Author: Minnesota Reformer

Gov. Tim Walz and legislative leaders agreed this week to spend nearly all of the state’s $17.5 billion budget surplus, with the largest amount of new money going to tax credits and cuts, infrastructure projects and K-12 education. Using almost all of Minnesota’s surplus over the next biennium propels spending for fiscal years 2024-25 to $72 billion, with about $2.8 billion set aside for reserves. Confusingly: The $3 billion Walz and legislative leaders have set aside for tax cuts and credits counts as “spending.” Also, aid to local governments will be part of that $3 billion. The budget agreement means lawmakers…

Gov. Tim Walz on Friday signed a bill to provide free breakfast and lunch to all Minnesota students at eligible schools. Walz signed the bill surrounded by lawmakers, community advocates and young students at Webster Elementary School in northeast Minneapolis. The second-term DFL governor lauded how universal meals will help make Minnesota the best state in the country to raise a child — one of Walz’s key budget priorities. “This bill puts us one step closer to making Minnesota the best state for kids to grow up, and I am grateful to all of the legislators and advocates for making…

U.S. Attorney Andy Luger points out all the sites across the state where federal child nutrition program funds were misused at a September 2022 press conference. Deena Winter/Minnesota Reformer

The story of Ticketmaster looks a lot like a tragedy now. A Minnesota House committee advanced a bill on Monday to increase transparency around ticket prices after Ticketmaster bungled ticket selling for Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, leaving millions of Swift fans — known as Swifties — without tickets after waiting in a virtual queue for hours. The bill, aptly named HF1989 after Swift’s celebrated album 1989, would require upfront pricing for all fees and charges, while also preventing “double-dipping,” or when fees are charged every time a ticket is sold and then resold by the same company. The bill also regulates ticket resellers by preventing them from…

The Minnesota House on Monday passed a bill (HF30) with broad support, 113-5, to crack down on catalytic converter thefts. The companion bill is still making its way through the state Senate. Minnesota is one of the worst states for catalytic converter thefts in the United States. Thefts have skyrocketed in recent years: Nationally, the National Insurance Crime Bureau estimates that thefts increased by 1,215% between 2019 and 2022. Last year, Minnesota was part of a nationwide catalytic converter theft ring bust. The bill’s been around for several years but never got a hearing in the GOP-held Senate. Former GOP Senate Majority Leader Jeremy Miller owns a…

A major elections reform bill moving through the Minnesota Legislature would protect the freedom to vote and make it harder to run political advertisements without saying who paid for them. The House elections committee last week advanced the “Democracy for the People Act” (HF3) authored by Rep. Emma Greenman, DFL-Minneapolis, to the transportation committee. The Senate companion bill (SF3) was also recently advanced by the Elections Committee. The bill includes automatic voter registration; allows 16- and 17-year-olds to pre-register to vote; restores voting rights to people on parole or probation; and seeks to protect voters, election officials and election volunteers from…

Rep. Brad Tabke said he wrecked his pickup on the first day of the legislative session, so he’s been regularly riding the light rail from downtown Minneapolis to the state Capitol, and it’s been an eye-opener for the Shakopee Democrat. “I see everything,” he said. He said safety on the Metro Transit Blue and Green Lines has “significantly devolved post-COVID” — and the Legislature needs to take action. Tabke said it’s not a place he would take his children, and the transit system needs a reset. “No, it’s not OK to smoke on the train. No, it’s not OK to…

With Gov. Tim Walz’s signature on Tuesday, state Democrats codified the right to abortion and reproductive health care for all residents in Minnesota law. Full stop. No exceptions. “The message that we’re sending Minnesota today is very clear. Your rights are protected in the state. You have the right to make your own decisions about your health, your family and your life,” Walz said during a ceremonial bill signing flanked by DFL lawmakers and abortion rights activists. Walz credited the women lawmakers who guided the law through the Legislature less than a month after the start of the session, breathtaking…

A House panel took up three bills Tuesday that would more strictly regulate a group of chemicals that have been made by Maplewood-based 3M since the 1950s. In late December, 3M announced plans to stop making per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and stop using the chemicals in its products by the end of 2025. Other companies still make the chemicals. Studies have shown the chemicals accumulate in the environment and the human body and are toxic.  One bill would ban the chemicals in firefighting foam. Another would require manufacturers that sell products with PFAS in Minnesota to disclose that to the state.…

Step away from Twitter. Stop doom-scrolling. Yes, I know, American democracy is under assault. Russian President Vladimir Putin is muttering dark warnings about nuclear weapons in the face of heroic and historic resistance by Ukraine. Dozens of people are dead and large swaths of Florida have been devastated by Hurricane Ian. And Kanye West did something so uniformly awful in Paris that I was forced to Google the tone-deaf thing that Kanye West did in Paris. These are bleak times, indeed. And the urge to simply throw your hands up in the air and declare yourself quit of the whole business is overwhelming. I’m right there with…