In House budget bill leans toward greater Minnesota, Forum Communications political staff writer Don Davis reports:
Much of the money in the Minnesota House's plan to tweak the state's two-year budget would go to greater Minnesota.
"We focused on rural Minnesota and greater Minnesota," House Majority Leader Erin Murphy, D-St. Paul, said, because many rural parts of the state have not recovered from the recession as well as the Twin Cities.
Debate continued into the night Thursday, but there was little doubt that the House would approve its $322 million budget increase. The bill slightly changes the $39 billion, two-year state budget enacted last year.
House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt, R-Crown, said the budget plan is one "Democrats are pushing like drugs on the House floor. They can't spend enough." ...
But Daudt forgets the spending his own caucus pushed as well. Not that Bluestem opposes these measures. For instance, Session Daily reports in House passes wide-ranging supplemental budget bill:
University of Minnesota scientists would try to make advancements in the fight against terrestrial invasive species in a new Invasive Terrestrial Plants and Pests Center. The center would receive $3.9 million from the General Fund and $490,000 from the Environmental and Natural Resources Trust Fund, which is supported by Minnesota Lottery proceeds. (A floor amendment reduced the General Fund appropriation by $1.2 million, which was directed to the university’s Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory to research a pig virus).
The floor amendment, offered by Chris Swedzinski (R-Ghent) passed 129-0. Then every Republican voted against the larger bill, but not before assuring that slice of "pork."
The disease itself is no joke for pork producers. As Julie Buntjer noted in Minn. veterinarians discuss PEDv:
[Steve] Dudley said with pigs valued at $80 per head, and a running average of 1,688 pigs lost per 1,000 sows, the impact to producers can be as high as $135,000 for each 1,000-sow farm. A recent Rabobank estimate is that 12.5 to 15 million pigs will die — that’s 6 percent to 7 percent of the nation’s hog production.
The virus has led to the biggest drop in pork production in 30 years. As the supply of pigs going to market drops, it will likely mean added costs for consumers.
Dudley said the virus is deadly for pigs less than 15 pounds. The newborns don’t have the antibodies to fight off the symptoms of the virus — vomiting and watery diarrhea that lead to severe dehydration.
And the current method of dealing with the disorder:
One of the methods now being used to build up immunity in baby pigs is to take a natural approach. Dudley said intestines can be taken from pigs that have died from PEDv — or the manure from scouring piglets — and fed back to the rest of the animals on the farm.
It's gruesome, but the sows eventually develop immunity, passing that to their nursing piglets through colostrum milk. More research is definitely needed to stem the outbreak and develop a vaccine for the disease, thought to have emerged in China.
Another item in the bill? Rep.Mary Franson's amendment included a 5 percent increase in the operating rate to nursing homes. Franson then voted against the bill, but not before scoring more money for homes.
This must be the new normal: ask for increased spending via amendment, then voting against a bill sure to pass. It's having eating one's cake while claiming you're dieting.
Republicans also voted for ending state payments for abortions for poor women when an amendment offered by Patti Fritz (DFL Faribault) passed with the support of pro-life DFLers. Then they voted against it. Under the state supreme court's Gomez decision, the amendment likely violates the state constitution.
But one thing that Republicans stood firm on: a provision that will aid the state's troubled beekeeping industry:
Beekeepers could make a claim for compensation if their bees are killed by a pesticide. Compensation would be eligible in situations where the person who applied the pesticide isn’t known or if the person applied the pesticide in a manner consistent with its labeling. Claims can’t exceed $20,000. The bill would appropriate $100,000 from the General Fund to pay for experts who evaluate the pollinator deaths and $150,000 from the Pesticide Regulatory Account for claims.
Joyce Peppin and Steve Drazkowski rose during the general discussion to object to that (their floor speeches can be seen near the end of the hearing video). Peppin confessed to being confused about the language apparently she's slept through months of media coverage, public concern and committee testimony about the issue. Draz droned on about how beekeepers shouldn't compensated for the value of their dead bees, since only live bees have value.
It was late, when a person's character shows through, and Representative Drazkowski's qualities as the ALEC Asshat of the Year shone through the fog of exhausted debate.
Read more about the contents of the bill in House passes wide-ranging supplemental budget bill.
Photo: A porker of a bill or relief for the pork industry and other helpful funding for rural Minnesota? We can't wait to hear the rural Republicans complain again how Greater Minnesota gets neglected.
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