While the gentlemen smiling in the photo are lobbyists, they are not lobbyists for the pro-coal group that gave Senate Majority Leader Bakk, the second most powerful Minnesota DFL elected official in state government. That's because the Coalition for a Secure Energy Future isn't billed as a lobbying group.
Of course not--and since it's not a lobbying campaign, the smiling guys who otherwise lobby for a living aren't required to disclose what they spend in order to smile with Tom Bakk and give him a certificate for making sure a jobs and energy bill got passed that set back clean energy in Minnesota.
North Dakota's Lignite Research, Development and Marketing Program (Program) is a multi-million dollar state/industry partnership that concentrates on near term, practical research and development projects that provide the opportunity to preserve and enhance development of our state's abundant lignite resources.
The Program is funded by approximately 10 cents per ton from the North Dakota coal severance tax. With annual production at approximately 30 million tons per year, about $3 million is available each year for the Research, Development and Marketing Program.
So that's who's putting the coal in the coalition. How much of that 10 cents per ton was directed to the Coalition for a Secure Energy Future? In February we explained:
According to the June 5, 2014 Lignite Research Council Agenda of the North Dakota Industrial Commission Lignite Research, Development and Marketing Program, CSEF is funded by a grant from the commission:
Re-Submission of Regional Lignite Public Affairs Plan (Coalition for a Secure Energy Future) Submitted by: Lignite Energy Council; Request for: $600,000 annually for a total of $1,200,000; Project Duration: 2 Years.
While the discussion of the plan was closed meeting, page 35 of the minutes (pdf) of the July 1, 2014 meeting of the North Dakota Development Commission reveal:
During the closed session, it had been moved and seconded that the Industrial Commission accepts the Lignite Research Council recommendation to fund the grant application “Regional Lignite Public Affairs Plan (Coalition for a Secure Energy Future)” and to authorize Karlene Fine, Industrial Commission Executive Director, to execute an agreement with the Lignite Energy Council to provide a total of Industrial Commission Lignite Research Program funding in an amount not to exceed $1,200,000 (marketing) with annual updates presented to the Commission . On a roll call vote, Governor Dalrymple, Attorney General Stenehjem and Commissioner Goehring voted aye. The motion carried unanimously.
The item appears in the Lignite Research, Development and Marketing Program portion of the NDIC minutes.
Of course, the Coalition provided a different explanation of themselves to the Tower Timberjay:
Mr. Moe and Mr. Beard serve as co-chairs for the Coalition for a Secure Energy Future.
The coalition was founded in 2014 to “enhance, preserve, and protect our diverse set of energy resources, including coal-based electricity, to ensure a continued affordable and reliable energy supply for families and businesses in Minnesota,” according to a statement.
The coalition opposes the “Clean Power Plan” put forward by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The plan is designed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 30 percent by 2030. The coal industry has lobbied heavily against the rule, claiming that the push for cleaner-burning forms of energy would significantly increase electrical rates, both for homeowners and businesses, while achieving inconsequential reductions in overall CO2 emissions.
Not directly related, but an ironic sidenote
Among the ironies of the session's energy legislation? The champions of "cheap" coal also provided a means to cut energy costs for big business, although somebody may have to make up the difference for the power companies' bottomline.
Residential customers in northern Minnesota will have to pay more in electricity rates because of a change the Legislature made last week to help big business.
Gov. Mark Dayton signed a broad jobs and energy budget bill that gives a rate break to mining companies, papers mills and steel mills.
The new law allows major industrial customers in northern Minnesota to apply for a break in their electricity rates. It aims to help lower energy costs for companies competing in a global marketplace, among them the taconite mines on the Iron Range. . . .
But to pay for the break for industrial companies, residents and smaller businesses will be forced to pay more. State Sen. John Marty, DFL-Roseville, said he didn't object to helping out steel and paper companies but worries that the way the law is written, other companies could also take advantage of it. He said that means higher rates for everyone else.
"When you're talking about utility rates, if you're bringing down one customer's rates, you're bringing it up for someone else," Marty said. "In this case, we're bringing down electric rates for the biggest customers and we're bringing it up for residents, for homeowners, for renters [and] small businesses. They're going to be paying more, perhaps significantly more." ...
Bluestem will keep an eye out for other Energy Champions in the state legislature who will be getting a certificate for helping out the North Dakota Industrial Commission. Of course, no one in the Coalition for a Secure Energy Future lobbied them at all.
Photo: The grip and grin, photo submitted by the Coalition for a Secure Energy Future to the Tower Timberjay. If you see a photo of other legislators getting a certificate from the marketing campaign sponsored by $1.2 million of the North Dakota Industrial Commission Lignite Research, Development and Marketing Program's money, please send it to us!
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However, a legislative update that the Glencoe Republican emailed to his list on Wednesday afternoon demonstrates that he's still the same old Glenn. His email directed readers to Weather Channel Founder Explains the History of the Global Warming Hoax, an article and video published by the Tea Party News Network.
When the Republican-controlled Minnesota House debated an energy bill earlier this year, Democrats offered an amendment that would have had the Legislature state on the record that climate change is real and caused by human activity.
The amendment failed, but the debate revealed how a national trend among Republicans is playing out in Minnesota: As public opinion on climate change shifts, the ways Republicans are talking about it are too.
In 2013, for example, state Rep. Glenn Gruenhagen took to the floor of the House floor to denounce arguments that climate change is linked to humans.
"There's more and more evidence coming that it's just a complete United Nations fraud and lie," said Gruenhagen, R-Glencoe. "The facts show that in the last 16 years there has been no global warming."
This year, Gruenhagen softened his tone during the debate over the amendment to the energy bill. When House Minority Leader Paul Thissen, DFL-Minneapolis, asked Gruenhagen if he believed climate change is caused by people, the Republican legislator said he would defer to researchers he trusts.
"Representative Thissen, I believe there's eminently qualified scientists who disagree with that comment, and I tend to agree with those scientists," Gruenhagen said. . . .
Gruenhagen wrote in his email:
I wanted to send along a video from meteorologist and Weather Channel founder John Coleman and his thoughts on Democrats' climate change rhetoric. For years, Democrats have tried to claim that climate change (first it was global cooling, then it was global warming, now it's climate change) is an imminent danger and we must implement policies that would crush low and middle-income families in order to combat it.
Republicans proposed sensible legislation this session that would allow us to take advantage of breakthroughs in technology to make our energy sources both cleaner and cheaper. Nobody is against cleaning up our energy, but we must do it in a way that doesn't crush low and middle-income families under sky-high energy bills and other taxes.
Both Fox News and CNN have recently invited John Coleman, one of the founders of The Weather Channel and former TV meteorologist, to express his views about climate change to their national audiences. Coleman is simply an awful choice to discuss this issue. He lacks credentials, many of his statements about climate change completely lack substance or mislead, and I’m not even sure he knows what he actually believes.
To begin, Coleman hasn’t published a single peer-reviewed paper pertaining to climate change science. His career, a successful and distinguished one, was in TV weather for over half a century, prior to his retirement in San Diego last April. He’s worked in the top markets: Chicago and New York, including a 7-year stint on Good Morning America when it launched. If you watch Coleman on-camera, his skill is obvious. He speaks with authority, injects an irreverent sense of humor and knows how to connect with his viewer.
Coleman has publicly denied the scientific reality of human-caused global warming for years, telling Fox News in 2008 that he wanted to sue Al Gore, for example. There’s no new content in these latest interviews; just the usual long-debunked climate myths and conspiracy theories. Coleman is apparently considered a credible climate interviewee because he was instrumental in creating The Weather Channel 32 years ago, but he’s woefully misinformed when it comes to climate science. . . .
Several times during the Fox interview, Megyn Kelly commented that The Weather Channel will “be pushed out of existence since [Coleman has] taken this position.” In reality, Coleman was forced out of The Weather Channel in 1983, just a year after he helped found it. Coleman has had no affiliation with The Weather Channel for over 30 years. . . .
On CNN, Coleman claimed to be a scientist. He’s been a TV weatherman for over 60 years, but his degree is in journalism. In recent years he forecasted the weather in San Diego, where it generally ranges from sunny and warm to sunnier and warmer. . . .
But it's not just Gruenhagen's placement of John Coleman among "researchers he trusts" that's problematic. The Tea Party News Network itself enjoys a dubious reputation. In February 2015, most of the staff resigned over the owners' focus on "clickbait" headlines and content that rivalled TMZ.
Not that this was the first scrutiny of Todd Cefaratti, the force behind TPNN. Buzzflash reported in 2013's There's Money to Be Made in Milking the Tea Party, 'Natch! that the entrepreneur looked at the grassroots citizens movement as something of a cash cow.
