in some bills, we will show citizens how we will pay for it – details that were severely lacking from the Governor’s proposals.
I believe the Governor will make most of his cuts in the health and human services budget and local government aid. Cuts such as these can be devastating for rural Minnesota, where we rely on our nursing homes and community hospitals not just to care for our citizens, but for jobs and economic stability. Essential services such as police and fire departments, infrastructure and roads will all suffer as towns and counties are forced to make more cuts. Moreover, a layoff, whether it is in the private sector or the public sector, is still a layoff. I cannot think of a worse problem than further exacerbating the current unemployment situation.
While the Governor continues to claim we have a bad business climate in Minnesota; publicly stating at two events that Minnesota has the “third highest” business tax in the entire world. Apparently he forgot about countries like Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Italy, etc. not to mention all of the exemptions in our business tax code, I would contend that our business climate is actually strong because of the investments we have historically made in our people.
I cautiously await seeing the Governor’s budget recommendations later this month. At that time we’ll get a better understanding of what kind of challenges we face with our budget negotiations. In the meantime, please continue to contact me with your suggestions and feedback. We are all in this together, and I look forward to hearing from you. You can reach me at 651-296-4228 or by email at rep.andrew.falk@house.mn.
As far as policy goes, this week, I along with other representatives introduced the Minnesota False Claims Act. This legislation mirrors the current Federal False Claims Act which puts in place incentives and protections for whistleblowers who expose fraudulent activity committed against the government while allowing the government to collect up to three-times the damages plus accompanying fees. The Federal False Claims Act was actually implemented by President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War as a way to combat fraudulent contractors who were ripping-off Union forces. Under any circumstances, negligence in the use of state government funds is unacceptable. However, when facing a record $4.8 billion state budget deficit, the issue is far more serious. Minnesota taxpayers deserve assurance that every penny is safeguarded by the full extent of the law. The False Claims Act would protect taxpayer dollars by helping prevent and prosecute costly fraud in state government. I am optimistic this bill will receive the support of the House and the Senate, and be signed into law by the Governor.
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