It's not just Brown County's train-manure truck accidents that we have to worry about in the carrer of muck-raking blogger, for Steve Drazkowski is on the loose, and he's popped out another half-baked bill.
Naturally the editors at the Winona Daily News are on the job, wiping the floor with Draz once more with their editorial, Our view: Look who's coming to dinner ... dysentery:
Few people will probably line up to speak out against veterans, churchgoers, and the local high school's popcorn stand. That's at least how state Rep. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, has framed legislation he's authored that would exempt certain groups from state health codes.
Then again, equally few people aren't going to wave banners saying, "Yippee, diarrhea," either.
Drazkowski's bill, like many of his well-intentioned but half-baked ideas, seeks to reduce the mandates on citizens and eliminate the need for local government. . . .
What's the problem with Draz's latest offering? The editors explain:
While it is certainly folly to expect that a church potluck would have white-gloved inspectors dipping thermometers in a seven-bean casserole, this law is more about organizations that routinely serve food as fundraisers. People should be given some type of assurance there are some food quality standards.
As officials from the Minnesota Department of Health pointed out, the problem may not be solved by this legislation. In fact, it could create more problems than it solves. If the exemption is passed, parochial school lunch programs could be shuttered, and VFWs around the state could find themselves without a kitchen.
That's not what Drazkowski intended. It wouldn't become the law to help churches, schools and veterans, it would become a law of unintended consequence.
More than 3,000 people in the past seven years have gotten sick from these same organizations. . . .
The editors suggest that Draz pay more attention to fixing the state's budget crisis and less to the local fish fry.
Not mentioned in the editorial: there's already a law exempting potlucks from government inspections. As the 2000 AP article Potluck outlaws buck the system in Minnesota, former state representative Al Juhnke crusaded to rescue the Sons of Norway from a criminal path. Potlucks have been exempted from health inspections since the "Minnesota Hotdich Bill" was passed.(Juhnke lost his seat in the House in 2010, but recently was hired as Senator Franken agriculture and energy outreach guy).
Draz is looking to exempt on-site kitchens, and conflating benefit suppers with hotdish potlucks does no one any favors.
Good Lord. Draz not only doesn't know shit, he doesn't know anything about the groups he's pretending to help. Is this the sort of thing that typically happens when his minders are out of the room and he attempts to think for himself?
Posted by: Phoenix Woman | Mar 05, 2011 at 03:23 PM