Dear Friends and Neighbors, 

 

This has been a slower week on the senate floor but much of the work is being done in committee as we approach the first deadline. This is when bills must get a hearing in one body or die.  Some will come back to life as amendments to other bills, but many are done for the session. This is is a good moment to catch up.  

On February 28, we learned that the state has about a $19 billion surplus. (After Democrats passed a bill to automatically spend the amount of inflation, the surplus comes to about $17.5 billion.)

 

Democrats have big plans for the surplus. If their early session insanity is any indicator, it is going to be a laundry list of extreme, ridiculous government spending on programs and bureaucracy. Every spending proposal is on the table, no matter how wasteful, unproven, or extreme it might be. The only thing we can be pretty sure of is that taxpayers won’t get much, if any, tax relief.  Democrats want to pay people not to work, pay them for belonging to a protected class, feed all school children regardless of whether their parents can afford to pay to feed them, and redefine "school children" up to age 22!  At some point there will be more people in the cart, than pulling the cart in our state economy.  The democrats are racing to get us there.

 

The surplus belongs to the taxpayers who built it. Giving it back needs to be our number one priority. That is why Senate Republicans rolled out a plan to return the surplus to you. It’s called the Give it Back plan, and it is straightforward:

 

• Social Security tax relief
• Permanent tax relief
• Property tax relief
• Direct relief rebates

In the House, I served many years on the Subcommittee on Employee Relations. This body oversees and approves or disapproves of the contracts negotiated by the various state government unions and the Administration.  This week, in State and Local Government and Veterans committee we heard a bill that essentially removes the legislature and this subcommittee from that process. As a result, the contracts that the Governor's staff negotiates will go into force without legislative approval.

 
Proponents of the bill, including several union bosses who testified, complained about how the legislature had disagreed with contract terms in the past, delaying policies or pay increases. In other words, the legislature was doing its job, protecting taxpayer money, and refusing to allow government union employees to give themselves pay increases without a check on the purse strings.

 
This puts government unions in a position far more advantageous than even private sector unions.  A private sector union knows that there is a limit to how much it can bargain with an employer without the employer going broke.  Government unions know that to balance the budget, the government will raise revenue, either by cutting services or raising taxes.  Either way, the taxpayer is the loser.

 
Moreover, we currently have a situation where the party in power, in the House, the Senate, and the Governor’s office, are all recipients of large donations from the unions.  Making this change under these circumstances is an abuse of power and a blatant conflict of interest.  I called out this conflict in the committee by reading a list of committee members who had received large contributions from unions and the number of their donations. 

I am tough on bonding bills.  I think our bonding (state borrowing) process is broken when less-than-critical projects are funded ahead of infrastructure and other necessities. The usual result is a bill with some important projects and a whole bunch of things that we shouldn’t be putting on the state’s credit card at all, should be paying cash for, or asking the people who want it to fund it themselves.   

This week, a bill I chief authored received a hearing.  The Goodhue Regional Wastewater project will support five communities: Zumbrota, Pine Island, Goodhue, Wanamingo, and the Prairie Island Indian Community/Elk Run Property. This project is an important one for these communities that cannot fund it on their own. The project will bring significant economies of scale, making it more affordable for the state and these communities than it would be otherwise. In addition, the project contains several environmental protections. It will increase environmental protection by only having one discharge point rather than 5, and discharge will meet higher standards. It will bring the ability to staff wastewater treatment facilities with greater expertise and consistency. Lastly, It will protect wastewater treatment facilities from future flooding for all communities, but especially in flood-prone ones like Pine Island and Wanamingo. 

I am hopeful that this will project will be successfully funded, as it has bipartisan support and is important for the entire region.  Mayor David Friese testified in support and The Prairie Island Indian Community submitted a letter of support.  Getting the hearing was an important milestone. 

Please contact me to share any issues, concerns, or feedback you have to assist me in best representing you.  The best way to reach me is by email at [email protected] or by phone at 651-296-5612. My legislative assistant is Margaret Martin, and her number is 651-296-4264.  

Sincerely,

Steve Drazkowski

Minnesota Senate, District 20, Wabasha, Goodhue, Winona, Olmsted, and Dakota Counties.

2411 Minnesota Senate Building

95 University Avenue W.
Minnesota Senate Bldg.
St. Paul, MN 55155