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Minnesota Update
While many legislative committees continued to hold informational hearings to help orient new members, the governor’s office began the process of rolling out its budget recommendations for the 2024-25 biennium. In what has become Gov. Walz’s practice in recent years, the administration has featured a different policy priority each day and held press conferences in various locations to tout the governor’s initiatives. The first two policy priorities, education and economic development, were released last week, while the remainder of the budget proposal will be released today or tomorrow.
Education
Last week, Gov. Walz released his recommendations for education funding for the FY 24-25 biennium. The proposal would increase education spending by $5.2 billion this biennium, and a total of $12 billion for the next four years. Significant pieces of the proposal include;
- A four percent per-pupil school funding formula increase for this year and an additional four percent for the following year;
- State funding to ensure free school meals for all students;
- An increase in special education spending;
- Expanding access to existing childcare subsidies and tax credits. Families making under $200,000 a year with one child could receive $4,000 a year for childcare, families with two children could receive $8,000 a year, and families with three children could receive up to $10,500 a year;
- Increased funding for mental health services for students; and
- Creating a new Department of Children, Youth, and Families to better align services and programming currently divided between the Minnesota Department of Human Services and the Minnesota Department of Education.
Economic Future
Gov. Walz also released his budget recommendations for what he called “Recommendations for Economic Future” This part of the budget included several different departments and areas of funding. The following are some highlights:
- Funding for the start-up of the paid medical and family leave program that is currently making its way through the legislature and for state agency compliance with the safe and sick time bill that is being heard in the House of Representatives and Senate as well;
- Various initiatives intended to support small businesses, including the angel investor tax credit;
- Grants for student teachers and loan repayment opportunities for teachers working in teacher-shortage areas;
- Stipends for student teaching;
- Funding for tools to ensure more teachers of color and indigenous teachers can enter the workforce;
- New investment in various broadband and energy grant programs.
House of Representatives Votes to Codify Reproductive Rights
On January 19, 2023, the Minnesota House of Representatives passed H.F. 1 (Kotyza-Witthuhn) which codifies an individual right to autonomous decisions about the individual’s own reproductive health. The bill seeks to put into statute the constitutional rights identified by the Minnesota Supreme Court in the 1995 case Doe v. Gomez. The bill passed the House of Representatives on a vote of 69-65, with Rep. Gene Pelowski (DFL-Winona) being the one Democrat to vote no. The companion file, S.F. 1 (McEwen), continues to move through the committee process, having most recently been heard in the Senate Judiciary and Public Safety committee on January 18, 2023.
Important Dates to Remember:
- January 24, 2023: Governor Walz releases his proposed budget
- TBD, February 2023: Updated budget forecast from MMB
- March 10, 2023: 1st Committee Deadline - committees must act favorably on bills in the House of origin.
- March 24, 2023: 2nd Committee Deadline - committees must act favorably on bills, or companions of bills, that met the first deadline in the other House.
- April 4, 2023, at 5:00pm: 3rd Committee Deadline - committees must act favorably on major appropriation and finance bills.
- April 4, 2023, at 5:00pm - April 10, 2023: Legislative Recess
- May 22, 2023: Deadline to adjourn legislative session
Federal Update
Congress is back — and House GOP leaders' big plans for the start of the 118th face a slowdown. Senate Judiciary looks into Ticketmaster's Taylor Swift meltdown. Heavy turnover and a tight timeline could pose a challenge in writing a farm bill. Here’s your federal CapWatch for Monday, January 23.
House GOP 'Ready-To-Go' Legislation Faces a Slowdown
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) projected that the chamber would take up a slate of 11 specific measures in the first two weeks of the 118th Congress. But after a drawn-out speaker battle ate up the first week, that fortnight target quickly drifted out of reach. The House passed five of the measures in its second week in session, ranging from a ban on the sale of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to entities affiliated with the Chinese government to a bill supporters say would increase protections for an infant born after an attempted abortion. This week, just one of the remaining six bills on the “ready-to-go” list has been announced for floor action.
House Committee Ratios
House committees are not yet officially formalized, but they're heading in that direction. Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said in a letter to colleagues on Sunday that he'd reached an agreement on committee ratios with Republicans. "These ratios are consistent with an inversion of those from the prior Congress where Democrats held a similarly sized majority," he wrote, aside from a few changes in overall committee size.
Senators Examine Ticketmaster's 'Swiftie' Failure
Senate committees could organize sometime this week, according to an aide to Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-NY) Holdover members of several panels are ready to get to work, with hearings, briefings, and markups on the calendar. The Senate Judiciary Committee holds a hearing Tuesday to examine the "lack of competition" in the ticketing industry. Senators turned their attention to the issue after Ticketmaster’s website crashed in November, leaving buyers unable to purchase concert tickets for musician Taylor Swift’s tour.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) said in announcing the hearing's date that while that incident made the problems with the ticketing industry "painfully obvious," they predated that tour. "For too long, consumers have faced high fees, long waits, and website failures, and Ticketmaster’s dominant market position means the company faces inadequate pressure to innovate and improve,” Klobuchar said in a statement.
Klobuchar said the hearing will focus on how to incentivize better services and fair prices. In November, the senator wrote to Ticketmaster's CEO expressing concern that the company may have violated a consent decree and abused its market positions. She also called on the Justice Department to investigate the company and hold it accountable for anticompetitive behavior.
Heavy Turnover Could Pose a Challenge in Writing the Farm Bill
House Agriculture Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson (R-PA) must write a 2023 farm bill, but heavy turnover could make it challenging. More than 40 percent of the seats in the House have turned over since the last time Congress enacted the multiyear, far-ranging, and sometimes contentious legislation several years ago. That means 200 of the 435 members may know little about the legislation. And only nine of the Agriculture panel's 27 Republican members, including Thompson, were in the 115th Congress when lawmakers last produced a farm bill. Chairman Thompson faces a tight timetable because his panel is slated, under an arrangement with the Senate Agriculture Committee, to take the lead on moving legislation before the current farm bill expires on September 30.
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