Given how Gruenhagen has made it clear which "respected scientists" and publications he trusts to share with his constituents and email list, Bluestem hopes that Minnesota Public Radio will update the piece to let listeners know that Glenn just maybe might not yet be the poster child for GOP evolution on this one.
Photo: Insurance salesman and state representative Glenn Gruenhagen (top); an April 8 Facebook post on Representative Gruenhagen's official page. Whatever story MPR was pitched about softening Republican attitudes about climate change, perhaps Richert could have picked a different poster child.
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By now, the last-minute passage of the vetoed Jobs and Energy omnibus bill (HF1437) is fodder for pearl-clutched and ruminations about What's Wrong With The Process.
A new issue with the bill emerged Friday; ""a substantial loss of revenue to the Highway User Tax Distribution Fund and to the Driver and Vehicle Services funds," according to a "Dear Colleague" email by Senator Scott Dibble (DFL-Minneapolis). Bluestem obtain the email early Friday evening; a second source filled in the circumstances of the issue's discovery.
Did Minnesota representatives need a chance to read and debate the 93-page conference committee report on the Jobs and Energy Finance and Policy Omnibus Bill?
Apparently not in the eyes of Minnesota House Speaker Kurt Daudt (R-Crown), who refused to recognize any House members as he railroaded the bill through the end of the legislative session, which had to end at midnight on Monday, May 18.
Here's Daudt speed date legislative moment, all one minute and 33 seconds of it, via The Uptake . . .
Governor Dayton had more time to read the bill, prompting the state's chief executive to veto the bill for not funding or underfunding various agencies, as well as gutting the net metering provision in state law that has allowed solar and wind energy to flourish. Moreover, Dayton thought the bill woefully unfunded the Border-to-Border Broadband Development Fund. [PDF of letter here].
A source tells us that sharp-eyed deputy registrars spotted another flaw in the bill, and their concerns were made known to Senate Transportation Committee Chair Scott Dibble (DFL-Minneapolis). Bluestem is not disclosing the identity of the deputy registrars in order to prevent potential retribution against them.
In the "Dear Colleague" email, Senator Dibble details how a last-minute provision in the bill would have created "a substantial loss of revenue to the Highway User Tax Distribution Fund and to the Driver and Vehicle Services funds."
Here's the email:
Dear colleagues,
In just the last day it has come to my attention that a provision in the Jobs and Energy omnibus bill (HF1437) as passed by the House and Senate in the final hour of session modifies a provision discussed at length in the Transportation and Public Safety Committee—both in the Senate Committee and in the subsequent Conference Committee, creating a substantial loss of revenue to the Highway User Tax Distribution Fund and to the Driver and Vehicle Services funds.
A proposal came before the Transportation Committee this year to allow for a three-year registration cycle option for towed recreational vehicles. It was suggested in the course of committee deliberations that the three-year registration cycle option be also extended to the trailers that normally tow these recreational vehicles. The Deputy Registrars Association testified with concerns that a three-year registration cycle would hurt their revenues—which can’t be compensated for in other ways since the State sets the filing fees that comprise their revenue. After careful and lengthy deliberation, the Senate Transportation Committee voted to triple the filing fee to prevent a loss of revenue to the Deputy Registrars of roughly $500,000 annually. They testified that this loss would put their businesses at risk of closure. We carried this measure in our SF1647 conference committee report as passed by the full House and Senate.
Contrary to those committee discussions and decision, a provision was inserted into the Jobs bill, HF1437 conference committee report that permits lifetime registration for trailers—not just a three-year option. The filing fee remains unchanged from the original $6. This will cause an annual loss of $1.3M to the Highway User Tax Distribution Fund starting in 2017—a loss the state cannot afford, given the constantly diminishing returns on our transportation dollars with this year’s lights-on bill. Further, the Driver and Vehicle Services account will also lose $88,000 annually in filing fees—dollars that are essential to their operations. This subsequent action by the legislature on HF1437 superseded and overturned our conference committee’s work.
Aside from the loss to the HUTDF and DVS, I am deeply troubled by the blatant disregard for the work of the Senate Transportation and Public Safety Committee, and utter lack of respect for an open, fair, transparent process that takes into account our own rules. I and my fellow committee members, take our responsibility for overseeing and being held accountable for transportation policy and funding very seriously—so to see a last minute maneuver create a hole in our budget area that puts businesses and road funding at risk is disturbing.
I am certain that had I simply slipped in measure that spends $1.388 million, or creates a $1.388 million hole in another Chair’s budget, with absolutely no discussion or communication of any kind, that would not be tolerated. I’m extremely bothered that some members of this caucus feel like they have some special powers reserved only to them and can do whatever they want -- that rules, fair play, transparency and accountability don’t apply to them. It is particularly galling to know that I voted for HF1437, having not been informed of the provision and being rushed to approve such the measure. It is important to recall that this bill passed by a vote of 34-29. Despite the other highly objectionable provisions in the bill and my desire to vote against it, I was taking my role as a team player seriously. I’m sorry that accord was not returned.
I request that this provision remains out of the special session legislation we will work on in the coming weeks. I would hope in the future that any matter pertaining to the jurisdiction of the Transportation and Public Safety policy and finance are brought to me and my committee members directly so we do not need to learn about losses to businesses, the HUTDF and the Driver and Vehicle Services fund accounts after the fact.
Yours, Scott Dibble
Let's hope that the re-do doesn't include this provision; the money may seem like a drop in the bucket, but it's clearly a hit to the services and offices that rely on the revenue.
Photo: House Jobs and Energy chair Pat Garofalo (R-Farmington). We know that face-palm feeling all too well.
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That being the case, it stretched belief when Representative Denny McNamara (R-Hastings) claimed that the Governor's veto "blindsided" him. However, information has emerged that may explain McNamara's hurt feelings.
Bakk said, in the waning hours of the regular session’s end on May 18, he warned Daudt that the environmental measure, which also contained language strengthening the state’s water protection zones and avian flu recovery provision for farmers, may be headed to a veto.
“I had told the speaker over those last few days that the environment bill especially that (those) poison pill provisions one on top of another is going to create a potential veto,” Bakk said. Daudt on Wednesday acknowledged that warning.
But the measure ended up including those provisions — so many that Bakk told Daudt that he would have to get Senate Republicans to vote for the bill because so many Democrats would not. In the end only 11 Senate Democrats voted for the measure. All the chamber’s 26 Republicans supported it.
It really was a terrible thing for Speaker Daudt to do to Representative McNamara. As leader of the House Republican Caucus, he really ought to have let the Hastings Republican know that his bill was heading for trouble.
Daudt shouldn't blindside his committee leaders like this.
Photo: Bakk and Daudt, whom Bakk so warned this veto was going to happen. At this point, we're not sure how nice a timeline of GOP statements about whether they were warned about the possibility of a veto might look. Or a close examination of the disgust within Bakk's own caucus at the Majority Leader's greenlighting the doomed deals. Perhaps avoiding special interest-favored sneak attacks on environmental might help when creating narratives in the future.
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When the ginormous ag and environment budget bill that the governor vetoed is scrutinized, inquiring minds discover the political games in this story are those played by politicians in both parties who fused the House ag bill and environment bill together. After doing so, they crammed a radical rollback of decades of environmental progress into the final document that landed on Dayton's desk.
Sign this, or the suffering in the state's poultry sector will be prolonged.
There's the gray lady of Southeastern Minnesota, the Rochester Post Bulletin. In Wednesday's editorial, readers are told Our View: Doing too much can leave much undone, and the plight of pandemic-stricken poultry people is part of the problem.
Post-Bulletin: End supersized, inefficient omnibus bills
The blame game is in full effect. After Minnesota's legislative session ended with unfinished business and Gov. Mark Dayton vetoing three major bills, there's plenty of opportunities for finger-pointing.
Amid the blaming, however, few fingers are pointing at the process, which appears to hare blame with political parties and individuals.
Rep. David Bly, the ranking DFLer on the House Agriculture Policy Committee, came close Monday, noting emergency funding for the state's avian influenza crisis was possible. "Today, I'm hearing House Republican Majority members express concerns that Gove. Dayton's veto puts farmers at risk," he stated in a press release days after the Environment and Agriculture Omnibus bill was rejected. "Gov. Dayton repeatedly directed the legislature to send him a standalone bill to provide the emergency funding. In the final days of the legislative session, I stood up five times and asked my colleagues to suspend the rules and send a clean bill to the governor."
He's right; the emergency funding could have been — and should have been — handled differently. But so should many measures that were derailed by inaction or vetoes. . . .
Now, it's time for our state leaders to realize that large, omnibus bills aren't saving time for taxpayers. They are delaying results and leaving work left undone.
It's a simple case of attempting to do too much and achieving too little.
In short, don't put one's eggs in one basket--and there were many, many eggs in that container.
