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Rep. Dan Schoen - E-Update - January 10, 2014

Friday, January 10, 2014

Friends,

 

With a new year comes new laws, and January 1, 2014, brought a bevy of them. I thought that I should give you a heads up on some of them.

 

Sen. Katie Sieben and I teamed up to pass legislation increasing community awareness about chemical spills. Thanks to this change, the state emergency response center must alert local 911 emergency dispatch centers in the first 24 hours after it has been notified of a chemical spill.

 

Local leaders had become concerned when they would read reports of an incident several days after the spill rather than having been notified immediately. This law means our families and neighbors will be much better informed, and residents will be safer as a result.

 

Another big development is the expansion of Medical Assistance. An estimated additional 40,000 low-wage earners and their families may qualify for Medical Assistance coverage as a result of a new law that extends coverage to those making up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. People who wouldn’t have received health care coverage will finally be eligible, and the federal government will pay 100 percent of the cost for adults without children who qualify through 2016. Beginning in 2017, the federal government will gradually reduce that support to 90 percent of the cost for 2020 and subsequent years.

 

We also passed a law extending the current “ban-the-box” law to private employers. In 2009, the legislature passed a law that made public employers wait until applicants are selected for job interviews to ask whether they have a criminal record or criminal history. On Jan. 1, we became the third state in the union to give potential applicants for jobs in the private sector the same protection.

It’s called the “ban-the-box” law because it makes illegal the question on job applications that asks potential employees to check a box to indicate whether they have ever been convicted of a felony or a gross misdemeanor.

For jobs that don’t include an interview, employers cannot ask about criminal issues until there is a conditional offer of employment.

Another new law that may affect District 54A is a measure requiring home sellers to disclose radon testing results. Radon is the second-leading cause of lung cancer, and one in three Minnesota homes is at risk from it. The law doesn’t require testing, but if sellers have knowledge of radon in the home, they must inform the buyers and hand over records pertaining to any testing.

Help staying warm

Think of the past week and now try to imagine living without heat in your home. Some in Minnesota live that way, but they don’t have to. The Minnesota Department of Commerce wants low-income Minnesotans – especially seniors, people with disabilities and families with children – to know that there is help available to them through the Energy Assistance Program (EAP).

Heat is not a luxury in Minnesota; it is a necessity. No one should have to choice between paying their heating bill and buying groceries or medicine. Yet many of our neighbors are put in this position.

EAP pays the utility company directly on behalf of eligible households. Qualifying families must apply for assistance at the local service provider in their area; Minnesota has 32 local service providers. A list of local service providers and information on applying for the Minnesota Energy Assistance Program is available by visiting the Energy Assistance section of the Division of Energy Resources website or by calling 1-800-657-3710 or 651-539-1882.

Other forms of assistance may be available through county social service programs, community-based organizations, and nonprofit agencies. See the Stay Warm Minnesota webpage for a list of resources.

Happy New Year, and stay warm,

 

 

Dan