It looked like the setting for a mock legislative session: Instead of desks and nameplates on the floor of the Minnesota House, there were theater-style seats assigned by slips of sticky paper, while a small lectern stood in for the Speaker of the House's usual podium. There was a gallery for the public to watch, though it only had 20 seats. And there was a version of the Abe Lincoln portrait that usually hangs at the center of the chamber and watches over proceedings, though it was a miniature one.
However it seemed, though, it was all very real: the setting for a historic, one-day 2015 special legislative session.
The
usual Capitol chambers were closed down in the midst of a messy
restoration project, so legislative staffers retrofitted a ground-floor
hearing room in the State Office Building to look like a miniature
version of the Minnesota House. Down the hall, a similar room had been
set up for the Senate, where they imposed the same strict dress code and
rules of decorum that senators are required to follow in the Capitol
chamber.
"Members, we are making a bit of history
today,” House Speaker Kurt Daudt said at the start of session, noting
that this is the first time in 110 years a special legislative session
has been held outside the halls of the state Capitol.
In
the end, though, the odd setting of the proceedings was almost more
notable than the final outcome — despite the hours of drama involved in
getting to a resolution. After weeks of negotiations, lawmakers sealed
the deal early Saturday by approving three budget bills.
While
there was uncertainty throughout the day about passage of an
agriculture and environment budget, lawmakers ultimately passed a bill
that honored their leaders’ original agreement on a 38-29 vote, after
ping-ponging the bill between the House and Senate chambers throughout
the day.
Legislators also passed a $17 billion
education budget that spends $525 million more on schools over the next
two years, as wells as a jobs and energy bill. All together, the three
budget bills account for roughly half of the state’s $42 billion
two-year budget. A bonus: Legislators rounded up enough votes to pass a
Legacy amendment funding bill and a $373 million total package of
construction projects, two non-essential budget measures that ran out of
time on the final night of the regular session.
The
whole affair stretched from Friday morning into early Saturday morning
and averts a partial government shutdown. Nearly 10,000 state government
workers had already received layoff notices in the mail in case
legislators didn’t reach a deal by June 30, the last day of the fiscal
year. Saturday morning, Gov. Mark Dayton said he will sign the final
bills.
Rifts in the DFL
But the back-and-forth drama of the session exposed serious rifts between some Democrats — and left much business unfinished.
Tensions
were particularly high in the Senate, where a majority of DFL members
opposed the final agriculture and environment bill that was negotiated
by their leader, Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk. Those senators were
upset with provisions in the bill that rolled back long-time
environmental protections and eliminated the nearly 50-year-old
citizens’ board of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.
The
first attempt to pass the bill, on Friday afternoon, failed in the
Senate by a single vote, with very few DFL votes and fewer Republicans
votes than had originally supported the bill. Bakk went back to the
drawing board — and to his caucus — and emerged with a new plan:
offering amendments to the bill that could win DFL support.
Sen.
John Marty, DFL-Roseville, the lead opponent of the agriculture and
environmental budget, amended the bill to restore the MPCA’s citizens’
board and eliminate a provision that would exempt mining sulfide waste
from solid-waste rules. The bill passed, garnering many of the Senate
DFL votes the previous version didn’t.
But
Republicans complained that Democrats were backing away from a deal they
had made with Dayton and other caucus leaders: to not support any
amendments to the budget bills.
In the House,
Republicans quickly took up the new bill — and amended it back to the
way it was under the original deal, before sending it back over to the
Senate for a final vote. “We are honoring the commitment we made to
Minnesotans with the four legislative leaders and the governor,” Daudt
said. “Now the Senate has the opportunity to do the right thing and send
this bill to the governor.”
The final vote in the
Senate ultimately passed, but not without Bakk having to make a deal
with Senate Republicans behind closed doors to give them “significant,
specific tax reductions” in a 2016 tax bill, Senate Minority Leader
David Hann said.
“The new agreement calls for
substantial Republican tax cuts to be added to already-planned
reductions in the existing bill,” he said. “We’re very satisfied with
the concessions made by Democrats to deliver significant tax cuts in the
next legislative session.”
Much to do
The
conclusion of the legislature this year leaves much up in the air for
next session. Legislators left nearly $1 billion of a $1.8 billion
budget surplus on the bottom line to deal with those tax cuts, as well
as a long-term transportation funding plan sought by Democrats. Those
topics failed to gain traction in divided government this year.
Dayton also didn’t get his number one priority, universal preschool education, and plans to continue his push next year.