It's also a consequence, Bluestem believes, of playing chicken on behalf of "reforms" dropped into conference committee reports or omnibus bill mark-up sessions without sufficient examination, in discussions where unfounded representation of a single case will go unchallenged. The number of unpermitted generators at a distribution center in Thief River Falls simply isn't common knowledge.
After reading a plaintive press release by Rep. Dave Baker (R-Willmar) about the plight of turkey growers in light the governor's veto, Bluestem contacted Rep. David Bly over the weekend concerning his numerous attempts to pass stand-alone bills to address the pressing needs of the state's poultry producers.
Our hope was to construct a timeline of the many points at which the legislature could have acted (obviously, the Post Bulletin was asking similar questions about process independently down in Rochester).
As it turned out, Bly had constructed such a timeline himself, intending to deliver the prepared statement below on the floor of the Minnesota House. As it was, he made an abbreviated set of remarks instead (we'll revise this post later tonight with more links to the incidents on the timleine); he arranged to have the document sent our way when offices opened again on Tuesday.
Here's the Bly timeline, which illustrates the PB editorial board's point about getting simple things done in excruciating detail:
I am bringing this motion to once more give you the opportunity to address this important Avian flu crisis and allow this funding to move forward today and get to the Governor’s desk before we adjourn this session.
I heard this morning from the member from Dakota in reference to the Ag/environment bill and I quote I “I can’t predict … when this bill will be settled … it is only part of the decision… we may meet in conference committee in a couple days.” Which again greatly concerns me as there are now some 70 hours left in our session. I believe that we should make sure we move this money forward to the agencies that need it.
Let me remind you what is in the bill as there seems to be some confusion about what the Governor has asked for.
In addition to the disaster recovery loan program; there are appropriations of $3,619,000 for Avian flu emergency response activities from the general fund in fiscal year 2015, a one-time expenditure available until it is expended.
$1,853,000 to the Board of Animal Health for emergency response activities from the general fund in fiscal year 2015, a one-time expenditure available until it is expended.
$103,000 to the commissioner of health for emergency response activities including the monitoring of human infection among workers from the general fund in fiscal year 2015, a one-time expenditure available until it is expended.
$350,000 to the commissioner of natural resources for sampling wild animals to detect and monitor the avian influenza virus from the general fund in fiscal year 2015, a one-time expenditure available until it is expended.
$544,000 is appropriated from the general fund in fiscal year 2015 to the commissioner of public safety to operate the State Emergency Operation Center in coordination with the statewide avian influenza response activities.
………………….
Now since several claims here on the floor and in the press have been made to accuse me of playing political games with the Avian Flu crisis. Let me first say my intent from the beginning and I have been clear about this is to get the funds as quickly as possible as we can to the agencies that need it. I have not wavered from that since the beginning. I am thankful that the whole house joined me in addressing the issue on April 16th and again on April 29th to pass the earlier funding bill. But in my defense let me remind you of the sequence of events.
On March 4th the first incidence of a MN farm being infected by the H5N2 influenza occurred.
On April 10th at the House Ag Finance Committee after money was added to the Ag omnibus Finance Bill to address concerns about the Avian Flu outbreak and placed under the jurisdiction of a proposed and yet to be formed Transfer Board (made up primarily of lobbyists and interest groups), Rick Hansen asked if a hearing had been scheduled, and then proposed the Ag Committee convene a hearing on the Avian Flu crisis as we were getting daily reports of increased flu outbreaks.
April 11th I drafted and dropped in a stand-alone funding bill to meet the Governor’s request to send emergency funds to the Dept. of Ag and to The Board of Animal Health
April 16th a joint hearing of the Ag Policy and Finance Committee was convened to hear testimony about the Avian Flu crisis affecting Minnesota Turkey Farmers. Testimony was heard from Commissioner of Ag Dave Fredrickson, Chief Vet. Medical Officer at USDA Dr. John Clifford, Pomeroy Chair of Avian Health at the Univ. of MN Dr. Carol Cardona, State Veterinarian at MN Board of Animal Health Dr. Bill Hartman, Executive Director of Natural Resources Seve Olson, Lou Cornicelli of the Dept. of Natural Resources and a constituent of mine and turkey grower John Zimmerman.
Later that day HF 2225 was introduced and I asked for a suspension of the rules to move my stand alone bill with emergency funds forward. You all joined me in suspending the rules and passing my bill off the floor.
April 21st The bill returned with an amendment. In the interest of getting the money to the Governor for his signature as quickly as possible I moved to concur. But the House decided not to concur and a conference committee was formed with myself the author as Chair and Rep. Hamilton and Rep. Miller.
April 23rd Governor Dayton declared a peace time emergency and outlined a new request for additional funds, I was the only legislator to attend the press conference and took notes on what those requests would be.
Between April 21st and April 24th while we waited for the Senate to appoint a conference committee I met several times with the Senate Author Senator Dahle he indicated who the conferees were likely to be including Senator Skoe who was the strongest proponent of their amendment, which the House objected to. I made several overtures to Rep. Hamilton and Sen. Skoe to meet and address the concerns thinking that this would facilitate the conference committee meeting and allow us to come to a quick agreement. Senator Skoe indicated he would rather have Rep. Hamilton contact him so I gave Rep. Hamilton Sen. Skoe’s cell phone number and encouraged him to call and arrange a meeting. That meeting never took place.
April 24th Friday The Senate appointed Sen. Dahle, Sen. Skoe, and Sen. Dahmes to the conference committee.
April 27th the Conference Committee was scheduled the morning of that day for April 28th at 3:00pm
April 27th that night I was informed by Nancy Conley that she had been informed by Majority staff that the conference committee meeting for April 28th had been cancelled
April 28th on the House floor I attempted to find out on whose authority a scheduled conference committee would be cancelled. Finding no answer to my question as the conference committee chair, I made the announcement that the conference committee would meet at 3pm.
April 28th 3pm I convened the meeting and as a proposal I introduced an amendment that would become HF 2296, the bill I hope to bring to the floor today. I was told that such an amendment would be out of order as it would greatly expand the bill and was told that it would need approval from both the Speaker and the Majority leader to go forward. While the Senate conferees conferred on accepting the House offer proposed by Rep. Hamilton I checked to see what getting agreement from the Speaker and the Majority Leader of the Senate to agree and would take to move this language forward. I concluded I would not have time though I did not believe it would be impossible, so I accepted the next best thing and wrapped up the conference committee with the agreement from the Senate.
April 29th the amended HF 2225 was taken up and passed on the floor.
May 1st the Governor signed the bill.
May 4th HF 2296 was introduced as a stand alone bill and I made a motion to suspend the rules and take it up and pass it off the floor. This was rejected by Rep. Hamilton and my motion did not receive enough votes.
May 11th Rep. Baker amended the emergency loan language, which he amended from the Ag Finance Omnibus bill to the Ag Policy Omnibus Bill. I attempted to amend the rest of the language in HF 2296 to Rep. Baker’s amendment but that was ruled out of order. Later, I attempted to suspend the rules to bring forward HF 2296 on its own. But I did not have the votes to suspend the rules.
May 13th I made the same motion and it was rejected.
May 14th My motion was also rejected.
Today I stand before you – 70 hrs left in the session and asking for your support to make sure that we send this important funding allocation forward so it has a chance of passing and being signed by the Governor before we close the 2015 session.
I believe it is important that the funds be released from the transfer board where it currently sits in HF 1437 and move forward as a stand alone bill. All members who currently have constituents dealing with this or waiting and praying that they are not hit by it the H5N2 virus should support this and not wait for a meeting that may or may not happen in the next couple of days.
My intent all along since I had HF 2225 drafted was to get the money to the agencies that need it as quickly as possible, that remains my one goal. If that’s what you mean by “playing politics” I will accept your accusation. To me politics is an honorable endeavor and I cast no aspersions on your side for doing what you believe is best.
I believe we owe it to all poultry farmers to act. Think about for a moment, all of the products that depend on chicken eggs and how a wipe out not only of the turkey industry but the egg industry would mean not just for Minnesota but for our national economy. I believe we owe it to all of our constituents to act on their behalf and move without prejudice to declare an urgency and move this funding where it needs to go. Every day matters. We should not wait another day.
But wait they did. House and Senate majority leaders thought getting that big honking bill with its veto-bait environmental policy rollbacks that mostly had little to do with ag policy and funding was more important than simply helping poultry farmers.
Photo: Rep. David Bly, DFL-Northfield, in conversation with opponents of the Ag & Environment Omnibus Finance bill last Thursday. The controversial provisions that led to the veto of the bill stemmed from the environmental sections of the legislation, rather than from agricultural funding.
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An exploration of the genesis of this particular provision--first introduced as an amendment by Representative Dan during the April 15 and April 16 markup of an earlier version of the bill by the House Environment committee--reveals yet another single instance of an action by the MPCA triggering an overhaul of law.
