Neighbors,
Last week was a busy week at the Capitol. The Ways and Means committee, which I am a member of, had meetings almost every day to pass all of the DFL omnibus bills. Here are some notable provisions in those bills:
The Health and Human Services Omnibus bill, coming in at about 1130 pages, is believed to be the largest bill in state history. It includes a cut to nursing homes across the state of over $68 million, which will be incredibly harmful to Greater Minnesota. When we have a billion dollar surplus and the state’s nursing homes are struggling, a cut like this is unconscionable.
Across all of the omnibus bills, there are a total of $12 billion in tax increases over the next four years. The Tax omnibus bill only accounts for about a third of those increases ($4 billion), with most of the rest coming from the Transportation Omnibus (almost $4 billion), the Health and Human Services Omnibus (about $2.5 billion), and the Jobs and Energy Omnibus (over $2 billion).
The Education Omnibus bill includes a rollback of significant bipartisan teacher licensing reforms passed in the last few years, which will lower standards and make it more difficult to get effective teachers in the classroom. It also opens the door for those convicted of domestic violence to get a teaching license, and eliminates four-year-olds from eligibility for Early Learning Scholarships.
Until next time,
Ron