Between election day and the deadline for officials to produce voter lists, lawmakers have time to make changes to address some privacy concerns. Yet legislators seem divided on what to do, if anything.
Legislative leaders’ comments suggest there could be some (but not too much) new spending and some (but not too much) tax cutting.
The mix of co-signers on Rep. Rena Moran’s bill indicates that this issue has the potential to transcend party politics.
The request —$20 million in this year’s supplemental budget — would be distributed to small organizations that work to respond to the impacts of gun violence and to de-escalate confrontations that can lead to gunfire.
Because — besides the inherent sexiness of the topic — Minnesota doesn’t account for inflation in state spending forecasts. Why that may (or may not) matter.
On Tuesday night, precinct caucuses for both the DFL and Minnesota GOP will be held in more than 4,000 locations around the state.
It is an election year, after all.
Skeptical lawmakers in both parties ripped the proposal as misguided, particularly for rural Minnesota.
The measure, deemed the “coal holiday bill,” got its first hearing in a Minnesota House committee on Tuesday.
Running against big cities has long been part of GOP election campaigns. It is especially potent when there are no Republicans elected from those cities, as in the case in Minnesota.
The current round of changes is focused on easing bureaucracy, paperwork and monitoring the agency has decided is redundant or unhelpful.
“If you are not in with your paperwork by June first, I cannot guarantee,” you will get a REAL ID by the Oct. 1 federally mandated deadline, said Emma Corrie, director of the state’s Driver and Vehicle Services division.
“There’s a different level of accountability when someone can see a video of you,” said state Rep. Jamie Becker-Finn, a Roseville DFLer who sits on the Lessard-Sams Outdoor Heritage Council.
In order to get a proposed change on the ballot, they’ll need to build support at the state Capitol for a majority vote in both the House and the Senate.
Meanwhile, at the Legislature, bills by Republicans and DFLers are also seeking to respond to the reality and perception that Metro Transit trains and buses aren’t safe.
As a lack of affordable child care has increasingly become a concern around Minnesota, new spending for the CCAP program is one way legislators from both parties are mulling how the government can help families enroll kids in early learning.
All members of the House and Senate are meeting at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs for an all-day gathering called the “One Minnesota Legislative Policy Conference.”
That’s 81 more than the number found in California, a state with seven times Minnesota’s population.
As the 2020 Legislature kicks off, here are some key issues — numerically.
With the House and Senate still split between the DFL and the GOP and a critical election on the horizon in November, the session could end with few accomplishments.