Fabian's amendment appears to be fueled by political campaign contributions by Digi-key to the Northwest Minnesota lawmaker, the HRCC and to the coffers of the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce's PAC. Tony Kwilas, the state chamber's environmental policy director, testified on behalf of the amendment on April 16.
During the April hearing (the discussion of Fabian's amendment is embedded below), committee chair Denny McNamara characterized the company as a computer "refurbisher."
Electronics distributor Digi-Key Corporation has paid a fine and taken corrective action to ensure that generators in its Thief River Falls facility are operated according to state requirements.
In spring 2013, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) determined that the facility had failed to obtain a state permit for a generator that was installed in 1990 and provide required annual emission reports. The company also failed to obtain a permit required when two generators were added in 1999 and 2002 and a Prevention of Significant Deterioration permit (for significant sources of NOx) after the fourth and largest generator was installed in 2009.
The permits and reporting requirements are designed to limit emissions of nitrogen oxide (NOx) air pollution. NOx, a byproduct of combustion, can cause respiratory problems in people, contribute to acid rain and cause other environmental problems.
Digi-Key has four generators in Thief River Falls that are used during power outages and three of them provide electricity to a local utility during peak energy demand periods.
The company is in the process of obtaining the permit required for the generators and has submitted emission inventory reports for the years 2004-2012. It has also paid a $25,000 penalty.
When calculating penalties, the MPCA takes into account how seriously the violation affected the environment, whether it is a first-time or repeat violation, and how promptly the violation was reported to appropriate authorities. It also attempts to recover the calculated economic benefit gained by failure to comply with environmental laws in a timely manner.
In the hearing, McNamara suggests that the company was fined for one unpermitted generator--or rather, for lacking "a piece of paper" for one generator. This is a notion that's about as accurate as calling firm a computer "refurbisher."
McNamara also suggests that the $25,000 fine might drive the company into the arms of South Dakota or some other locale, but other reports suggest that a greater issue is affordable housing for new hires or finding workers at all, given the robust economy in North Dakota. The Wall Street Journal has called Thief River Falls a "job island."
Here's the April 16, 2015 discussion of Thief River Falls Republican Dan Fabian's A3 Amendment to HF846:
Following the money
So what drives the hyperbole in the words of the politicians standing up for a poor little rich company with over 3,000 employees and yearly sales of $1.6 billion that received a $25,000 fine after operating four generators without a permit?
Stordahl, Ronald 10-28-2014 HRCC $5,000.00 Larson, Mark 10-10-2014 Minn Chamber of Commerce Leadership Fd $3,000.00 Stordahl, Ronald 10-06-2014 Johnson, Jeff R Gov. Committee $ 2,000.00 Trontvet, Rick 08-18-2014 Minn Chamber of Commerce Leadership Fd $1,200.00 Larson, Mark 10-06-2014 Johnson, Jeff R Gov. Committee $1,000.00 Stordahl, Ronald 10-17-2014 Kiel, Debra (Deb) L House Dist. $750.00 Stordahl, Ronald A 10-09-2014 Fabian, Daniel E House Dist. 750.00 Larson, Mark A 05-10-2014 Fabian, Daniel E House Dist. $500.00 Trontvet, Rick 10-07-2014 Johnson, Jeff R Gov. Committee $350.00 Trontvet, Rick 08-17-2014 Minn Chamber of Commerce Leadership Fd $300.00 (a gift card) Trontvet, Rick 08-25-2014 Minn Chamber of Commerce Leadership Fd $250.00 Trontvet, Rick 10-06-2014 Johnson, Jeff R Gov. Committee $250.00 Trontvet, Rick A 04-29-2014 Fabian, Daniel E House Dist. $125.00
Note that the company's leaders ponied up $4750 for the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce Leadership Fund; in its turn, the Chamber testified in favor of the Fabian amendment.
The Chamber was only $250 behind the HRCC (the Minnesota House Republicans' campaign committee)as a recipient of the company's political generosity.
The executive spouses of the Digi-Key executives also gave to conservative political candidates. Jean Larson gave Dan Fabian $500; Karmon Trontvet contributed $225.
Was this a clear quid pro quo? It's unclear, since Digi-Key was also a poster child for the very real problems in Thief River Falls related to affordable workforce housing.
Whatever the case, those tuning in to the April 16 omnibus finance bill mark-up didn't hear about the money trail, the real number of the un-permitted generators and the length of time that they were unpermitted--or even the nature of the company itself, only that the fine was oppressive.
Perhaps the amnesty provision needed a bit more sunlight; the Governor made a good call on including this in his veto letter.
We're finding one thing fascinating as we dig into the money behind the bad policy that House Republicans (and Senate conferees) were attaching to these funding bills. That's the willingness to hold Minnesota poultry farmers, the Governor's buffer initiative and departmental budgets hostage in order to cram special interest favors into bills.
A dairy owned by a big funder asked for more environmental review by the MPCA's Citizens Board? Get rid of the board. A billion dollar plus company fined for running four generators? We'll make sure that doesn't happen again. The public interest? What checks has that written recently?
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Environmental advocates upset about a budget bill that includes several controversial policy provisions today picketed the governor’s mansion to demand a veto.
DFL Gov. Mark Dayton surprised them all by coming outside with cookies and a listening ear. He said he is still looking at all the budget bills and hasn’t decided whether to veto the environment and agriculture budget bill. But he reiterated the same doubts he raised on Wednesday during a news conference.
“Those items that you find offensive — and I agree with you — they didn’t get in there by accident. They got in there because we have a Republican-controlled House and DFL-controlled Senate,” he said. “We’re not going to be able to come back with a DFL bill … We’re in an era where we’re going to have to deal with some of these things we don’t like.”
Bobby King, a policy program organizer with the Land Stewardship Project, responded that some of the provisions, such as the elimination of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency Citizens’ Board, were inserted in closed-door meetings without a public hearing. . . .
Gov. Mark Dayton has already vowed to veto education funding legislation, citing early education as a top priority. A governor who has also championed water quality should swiftly veto another budget bill — the agriculture and environment spending legislation.
Signing it would put the gubernatorial stamp of approval on multiple measures that would weaken protections for Minnesota’s treasured waterways. Dayton, serving his final term and looking to burnish his legacy, would tarnish it if he let this shortsighted legislation sail through. It needs a do-over in the looming special session. . . .
That these measures even reached the governor’s desk is frustrating when Minnesota was poised this year to make serious progress on water cleanup. In January, Dayton boldly called for strengthening the state’s “buffer” law, which requires vegetative strips along many waterways. The strips help filter out agricultural runoff, a key source of river and stream pollution, especially in the southwestern part of the state. . . .
But there’s little positive to say about other water-related measures in the bill. Among other things, the legislation calls for dissolving the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s long-standing Citizens’ Board. The move smacks of retaliation on behalf of special interests. In 2014, the board voted to require an environmental-impact statement for a proposed 9,000-head dairy operation.
The bill also undermines a promising biofuels compromise between agricultural and environmental groups that could have helped attract biofuels investment in the state while creating incentives for growing perennials and cover crops. These fight water pollution naturally.
Other backward water-quality measures in the bill are almost too numerous to list. Wastewater facilities in the Red River watershed shouldn’t get a pass on meeting new standards. Diverting money dedicated to landfill cleanup is lousy policy. So is a move that could harm wild rice by exempting some mining waste from water protection rules.
Bluestem attended; we were impressed by the energy of the crowd and the presence of so many children, who enthusiastically accepted cookies from the Governor. Dayton said that he'll be looking over the legislation and will mostly likely announce his decision on Friday or Saturday.
There's still time to call or email Governor Dayton and join your voice with those of the protesters and the paper's editorial board. Readers can contact the Govenor's Office via these numbers and email form:
[T]he Legislature missed the mark on several key areas of the Agricultural and Environment Omnibus Budget Bill having final votes today, including:
Abolishing the Citizens’ Board of the Pollution Control Agency: The Citizens’ Board has worked well and is a model we can be proud of. Eliminating it is simply bowing to special interests.
Raiding Dedicated Environmental Funds: Even with $1 billion on the bottom line, this bill raids funds that are to prevent old landfills from contaminating our groundwater and surface water and clean up the pollution where it occurs.
Breaks the Compromise Agreement on Biofuels: The signed agreement between energy, agriculture, and environment stakeholders would establish the next-generation biofuel industry in Minnesota. This bill violates that agreement, undercutting our ability to establish perennial crops for ethanol production and develop new beneficial agricultural systems to protect and restore our lakes, rivers and streams in some our most polluted watersheds in the heart of ag country.
Provides Funding to Promote False Pollinator Labelling: The Legislature voted to allow deceptive advertising for “pollinator-friendly plants” that need only not kill bees upon first contact.
