MANKATO — Time was ticking Monday evening as a closely divided Minnesota Legislature rushed to get as much of their budget work done before their midnight cutoff.
DFL Rep. Luke Frederick, of Mankato, who said he’s also been in back to back bonding bill meetings for the last week, admitted the race to the finish line has been a challenge.
He argued some work, such as the human services policy bill, was held up by Republicans as last minute leverage.
“When we came to an agreement at the beginning of session, there was a set of rules that we all agreed that we would follow. Some of those rules were that once we have a signed conference committee report, that it wouldn’t be held up,” he said.
The human services policy bill passed the House Monday and is now in Senate hands; proposed provisions include the right to a designated support person for nursing home residents, according to a Legislature report.
Disagreements over cutting health care access from undocumented adults have also been a debate this session.
Frederick said Republicans are framing the topic as a budget issue.
“That we need to save the state money. Anyone who believes that is not looking deep enough at the details, because when people need health care access, they will get health care access,” he said. “If you wait to get the care you need, it is going to be more expensive.”
Republican Rep. Bjorn Olson, of Fairmont, is in favor of the proposal, which he said would end someone’s state-funded health coverage during their next enrollment period.
“The nice thing that I think is a good compromise is that any illegal immigrant’s child still qualifies,” he said.
Frederick said he has a bonding meeting scheduled for Tuesday, despite Monday being lawmakers’ last day.
He said there could be a bonding bill agreement this year that wouldn’t include any local projects.
“That was a priority for the Republicans, and so we said ok, we’ll take that in the hopes that then we’ll have a second bonding bill next year that will include local projects,” he said, adding that those could include state water infrastructure programs.
“I think the conversation has kind of bubbled up to the surface again, and we may see a bill on the floor tonight or in the special session that has significant funds for state-owned assets,” Olson said Monday evening.
As of Monday evening, bills such as the K-12 education bill, the transportation bill and more still hadn’t passed off the House floor.
Olson said one compromise for the education finance bill proposed taking $77 million originally meant for a passenger train from the Twin Cities to Duluth and putting it towards unemployment insurance for hourly school workers over the summer.
“Nothing’s happened with (the train) for two years. The money’s just sitting in an account and it could be put to better use, so the agreement is in order to hold schools harmless for the state’s decision to force them to pay unemployment insurance for hourly workers… we’re taking $77 million from that account and diverting it,” he said, adding that Republicans still would like to sunset the program, originally passed a few years ago, in 2028.
Lawmakers hope a special session would only last a day and would take place later this week.