Neighbors,
Throughout our nation’s history, more than 41 million men and women have served our nation during wartime, from the American Revolution to today’s global war on terror.
Our state, Minnesota, has a proud history of serving our nation. We were the first state to respond to President Abraham Lincoln’s request for volunteer regiments during the Civil War.
Today we celebrate the nearly 400,000 veterans in the state of Minnesota.
Like you, I appreciate and honor those who wear our uniform and I will not forget their sacrifices, nor those of their families.
As state representative, I am honored to represent 2,520 veterans from our District 31A at the Capitol in St. Paul.
As Speaker of the House, I have made it a priority to improve Minnesota veterans’ quality of life and show gratitude for their sacrifices. Some of the initiatives we successfully passed into law include:
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Veterans Health Care: Increased funding for health care in Veteran Homes by $16.905 million, an increase of over 16%. Legislative Auditor will conduct a review of veteran home finances to discover administrative sources of cost savings to increase sustainability without impacting veterans’ care.
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Expedited Licensing: Provided speedier licensing procedures for active military and recently discharged veterans in variety of engineering, health care, and service professions.
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Improved Veteran Small Business Performance: Simplified application process for Veteran Owned Small Businesses to receive state certification and be given preference points in state procurement contracts.
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Eased Military Document Search: Allowed location of important DD214 and DD215 discharge paperwork to be filed with state Department of Veterans Affairs. These forms are filed with a veteran’s county of last residence, and can be hard to track down decades later in life. Forms will still be privately held with counties, but veterans can discover location of the document with single call.
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Military Spouses and Families Day: Sunday before Memorial Day created as new holiday to honor sacrifices of families and spouses of military members and veterans.
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Speedy Residence Status for Education: Allowed new Minnesota National Guard enlistees to immediately become state residents for purposes of higher education rather than waiting a year to utilize their educational enlistment bonuses.
We also passed a bill in the Minnesota House that would encourage military retirees to stay in Minnesota and help them keep more of the money and benefits they have earned. The fact is: there are two million retired military members in America today, and Minnesota is home to less than 1 percent of them.
House Republicans prioritized veterans in our tax bill, passing legislation that would have exempted veteran military pay and pensions from state income tax. Minnesota is one of a small number of remaining states that taxes veteran benefits.
While we were not successful in getting the Senate Majority and Governor Dayton to approve the measure, we will try again next year. If our tax relief legislation is enacted, a veteran with 20 years of experience could receive up to $2,000 each year from exempting military retirement pay.
Frankly, we owe our veterans and their families for their defense of our freedom and values here in America.
This morning I attended the Veteran’s Day Breakfast at the American Legion in St. Francis and participated in the St. Francis Christian School Veteran’s Day Service. I encourage you to please join me today in honoring all veterans who have selflessly stepped forward to serve our nation.
God Bless our veterans,
Kurt