Rolling Back Wild Rice Standards: This language defies the Federal Clean Water Act by limiting the PCA’s authority to enforce our state water quality standards. Surprise Sulfide Mining Amendment: The bill exempts sulfide mining waste from solid waste rules. This amendment was never introduced as a bill or heard in any committee, and its future effect is unknown. Exempting as-of-yet unknown waste streams from potential sulfide mines is an unnecessary risk to water quality and public health.
Red River Rules Suspension: Delays enforcement of updated nutrient pollution permits for wastewater treatment facilities in the Red River watershed until 2025, unless approved by the U.S. EPA, North Dakota Department Health, and EPA Regions 5 & 8.
Polluter Amnesty: A polluter amnesty provision delays enforcement and waives penalties for regulated parties that self-report violations of environmental regulations. This provision needlessly strips the MPCA of its powers to hold polluters accountable for protecting our natural resources.
“Overall, the Ag and Environment Omnibus moves us in the wrong direction for Minnesota’s Great Outdoors, and it’s not what the people of Minnesota want,” said Morse. “Our coalition of 70 environmental and conservation nonprofits, representing over 450,000 Minnesotans urge the Governor to stand his ground for improving water quality and veto this bill.”
Photo: Children at the rally were charmed by Dayton and his cookies, while adults listened to Dayton's words about the bill.
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While acknowledging some good things in HF846, the massive agriculture and environment omnibus finance bill, thirty-six environmental groups--including Greater Minnesota-based grassroots organizations like Clean Up The River Environment (CURE) and Mankato Area Environmentalists--have sent a letter to Governor Mark Dayton urging him to veto the bill.
Here's the letter that has been sent to the Governor's office:
From the Facebook page for the Keep Minnesota Clean Event at the Governor’s Mansion:
Join together to ask Governor Dayton to veto the dirty environment bill and ask the legislature to fix it to keep MN clean. #KeepMNClean
What the bill does: - Eliminates the MN Pollution Control Agency's Citizens' Board - Raids dedicated environmental funds - Allows deceptive labeling for pollinator-friendly plants - Exempts sulfide mining waste from solid waste rules - Grants polluters amnesty from enforcement and penalties
We'll gather at 10:30AM
Kids encouraged!! This is an event with a positive message.
A program of speakers will begin at 11:00 a.m. To represent river otters living on the Upper Minnesota River, CURE is sending a nice-looking Swedish-American guy from Montvideo dressed in an otter suit:
The law, however, is not a done deal. It passed both houses, but its funding comes from a bill that failed to pass the Senate.
Meanwhile, some DFL legislators and environmental groups are urging Dayton to veto the entire environmental policy bill because it contains many provisions they find unacceptable, including the buffer rules.
The Minnesota Environmental Partnership described the buffer law as “insufficient,” and Friends of the Mississippi River said that while it’s a step in the right direction, it doesn’t do nearly enough.
“We are extremely grateful to the governor for being such a champion for our waters,” said Whitney Clark, executive director of Friends of the Mississippi. “It’s unfortunate that it is not stronger.”
Farm groups, which said they wanted more input on how the law came together, were also lukewarm on the final version. . .
In a press conference with greater Minnesota reporters Tuesday afternoon, Dayton said although he had yet to fully examine the bills that along with the education measure passed in the frenetic final hours of the session, he liked what he saw on shoreland buffers.
The language on buffers was a "very, very compelling reason" to sign the larger bill containing the buffer strip measure, he said.
However, there were other provisions in the bill that Dayton said he opposed, including the elimination of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency's Citizens' Board.
"But, I don't expect to have bills that I agree with entirely," he said. "That's a guarantee when you have a divided government. ... I'm prepared to accept things I don't like in the spirit of compromise." . . .
Sounds like those asking Dayton to veto the bill have our work cut out for us.
Photos: River otters (above); Those hard-working kids at CURE broke out the otter suit on their behalf.
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See below for the update on the buffers initiative.
Bobby King of the Land Stewardship Project sends us this alert:
The legislature decided that instead of weakening the MPCA Citizens’ Board they would outright ELIMINATE it. This outrageous idea, which was not introduced as a bill or heard previously in any committee, was unveiled late Saturday night and adopted in conference committee. Forty seven years old, the Citizens’ Board was established in 1967 with the creation of the MPCA to ensure the agency serves the public interest and to establish an open and transparent decision making process. It has worked will and is a model the state should be proud of.
This language is included in the Agriculture and Environment Budget Bill along with many other bad provisions, including a sham buffer program that puts off addressing the issue of dealing with agricultural runoff. Read more in this letter from the Minnesota Environmental Partnership to legislators.
There is negotiating going on now to potentially take some of the bad provisions out of the bill. We need calls to the Governor’s office now to keep this on his radar.
Call Gov. Dayton at 651-201-3400 or 800-657-3717 and say “The Ag and Env Budget bills ELIMINATES the MPCA Citizens’ Board. This is a terrible idea. The Citizens’ Board has been around for over 40 years and creates an open and transparent decision making process that helps guard against undue corporate influence. This entirely new proposal was adopted late at night and is outrageous. Governor veto this if it is sent to you.”
Via Minnesota Public Radio, the Associated Press reports the outline of the deal in New buffer strip plan speeds implementation, carries fines.
Here's the final letter that the Minnesota Environmental Partnership and partners sent to legislators objecting to many provisions in the conference committee report. From eliminating the Citizens Board to providing funding to promote false pollinator labeling, this is a bad bill.
Photo: Minnesota House Environment and Natural Resources Finance and Policy Committee Chair Denny McNamara (R-Hastings) and Minnesota Senate Finance - Environment, Economic Development and Agriculture Budget Division Committee Chair David Tomassoni (DFL-Chisholm) confer over the smorgasbord of special interest goodies. Photo by Paul Battaglia via Session Daily.
Bluestem readers may remember some of our earlier posts on these charming chaps.
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Fresh off a round of criticism for a racially-charged remark the day before, on Wednesday, Minnesota State Representative Jim Newberger agonized on the house floor about being labelled and persecuted for his beliefs on climate change.
An amendment to an energy related bill essentially asked Minnesota lawmakers to decide if climate change is real. Rep. Jim Newberger (R-Becker) took exception to that and that he was voting no because the amendment was questioning beliefs.
Transcript: I’m voting red because we’re being asked to make a statement about what we believe. And we have to be very careful with this because what happens to the people that vote no?
I’ll tell you what happens. We’re going to get labeled. We’re going to be called deniers and then we’re going to be persecuted. It will happen. I’ve seen it.
I’m not standing up here and I’m not giving this advice to the body lightly.
So if you’re asking me to vote on this issue, I’m voting. But I’m voting red because I refuse to be put in this position. I’m not voting on how I feel about this issue . I’m not going to be put in the position where if I take this vote then, what I believe in going to be judged. Because that’s exactly what you’re doing and we have to be very careful with the precedent that we’re setting here members . This has the potential to be a dangerous path. I thank you for your time, and I don’t take this lightly. And I respect the opinions of everyone on both sides of this issue, deeply. I’m not here to insult anybody. I respect you and I’ll never question your beliefs. Please don’t question mine.
The amendment failed on a 58-71 vote.
Here's the video:
It had not been a good week for the Becker Republican.
House Speaker Kurt Daudt said Wednesday that he is satisfied with an apology from a fellow Republican lawmaker for a comment on the House floor that many considered a racial insult to people in north Minneapolis.
Democrats say the apology isn’t enough. They say Rep. Jim Newberger, R-Becker, should be publicly reprimanded by Republican leaders for remarks they believe show he’s insensitive to minority communities.
During a Tuesday night debate on a transportation funding bill, Newberger was speaking out against an effort to study extending the Northstar Commuter Rail Line to
St. Cloud. He said that a train between the prison in St. Cloud and north Minneapolis — a predominantly black Minneapolis neighborhood — would be “convenient.”
“Right on the edge of St. Cloud, about a half of a mile, maybe a quarter of a mile from the rail tracks is the St. Cloud State Prison,” Newberger said. “Boy, wouldn’t that be convenient to have the rail line going from the prison to north Minneapolis?” . . .
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With a new and dirtier Jobs and Energy Omnibus Finance Bill up for debate on the Minnesota House floor Wednesday afternoon, Bluestem thought we'd examine part of that earlier story from a different prism: which energy special interests paid to try to defeat Rep. Melissa Hortman (DFL-Fridley), a clean energy advocate who chaired the Minnesota House Energy Policy Committee in 2013-2014.
The company also gave $25,000 directly to the Minnesotan Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund PAC on August 15, 2014 (p. 6, year end report). That's at least $25,000 and perhaps as much $50,000 of good Bakken crude flowing into Minnesota politics for independent expenditures.
It's hard not to envision at least some of that oozing into the hands of the venders MJC chair (now House Majority executive director) Ben Golnik hired to craft $58,640 worth of attacks against DFL state representative Melissa Hortman in House District 36B (page 18, year end report).
