Dear Neighbor,
Thank you to all of our Veterans who have served our country and continue to do so today. I am very proud of the work we have done to help homeless veterans in Minnesota over the last two years. You can see some of our efforts in this recent Kare11 story.
By now you have seen the stories confirming my fear of a special session noted to you in my last update. Governor Dayton has vetoed the E-12 Education Bill, The Agriculture and Environment Bill and the Jobs and Energy bill.
Governor Dayton has been resolute in requesting adequate funding for our schools and providing voluntary Pre-K programs for every four year old in Minnesota. Unfortunately, his request fell by the wayside in favor of partisan gamesmanship. All you have to do is take a short drive to Prescott, WI and visit with families to see how popular and effective universal preschool programs are. Voluntary Pre-K isn’t the only problem in the now vetoed Education bill. In today’s dollars, we’re 24% below the education funding levels we were at in 2003. In that time we’ve seen class sizes increase and schools cut programs and staff. Quite frankly our school districts need more than a minor increase in funding. As of now, Governor Dayton has said he’s willing to start from square one on the entire E-12 budget.
There also won’t be a tax bill this year. Republicans promised tax relief and lower spending, but neither happened. However, they actually increased taxes by $30 million and passed the largest budget in state history. During the last two years when Democrats were in the majority and I sat on the tax committee, we eliminated the very taxes that the Republicans restored. Minnesota has a projected surplus of $2 billion. I can’t even begin to understand the rationale of raising taxes.
If you haven’t seen the video, it’s worth watching how the Jobs and Energy bill was rammed through with only moments left in the session. No member of the legislature, outside of those involved with making the backroom deal, was allowed to read the bill before the vote. Just as the Republicans had done all session, Speaker Daudt moved forward with the vote and refused to allow any discussion of a bill that many of us hadn’t seen. The lack of transparency is shocking.
Your state budget is now over $42 billion. Republicans and Democrats alike look over the budget carefully, paying special attention to ways to find efficiencies and prevent waste and fraud. It’s important to all of us. It can take years for us to become experts in areas of law and fully understand what the implications of language in a bill are. We each carve out areas to work on and educate our colleagues on those through honest and open debate. That’s how we protect the public from poor legislation.
If the trend we saw this session continues, then plan on special interest groups and their lobbyist running the legislature. We’re moving in a direction where we no longer have input in the process of governing. After all, would you like to take a vote on spending $110 million and not know a single things about what spending that money will do for Minnesotans? I wouldn’t and I didn’t.
I’ll keep you posted on the pending special session. I’m sorry to those of you who get upset about special sessions, but this special session will be a minor inconvenience compared to the damage the legislation he vetoed would have done to the state. I stand with Governor Dayton in his vetoes and hope we can quickly resolve our differences before layoff notices are sent out.
Sincerely,
Dan Schoen