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Minnesota House of Representatives

State Representative Debra Kiel

337 State Office BuildingState Office Building
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
651-296-5091

For more information contact: House GOP Communications 651-296-5520

Posted: 2011-04-08 00:00:00
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SESSION UPDATE

News From Representative Kiel’s Desk

Friends –

This week we passed the last three remaining omnibus bills. Late Wednesday we voted and passed the Health and Human Services Bill.

Providing health and human services in the state of Minnesota has always been a point of disagreement between parties. This week though the Health and Human Services committee proposed their budget on the House floor and it passed late Wednesday night. This bill does include a 5% increase in its budget but does decrease future spending. It’s important to remember that last year the state received $2.3 billion in stimulus funds which allowed Minnesota to expand a health care program. This one time expansion has now put Minnesota in a tough position, because we cannot continue to fund it. Through this bill we are finding ways to keep the necessary programs and make sure that they are being used in a way they are supposed to and take away programs that are not working.

This year we are looking at a $9.1 billion budget for health and human services. This is 28.9 % of the general fund. The $500 million increase is much lower than Governor Dayton’s proposed increase of $1.8 billion. We cannot afford to raise taxes on Minnesotans and therefore our increase is much less than Governor Dayton’s. We need to learn to live within our means.

This bill also presents a 15% reduction in projected spending increases. We cannot continue to spend and spend and spend. It is time for state government to restore fiscal responsibility and make our system sustainable.

Our main concern is to protect priorities, including seniors, the disabled and the safety net. This bill keeps funding for our nursing homes and does not include any cuts to them. This bill also promotes paths to increased independence for disability waiver recipients by requiring more frequent evaluations and determination of level of need. The bill also does not cut childcare, CCSA or MH grants.

The proposed bill also would repeal Governor Dayton’s early Medical Assistance enrollment (Enrolling in the national health care system). This bill also promotes system-wide reform, including incentives for high cost providers to become more efficient while maintaining quality. It also allows counties to have fewer MOE’s and more local control. We give them the freedom to decide how to serve their own residents based on local circumstances.
With this bill we are putting Minnesotans first and allowing them to keep more of their hard earned money. This bill helps our state balance the budget, deliver core services and put Minnesota on track for a sustainable future.


Governor Dayton also declared a state of emergency for several counties in Minnesota. Please check out this website for more information: http://mn.gov/governor/newsroom/pressreleasedetail.jsp?id=10399
Flooding information from MN Homeland Security and Emergency Management: http://www.hsem.state.mn.us/eoc/2011flood/index.asp

I always appreciate your input. If you could please fill out this online survey, if you haven’t already, I would greatly appreciate your feedback. Www.surveymonkey.com/1Bsurvey

Thank you,

Deb

P.S. As always I am happy to help and if anyone would like to make an appointment to see me please don’t hesitate to call my office and schedule an appointment with my assistant Stacey.

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