That's one possible source of independent expenditure cash from the energy industry to work against Hortman. Here's the list of all the IE above $1000 that were spent against Hortman in 2014, via the Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board:
HRCC (MN House GOP campaign committee) $91,328.00 Minn Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund $68,140.00 Republican Party of Minn $14,338.83 MN Action Network IE PAC $9,009.32
After all, in the 2013-2014 session when the DFL held the majority in the Minnesota House, the Fridley Democrat chaired the Energy Policy Committee, helping to shepherd through clean energy policy.
Northern Oil and Gas Inc Chair and CEO Micheal Reger also gave big to the HRCC, the campaign committee for Minnesota House Republicans. Reger dropped $10,000 into the HRCC kitty on October 14, 2014, (p. 48 year end report) after giving the committee $25,000.00 on December 31, 2013 (p. 26 year-end report), or $35,000 for the cycle.
HRCC Energy Money
So perhaps some of that Northern Oil and Gas cash got spent against Hortman by the HRCC. The $91,328 Independent Expenditure spending by the HRCC against Hortman was the committee's highest IE figure in 2014.
From whence else in the energy industry do we find money flowing to the Jobs Coalition Legislative fund and the HRCC?
Clearly, energy policy mattered to the HRCC, and to current Jobs and Energy chair Pat Garofalo, whose campaign committee contributed $60,000 to the HRCC (page 18, year end report). This contribution appears to be the largest gift to the HRCC by a GOP House candidate's committee; other high-rolling committee chairs, such as McNamara and Loon, contributed between $32,000-35,000 each.
Xcel Energy Employees PAC gave the HRCC $12,000 (page 60). The Rural Electric PAC gave $1900.
Republican State Leadership Committee funds to Jobs Coalition
While some funds shifted to the from the Jobs Coalition to its legislative fund, we don't know where the thought leader organization got most of that money. The biggest contributor to the IE spending was the Republican State Leadership Committee as we'd noted in February's Feb 2015 update: MJC received $325,000 from the RSLC; where'd that money trickle down from?. We noted a few energy industry and industry ally contributors to the RSLC:
UPDATE II: According to Open Secrets, Edison Electric Institute, an industry front group that's anti-solar, gave RSLC over $100,000 in the 2013-2014 cycle. How much of that flowed to the $325,000 the RSLC sent to Minnesota Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund for IE against DFLers?
$25,000
EDISON ELECTRIC INSTITUTE
WASHINGTON DC
06/26/14
$25,000
EDISON ELECTRIC INSTITUTE
WASHINGTON DC
11/26/13
$295
EDISON ELECTRIC INSTITUTE
WASHINGTON DC
11/26/13
$399
EDISON ELECTRIC INSTITUTE
WASHINGTON DC
10/14/13
$50,000
Edison Electric Institute
Washington DC
03/28/13
UPDATE III:According to Open Secrets, the Nuclear Energy Institute gave RSLC $115,000 in the 2013-2014 cycle. How much of that flowed to the $325,000 the RSLC sent to Minnesota Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund for IE against DFLers?
SourceWatch describes the front group in these terms: the "NEI’s objective is to ensure the formation of policies that promote the "beneficial uses" of nuclear energy in the United States and around the world. It has over 280 corporate members in 15 countries, including companies that operate nuclear power plants, as well as design and engineering firms, fuel suppliers and service companies, and labor unions."
$5,000
NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE
WASHINGTON DC
10/30/14
$50,000
NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE
WASHINGTON DC
02/06/14
$10,000
Nuclear Energy Institute
Washington DC
03/15/13
$50,000
Nuclear Energy Institute
Washington DC
03/14/13
UPDATE IV: According to Open Secrets, Continental Resources, Inc, an Oklahoma based energy company that calls itself the largest acreage holder in the Bakken, gave RSLC $57,000 in the 2013-2014 cycle. How much of that flowed to the $325,000 the RSLC sent to Minnesota Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund for IE against DFLers?
How much of that $50,000 flowed to the $325,000 the RSLC sent to Minnesota Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund for IE against DFLers?
$50,000
PAUL SINGER
NEW YORK NY
10/29/14
UPDATE VI: According to Open Secrets, Cloud Peak Energy Resources LLC, a Powder River company that sends coal to Minnesota, gave $15,000 to the RSLC. Wyoming Mining reported. in 2014 that Cloud Peak Taking More Active Role in Coal Debate. How much of that $15,000 flowed to the $325,000 the RSLC sent to Minnesota Jobs Coalition Legislative Fund for IE against DFLers?
$15,000
CLOUD PEAK ENERGY RESOURCES LLC
GILLETTE WY
10/06/14
What proportion of all these contributions trickled into Minnesota? We'll never know how much of the mix came from which industry, but given where the spending was directed, it's likely some energy money flowed to Minnesota.
Tweet photo: Rep. Melissa Hortman, former Minnesota House Energy Policy Committee chair, who was a big IE target in 2014.
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A fascinating letter to the editor of the Morris Sun Tribune from Alexandria reader Susanne Engstrom fact-checks a recent Republican House leadership photo opportunity and discovers a wee bit of pandering on the part of the Majority Caucus's leadership.
House Republican leaders try to talk a good game when it comes to sticking up for Greater Minnesota, but are they there for us when it really counts? Case in point, House Majority Leader Joyce Peppin's tour of the ethanol plant in Morris as part her tour to “support” Greater Minnesota. I'm glad she enjoyed her time in Morris, but when it came time to vote, Peppin voted against ethanol and Greater Minnesota.
House Majority Leader Peppin has been a strident opponent of ethanol. In fact, she voted against $750,000 in funding for the Morris ethanol plant in 2013 (HJP 4722 3/15/13). She voted against funding for the Morris plant again in the 2014 session (HJP 11838, 5/16/14).
And what has Majority Leader Peppin and the House Republican leadership actually proposed for Greater Minnesota this year? They are proposing a cut to the jobs and economic development budget that supports key funding for Greater Minnesota jobs initiatives, including eliminating support for broadband infrastructure. [See "Follow through on broadband pledge to MN"? In campaign, Miller made no-broadband pledge for an update on broadband funding]
It would have been nice for Majority Leader Peppin and Jeff Backer to thank Rep. Jay McNamar during their visit. It was McNamar that authored the bill that provided new funding for the Morris plant – despite opposition from Republicans like Peppin.
I have some advice for House Majority Leader Peppin. You can save some gas money next time you’re coming out here to pander to us Greater Minnesota folks. We’d rather you put your money where your mouth is and actually vote for Greater Minnesota.
Mick Miller (left), general manager of Denco II, gave a tour of the facility to House Majority Leader Joyce Peppin (center) and Rep. Jeff Backer (right) on Friday, March 27. Miller and Denco II board members met with Peppin and Backer to discuss the local impact of ethanol. (Submitted Photo)
Photo: We're curious who took this photo.
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Bluestem has been cross about the breathless reporting and tweeting about how Minnesota Nice Sixth District freshman Congressman Tom Emmer has been, because those fawning articles and posts mention surface niceties, not policy.
We don't care how much a congressman--or a commoner--makes us cry with his or her storytelling; indeed, the debasement of the storytelling form by marketing and issue campaigns now cause the mere delivery of a personal witness Youtube to our mailboxes fire up our fact checking.
The first quarter of the first year of U.S. 6th District Rep. Tom Emmer's first term is drawing to a close. If you, as a constituent, had to grade him, how's he doing?
Based on the articles and opinion pieces in the St. Cloud Times and the Star Tribune concerning Emmer's efforts to assimilate in Washington, work with both "sides," and listen to people, plus his town hall meetings and email newsletters, under "Conduct" we'd certainly have to award him a "+" and a smiley face in the category "Plays well with others."
That's nice, but how's he voting? That is how he represents us.
There's been little or no reporting on this subject. I've pulled the information on a few of the key votes taken in the U.S. House so far this session. This is how our Republican representative voted:
•In favor of HR 161, which allows only 90 days for environmental reviews of gas pipeline permit applications after the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has evaluated the application.
•Against a motion to amend HR 161 to make gas companies responsible for cleanup in case of explosions and hold pipeline owners responsible for loss of life and other damages.
Did you see a headline "Emmer OKs rushing pipeline studies. If shoddy workmanship results in explosion, taxpayers will pay for cleanup"? Me neither. . . .
•Against a motion to require Keystone's owners to pay into a Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund.
I guess I missed the oil pipeline one, too. "Emmer votes to OK Keystone; owners excited that spills won't be their worry."
•Against a motion to deny tax benefits, as part of HR 644, to any business that reincorporates overseas to avoid U.S. taxes.
I never saw "Emmer votes to allow businesses to skip the country and skip paying taxes. . . .
