Dear Neighbor,
Shout-out to Jada Bierschbach of the ROCORI Spartans girls basketball team for recently scoring her 1,000th point! Congratulations, Jada, on this outstanding feat and best of luck to you and the Spartans.
As for this week’s news from the Capitol:
State surplus rises
Minnesota Management & Budget issued its February economic forecast this week and it projects a $9.3 billion biennial surplus. That figure is up $1.5 billion from the already historic $7.7 billion surplus projected in November.
This is a much better economic scenario for our state than the horrific shortfall projections issued earlier in the pandemic. While we avoided that crisis, a different set of issues has arisen. Namely, our state has a massive over-collection of tax dollars at a time when Minnesota families and businesses are struggling to make ends meet amid higher prices.
We can help mitigate that pain by providing permanent, meaningful relief this session. The state’s government is fully funded for the biennium so there’s no excuse to not get these surplus dollars back in the hands of overtaxed Minnesotans. We can start by ending the state tax on Social Security.
Deadline to stop tax increase nears
Legislation must be enacted by March 15 to replenish our state’s depleted unemployment insurance funds to prevent a tax increase from taking place. The Senate overwhelmingly passed its clean UI bill two weeks ago on a bipartisan vote. Gov. Walz, House Republicans, Senate Republicans, and Senate Democrats all support full UI relief.
The holdup is over in the House, where the majority has yet to put forward a clean, bipartisan bill to address this issue. This is causing unnecessary uncertainty for businesses who may face significant tax increases. A recent article sheds some light on the actual tax increase costs, with anecdotes from Mankato that apply statewide:
"Andy Wilke of Greater Mankato Growth said he’s heard of a local bank that would see its unemployment insurance tax rate increase by 130% — meaning the bank would pay another $21,000 this year. Another local business would see its taxes raised from $6,000 to $32,000. And a local wholesaler would get an extra $12,000 on its tax bill this year."
While this tax formally would be imposed on businesses, we’d all feel it one way or another with costs being passed on to consumers. This, at a time when the state has nearly $10 billion in surplus tax revenue and people already are seeing price increases at 40-year highs.
We need to pass a bill to settle this issue asap.
Package to make our cities safer
House Republicans this week unveiled our 2022 public safety priorities in response to an ongoing rise in violent crimes in Minnesota. The package focused on three key areas: crime prevention and accountability for criminals; police recruitment and retention; and holding the criminal justice system accountable.
I am pleased that a bill (H.F. 3387) I have authored providing pathway-to-policing grant funding is included in the package. We’ll take a closer look at this provision and others included in the Safety in our Cities legislation in an upcoming newsletter.
For now, as always, your input is welcome.
Sincerely,
Lisa