The First Week of Session
Friends, the first week of the 2022 legislative session is just wrapping up, and there has already been a lot of activity here in St. Paul. All of our committees have begun to meet regularly again. I serve on the Education Finance, Education Policy, and State Government committees. For their designated subject area, these committees are the first stop for important legislation that will impact all of us. If you have any thoughts, ideas, or anything you would like to express on these subjects; please reach out to my office.
More Workers’ Comp for COVID?
Back in the early stages of the pandemic, the Minnesota Legislature voted to award workers’ compensation benefits to frontline workers if they contracted COVID-19 while on the job. At that time, we were in a peacetime emergency and there was a great amount of uncertainty about what COVID was. At the urging of my local firefighters, I voted to temporarily give COVID-19 workers’ compensation to frontline workers.
Yesterday, the Minnesota House took up a bill that would extend COVID-19 workers’ compensation for frontline workers through January 13, 2023. As you know, a lot has changed since this pandemic began. People are no longer scared, we know how to treat this disease, and we are no longer in a peacetime emergency. We have learned to live with COVID-19 just like we have learned to live with the flu and other respiratory diseases.
Additionally, there is no way to determine where an individual contracted COVID-19. If a person gets COVID, they could have gotten it at work, the gym, the grocery store, or any place. Workers’ comp is specifically for on-the-job injuries only. Why should your tax dollars be spent on expensive benefits if it is impossible to determine whether the criteria for receiving those benefits have been met?
Moreover, local municipalities are the ones responsible to pick up the bill for this benefit, not state government. In essence, we are voting on a policy that forces cities and towns to pay out massive amounts of money without their input. This is extremely unfair to small towns and cities who have limited resources.
Finally, this is just another way for the establishment to crank up the scare factor around COVID-19. For two years, powerful politicians have benefitted by keeping people uncertain and afraid. They use this fear to extend wasteful benefits and perpetuate government spending and control. I won’t stand for it, and the people shouldn’t stand for it either. There is no need to take extreme measures on COVID-19. The emergency is over, and we have come through this pandemic in spite of our government’s attempts to destroy us.
For all these reasons, I voted against extending this workers’ compensation benefit through January 13, 2023. Unfortunately, the House voted to pass this bill by a vote of 124-8.
To see my speech on this issue, click here.
Steve Drazkowski