And my personal favorite:
•In favor of HR 1029 to reshape the Environmental Protection Agency's Advisory Board, reducing the number of academic scientists on the board and filling those seats with members of the industries being regulated. How could this go wrong?
But wait. There's more.
Emmer also voted against an amendment that would have required those captains of polluting industries to not have been convicted of pollution crimes.
The net effect is the scientists who actually study pollution and its effects will be replaced on the regulatory board by industry insiders who may actually have been convicted of crimes related to environmental pollution.
This isn't legislation. It's an environmental atrocity. . . .
Read the entire article in the Times, then make sure each time a good progressive friend starts rattling on about What A Nice Guy Tom Emmer Has Become, you rescue your friend from the walking dead by asking: which votes?
Photo: Tom Emmer, Mr. Nice Guy, back when he was doing infomercials for Renters Warehouse. Pay no attention to the votes behind the CSPAN screen.
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On April 6th, the House Jobs and Affordable Energy Committee posted a final energy package that was radically different from the Senate’s Clean Energy Plan (SF 1431) passed two weeks earlier. Evaluating and reforming energy and climate policy is important, but the House proposal guts Minnesota’s successful, nationally recognized clean energy and climate policies. We believe that evaluation and reform should be done in an attempt to transition Minnesota’s energy system and economy from dirty fossil fuels to no carbon, renewable sources to improve air and water quality, reduce the impacts of climate change, create economic benefits and jobs for all Minnesotans, and to create a resilient, affordable, and reliable energy system and economy.
In a concise and thoughtful post, Rosier lays out four principles for Minnesota’s clean energy transition, followed by eight points critiquing the draft of the omnibus bill draft, along with a recommendation and link to contact legislators:
Key people within the Minnesota House of Representatives are working to gut Minnesota’s successful landmark clean energy policies, but people of faith are stepping up and calling on them to do the right thing.
Over the past twenty years, Minnesotans have built a responsible transition beyond fossil fuels to a clean, renewable energy, and a thriving industry that employs >15,300 people. Faith actors have been at the forefront of these successful steps forward.
But the Minnesota House bill would:
Eliminate Minnesota’s science-based goals aimed to reduce and offset climate pollution;
Repeal Minnesota’s energy savings program that has saved the energy equivalent of 8 Prairie Island nuclear plants;
Repeal the nuclear moratorium;
Destroy the progress made on solar energy in 2013
Roll back Minnesota’s renewable goals by watering down standard renewable energy by allowing existing, large hydro from Canada.
Tell your State Senator and Representative to vote NO on the House energy bill and instead supporting clean energy & jobs policies by supporting the Senate clean energy package.
The right thing to do is to continue to make progress by supporting the Senate clean energy package that sets Minnesota’s renewable energy benchmark to achieve at least 40% renewables by 2030 and increases energy savings.
Thanks for all you do to build the climate movement!
Minnesota has been a leader in solar energy, but proposed legislation threatens the state's growing rooftop solar industry, local job creation, and energy choice by eliminating fundamental solar policies.
Send a letter to save solar now!
This proposed House Energy Omnibus Bill changes the way utilities account for the energy that rooftop solar customers export to the grid. The current policy, called net metering, provides a fair accounting of a customer’s solar energy production and has driven almost 100% of all rooftop solar deployment in the United States over the last three decades. Net metering is critical to Minnesota’s energy future.
Lend your voice and tell your elected officials you support net metering and a thriving clean energy market that brings choice and control over electricity costs to Minnesotans!
Feidt,whose large online following reaches into Occupy and left libertarian circles, includes a rollicking twitter exchange with Jobs & Energy Affordability committee chair Pat Garofalo (R-Farmington).
Photo: Rep. Pat Garofalo (R-Farmington).
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Rep. Pat Garofalo has introduced his draft Omnibus Energy Bill. d0b80283-da3f-4839-baf9-551613c2b6d9.pdf Since he is Chair of the House Jobs Creation and Energy Affordability Committee, his bill is the Republican bill.
The Garofalo bill incorporates the energy-related ideas and bills that had been heard in his committee. Rep. Garofalo then found more bad ideas to include. This post would be much too long if it did more than scratch the surface. So it just covers the worst of the worst. Two of the worst of the worst were presented earlier in committee so there are earlier and more detailed posts about them. The earlier posts are noted below.
In summary, Rep. Garofalo’s bill would dismantle most of Minnesota’s efforts to promote renewable energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by repealing the laws that support these efforts. He totally sabotages solar.
In 62 pages he does a lot more, like proposing to make gifts to coal, the Koch brothers, and people wealthy enough to buy electric cars.
Before the worst of the worst, the back story needs to be told. The fight brewing in Minnesota is just one of many happening across the U.S. In an article entitled “Utilities wage campaign against rooftop solar,” The Washington Post reported on the campaign by utitlites and its fossil-fuel supporters to stop residential solar. The Post says that legislation to make net metering illegal or more expensive has been introduced in legislatures in nearly two dozen states. The Los Angeles Times article, “Koch brothers, big utilities attack solar, green energy policies” links the effort against net metering to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and the Koch brothers.
Read the rest at her blog, which critiques the 3/27/2015 draft. Here's the final draft of the Minnesota House omnibus energy bill (posted 4/6/2015 online here on the committee's web site):
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As Bluestem reads about the reaction to Governor Dayton's vegetative buffer proposal, we're struck by the sincerity of the stories being told about farmers' intense affection for conservation.
Take, for example, the story told in Minnesota Corn Growers President Bruce Peterson in Farmers are losing the public perception battle. It's not that farmers don't practice conservation, Peterson says, it's just that non-farmers' perceptions and knowledge of conservation is somehow flawed.
If only farmers could communicate better, those perceptions would vanish like the morning dew.
A similar narrative governs the local guide for Minnesota House Majority Leader Joyce Peppin (R-Rogers) and freshman state representative Jeff Backer as they explore the ethanol plant in Morris, Minnesota. In Kim Ukura's article in the Morris Sun Tribune, Local business leaders share story of ethanol with legislators, the story of this good news about corn growing is shared:
Miller added that the food versus fuel debate over the use of corn is also misleading. Ethanol production uses about 30 to 35 percent of corn produced in the Uniteid States, while the rest is either fed to cattle or exported.
"We're not tilling up more ground to make more corn for ethanol demand — our farmers are becoming more and more efficient," said Miller.
Remember, it's not public relations or propaganda anymore, it's story telling.
Corn and soybean prices went sky high between 2008 and 2012, and so did the number of acres that went under the plow in Minnesota and the rest of the country, according to a new study.
About 250,000 acres, or nearly 400 square miles, of Minnesota land was converted into row crops during that period. Most of it was grassland, but 25,000 acres were wetlands — more than any other state. And 13,000 acres of forests were converted — the second largest forest conversion in the country.
The researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison used satellite data from three different sources to analyze land conversion. The study was published Thursday in the journal Environmental Research Letters.
"In the Midwest we saw a lot of croplands expanding outside the traditional corn belt area, and Minnesota in particular was a key hot spot of land conversion," said Tyler Lark, a university graduate student and the study's lead author. "Much of the conversion came at the cost of natural ecosystems."
Converting forests, wetlands and grasslands into row crops has raised concerns in Minnesota and elsewhere for two reasons. First, farming practices can degrade water quality. . . .
The researchers aren't the first to point out the land conversion, but they used data that allowed them to determine how much of the converted land had not been used for crops in at least the past four decades. In Minnesota's case, 22,000 acres that were converted to cropland between 2008 and 2012 hadn't been used for that purpose in recent history.
In addition, the study found that converted land was often considered "marginal," meaning previously farmers hadn't wanted to plant on it. . . .
Surely, as farmers tell their stories, all of that data will simply disappear from the public's awareness. Better check out this map before the story tellers erase it from public memory:
Public funds in private hands may aid in shaping perceptions
Indeed, HF779, which would establish an Agriculture Research, Education, Extension, and Technology Transfer Board, will be dedicating $2.4 million to ag education, some of which will go "leadership" education, wherein ag leaders will no doubt learn more about communicating away the public's perceptions.
Of course, that's just a drop in the bucket as part of the $18,750,000 in fiscal year 2016 and $18,750,000 in fiscal year 2017 that are to be transferred from the general fund to the board. If you liked the IRRRB, you're going to completely adore this entity. Unlike the IRRRB or the Lessard-Sams Legacy Council, there aren't any legislators on the board to help oversee the spending of that $37.5 million over two years (and that's just the first two years).
Indeed, with the exception of three non-voting seats for the Minnesota Commissioner of Agriculture, the Dean of the College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences at the University of Minnesota, and one person representing the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) system, the voting members of the board represent farm organizations, commodity councils, the forest industry and the agriculture industry.
