Hopkins Lawmakers Back Dayton's Budget

Hopkins Rep. Steve Simon (DFL-District 44A) said Gov. Mark Dayton’s budget, which was released last week, most likely won’t be the ultimate solution at the Legislature, although he called it a good start.

Dayton’s two-year, $37 billion budget calls for $4.2 billion in tax increases—many of which would be levied against the state’s top earners—but also a number of cuts, including $680 million to health and human services.

Simon said he disagrees with Dayton on the specific threshold used to set the newly proposed top income tax rate of 10.95 percent—up from the current top rate of 7.85 percent. Dayton proposes the rate be applied to households making $150,000 or more per year, while the representative said he thinks the threshold should be $250,000. Despite that difference in opinion, Simon said he applauds Dayton for presenting a “balanced” proposal that combines tax increases and spending cuts.

“I think he recognizes it has to be a balanced solution,” Simon said.

Still, Simon said it would be unrealistic to expect Dayton’s exact proposal to be approved by the Republican-controlled Legislature. As expected, a number of Republican leaders criticized the governor’s proposal as soon as it was released, saying it stood little to no chance of passing the two houses.

But Simon said he also thinks it would be unrealistic to expect a “spending-cuts-only” plan pushed by Republicans to get by the governor’s desk. Instead, the representative said the rest of the session has to be spent finding some common ground between the two opposing plans.

“Both sides will have to do some things they find unpleasant,” Simon said.

Sen. Ron Latz (DFL-District 44), of St. Louis Park, also backed Dayton’s budget. He said eight years of tough budgets done much to make government efficient—cuts are hitting programs, not the “fluff” or waste, fraud and abuse so many like to cite for the current ills. Taxes on the highest income earners are a good way to mitigate that.

“I would submit that (those residents) could probably afford to pay more in taxes,” he said.

The Minnesota legislative session ends on May 23. Per the state’s constitution, a balanced budget needs to be passed before adjournment.

 Here’s what’s happened this past week with bills authored or co-authored by your legislators:

Rep. Steve Simon:

• Proposed a bill that would that change certain voter registration provisions, including making the state’s “motor voter” law an opt-out program, rather than an opt-in program, meaning new driver’s license applicants would be automatically registered to vote unless they specifically declined. HF0510 was introduced Feb. 14 and referred to the Government Operations and Elections Committee.

Sen. Ron Latz

• Introduced a bill that would give St. Louis Park money to predesign, design, build and install noise mitigation barriers associated with created by the light rail project. SF0407, to be introduced Feb. 21 and referred to the Capital Investment Committee.
• The Judiciary and Public Safety Committee recommended passing proposed technical changes to the Minnesota Common Interest Ownership Act. SF0136, introduced Jan. 27.