Republican heavy breathing about the proposed nitrogen rule continued on Tuesday as the Minnesota House Ag Finance committee inserted Jeff "Goose Poop" Backer's HF2887 into the ag funding omnibus bill.
Readers may remember that Backer blames nitrogen pollution in Minnesota's groundwater and surface water on Canada geese, repeatedly brings this nincompoopery--we stress the poopery here--up in committee as City Pages' Susan Du reported in Rep. Jeff Backer tries to blame Minnesota's ag pollution on... goose shit. Those honkers actually contribute "approximately 0.1 percent of the statewide nitrogen load to waters."
Such is the creative genius of one of the House Republicans' heroes of the no-rules revolution. Never mind what's really causing wells to go bad and safety drinking water for cities to become ever-more difficult to secure.
Session Daily's Jonathan Mohr reports in Mental health and farm loans the focus of omnibus ag finance bill:
The House Agriculture Finance Committee approved HF3719 after adopting a delete-all amendment that sparked some debate and required two votes for approval.
Rep. Jeanne Poppe (DFL-Austin) requested the amendment be split to remove the final section, which would add the same controversial language included in HF2887, passed by the House as a standalone bill yesterday. It would prohibit the Department of Agriculture from adopting new nitrogen rules proposed by Dayton unless they are specifically approved by law. The governor has promised to veto that bill if it reaches his desk.
Rep. Clark Johnson (DFL-North Mankato) said including that language in the omnibus bill was a “fundamental mistake” that injected politics into the committee’s bipartisan work that he said includes “bringing together people around agriculture.”
But Hamilton said the language is needed because the department has not yet released the final version of its rule and “we are somewhat concerned about this.” He encouraged the department to release the final rule as soon as possible so the public and lawmakers could see it and said the language may not have been needed had that already been done.
Hamilton granted the request that the amendment be split and both portions were adopted – with DFL members voting against the nitrogen rules section.
Whitney Place, the [Minnesota Agriculture] department’s director of legislative affairs, said the rule would be available to the public April 24 and be published in the State Register April 30.
She also urged the committee to remove the controversial language to avoid a veto and allow the department “to implement what is an otherwise really good bill.”
One wonders how much longer Minnesotans will put up with the pandering to industrial-scale agriculture over as simple a right as access to drinking water--and sane rule-making. Meetings were held all over the state and hundreds of people commented as the Minnesota Department of Agriculture sought input.
If some farmers and ag lobbyists are blindsided by the draft rules, Bluestem suggests that they avoid Backer-like naps at the Governor's water summits.
Monday's Vote on HF2887
How much do House Republicans love this bill? Maybe not as much as the headline to Forum Communications capitol reporter Capitol Chatter column about the vote: GOP Fights Dayton Effort To Restrict Some Fertilizer Use. After all, in yesterday's floor vote, while GOP-lite place-baiting Democrat Paul Marquart voted for the Backer bill, he was the only DFLer to do so. The story was somewhat different on the other side of the aisle, where six Republicans stood up for their constituents' right to clean drinking water:
Backer's bill #HF2887 " Nitrogen fertilizer rules prohibited" passes, but while it looks like DFLer Paul Marquart voted "yes," @MNHouse GOPers Alselmo, Barr, Franke, Jessup, Jurgens, Loon voted "no." pic.twitter.com/sLQtwbj1Fa
— Sally Jo Sorensen (@sallyjos) April 16, 2018
The Journal of the House includes the vote here.
We think that the six Republicans are on to something: this isn't a partisan issue. In a statement, South St. Paul (and Harmony-area farm owner) Rep. Rick Hansen sent out a statement:
Statement: Polluted drinking water is a public health issue, not a partisan political problem
Saint Paul, Minn. – Today, the Minnesota House passed a Republican-authored bill to prohibit the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) from implementing their proposed rules for nitrogen fertilizer use. These rules, authorized under 1989’s Groundwater Protection Act, would protect Minnesota’s water resources by minimizing nitrate pollution.
Gov. Mark Dayton delivered a letter to the chairs of the House Agriculture committees indicating he’d veto the bill, HF 2887. Commissioner of Agriculture David Frederickson also sent one to the authors of the legislation sharing his opposition.
Representative Rick Hansen (DFL – South Saint Paul) issued the following statement:
“Minnesotans expect clean drinking water. This Republican Legislature continues its pattern to deny problems, delay implementation and deflect responsibility. This was yet another bill requiring legislative approval for common-sense efforts to protect the environment. Contamination of drinking water is a public health issue, not a partisan political problem to be denied, delayed or deflected. The narrow approval shows more legislators are listening, even though the Republican leadership is not. We can do better.”
The floor debate over Backer's attack on safe drinking water begins at the 9:42 mark here:
Photo: Jeff Backer, sleeping during the 2017 Water Summit in Morris (photo by a now former constituent), as we reported in Republican guy who voted for Minnesota's buffer bill continues to grandstand against it. Maybe he slept through the news about nitrogen pollution and school shootings as well.
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