We know of no other board in Minnesota where public money is simply transferred over to private hands that will select projects for research and "education" purposes, but perhaps one exists somewhere.
We're not sure why funding for ag education and research can't simply to allocated to the University's ag school and MNSCU, with some under-served farm management education programs being transferred to the MDA, rather that handing a pot of money to private organizations to decide.
It's pure pork in more ways than one.
We've heard from reliable sources that suggest that supporters of other legislation--such renewable energy groups seeking dollars for HF 536/ SF 517 (which "will create production-based incentives for renewable chemicals, advanced biofuels, and biomass thermal energy") had to agree to support the Transfer Board. [Update 4/9: we're told that while Hamilton floated this horsetrade in negotiations, the final agreement did not include any sort of compromise related to the Transfer Board. Waiting on confirmation].
Coin toss to see if the pork transfer board ends up being called the Hamilton board by the time the dude retires from the legislature. We can think of no better legacy for the Christiansen Farms employee.
Images: An ethanol plant manager in Morris (left) tells Majority Leader Joyce Peppin (center) and Representative Jeff Backer (right) about corn, ethanol and cattle feed (above). This map by University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers represents the amount of new cropland expansion as compared to existing cropland in 2008. Areas in red are hot spots where the amount of cropland more than doubled between 2008 and 2012. Courtesy of Tyler Lark & MPR (below).
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John Weiss's article in the Rochester Post Bulletin, Frac-sand mining still contentious in Houston County, helps flesh out more of the details about the new complaints against Houston County Zoning Administrator Bob Scanlan.
Scanlan was suspended for five days last year (two days were dropped if he completed some actions) because a long investigation found he had retaliated against frac-sand opponents by trying to use zoning rules against them, shared confidential information with others and gave special treatment by advocating in behalf of others.
Now opponents have filed new three new ethics complaints against Scanlan with the county's Human Resources Department.
• Bryan and Sue Van Gorp and Cory and Jackie Baker contend that Scanlan has undue influence over the permitting of the Tracie Erickson mine near Rushford. "He misrepresented the facts of the case at various levels of government," they claim.
• Ken Tschumper contends that Scanlan was active in writing the mining ordinance that didn't pass while owning a non-conforming shale mine. He could gain financially from the ordinance, so he should have disqualified himself, Tschumper contends.
• Bruce Kuehmichel contends that Scanlan was derelict in his duties by not administering county ordinances that require reclamation plans and bonds. "The absence of a bond puts the county at great financial liability to assume the burden of reclaiming an abandoned mine," Kuehmichel said.
While all of the charges of conflict of interest and preferential treatment (especially of a mine owned by a Houston County deputy sheriff) are troubling, the final new complaint is particularly troublesome in light of the fact that the frac sand industry widely touts its reclamation projects (while downplaying the limit use to which reclaimed lands can be put).
If the development of mining--through the undermining of the will of Houston County citizens through harassment and intimidation--is largely in Scanlan's hands, what are we to think of his statement to the Post Bulletin:
. . .While Scanlan hasn't spoken about the complaints, he has in the past said the ordinance that is now in place is good and has worked well.
Reclaiming the land after mines closed "has never been a high priority for the county board," Scanlan said. And the county doesn't have the staff to do that kind of work, he said. . . .
Echoes of January's pro-frac sand hearing in St. Paul
None of the citizens shoehorned in at the last fifteen minutes were from Houston County, but the episode illustrates the same attitude held by some electeds that somehow Minnesota residents are somehow a nuisance when they raise questions about who is being served--people or corporate interests. Somehow, we doubt the torches will be doused anytime soon.
Cartoon: Angry citizens with pitchforks and torches, Simpsons' style.
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A zoning official here wielded his power to retaliate against people who opposed frac sand mining, an independent investigation found, slapping frac opponents with bogus zoning violations, threatening to tear down their house or cabin and, in one case, warning a frac opponent that she should “watch what she says” or risk getting cited.
His targets were people who had spoken out at public meetings or sent letters to the Houston County Board to complain about the encroachment of frac-sand mines, an issue that’s torn the county’s social fabric as the local government wrestles with how to manage the emerging and potentially lucrative industry.
The official, Bob Scanlan, was suspended for three days and given mandatory ethics training as a result of the investigation ordered last summer by the County Board of commissioners and conducted by Minneapolis law firm Lockridge Grindal Nauen.
The findings were made public recently, when the county released a redacted version to the Star Tribune. Today, Scanlan presides as the county zoning and planning director and acts as a key official in the county’s ongoing deliberations over sand mining.
What's perhaps just as outrageous is the defense of Scanlan by a county commissioner:
Commissioner Judy Storlie said she believes Scanlan is a good employee who’s being harassed at his job by people opposed to sand mining.
Take that, peasants! Should a public employee threaten you (contacting your employer, threatening to pull your house down) when you seek to have ordinances protecting your property enforced, your act of registering a complaint is harassment.
Lovely. Storlie sounds like the type who'd nominate Scanlan for a Nobel Peace Prize.
But there's even more. McKinney reports:
Until he got a judge to help him, Bryan VanGorp couldn’t walk on some of his property because it would violate a restraining order filed by a neighbor.
The order was ostensibly about VanGorp driving across his neighbor’s rural property to check on someone else’s cabin, but it came amid frac sand mining argument that found VanGorp, a retired veterinarian, and his neighbor, a Houston County sheriff’s deputy, on opposing sides.
Speaking from his back deck one recent afternoon, VanGorp said he worries about what could happen to him if he bumps into his neighbor at the grocery store and unintentionally violates the restraining order.
The frac-sand debate, he said, has “just blown up the neighborhood.”
Since Bluestem likes to nitpick media reports, bringing completely insignificant details that have nothing really to do with the story, we felt that our readers might enjoy knowing a bit more about this anecdote.
During the public comment portion of the Houston County Board meeting Tuesday, August 5, several concerned citizens expressed their opinions to the county board.
The citizens were concerned over the county’s support of a mine known as the “Erickson mine.”
A recent DNR decision ordered all mining to stop at the Erickson mine until a trout stream setback permit can be obtained.
The citizens would like the county to “stop defending this illegal permit.”
“You have already spent a huge amount of our money trying to grant one individual the ability to profit at the expense of other citizens and our environment,” said Sue Van Gorp during the comment period. “If one more dollar is spent on this fiasco to favor Erickson over the tax payers of this county we will go big and go public and have you investigated for misuse of public funds.” . ..
And then:
Following Tschumper and Van Gorps comments, Donna Buckbee indicated that she is concerned by the treatment her neighbor, Bryan Van Gorp is receiving from Erickson himself.
“We have been on the receiving end of threats and intimidation,” said Buckbee. “Threats to demolish our property and property damage. This is escalating.”
“I need to tell you, your deputy, your employee, Tracie Erickson is escalating his intimidation. I’m in fear for the life of my neighbor, Bryan Van Gorp. I’m in fear for a lot of us, including my own safety, but especially Bryan.
“You all have some responsibility to protect the citizens of this county.”
That's right. The deputy, Van Gorp's neighbor, runs one of the mines at the heart of the conflict. For more on the Erickson mine, we recommend the "News and Information" timeline on the Erickson Mine page at the activist-run Sandpoint Times. While the information hasn't been updated recently, it will help provide a sound backstory to McKinney's closing anecdote.
UPDATE: A kind reader reminded Bluestem of the material related to "Whether the Michelle and Tracie Erickson 19.11 acre mine site is a phased action to the Minnesota Sands multi-site EIS project" in the June 18, 2014 Environmental Quality Board packet pdf.
It's fascinating reading about a mine that has generated the particular anecdote at the close of the Star Tribune story, and names are used. [end update]
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The 326,170 Minnesotans who live near railroad tracks carrying North Dakota crude oil should be prepared for a train accident, a state emergency management official says.
“If you live by the train, people need to take some personal awareness of what’s around them,” Kevin Reed of the Minnesota Homeland Security and Emergency Management department said. “‘How do I get out of the way before the fire department gets here?'”
Minnesotans should answer in advance questions such as “what would I take with me?” he added.
Here in our world headquarters in sunny Maynard, three blocks for the BNSF tracks, the answer to the second question is easy: grab the cat and run like the dickens.
The first gives us greater pause, since the fire department is a couple of blocks closer to the tracks than our domicile. An explosion is more like to get the fire department "out of the way."
Davis writes:
In greater Minnesota, Winona in the southeastern part of the state has the most residents near tracks, 22,325. Clay County, where most Bakken oil enters Minnesota, has 19,499 residents near the tracks.
Stearns, Benton and Sherburne counties in the St. Cloud area combine for 38,365 residents in the danger zone.
Most Bakken oil trains come into Minnesota in Moorhead, go through the Twin Cities and then south along the Mississippi River. Some oil trains head south to Willmar then out the southwest corner of the state.
Since there's an ethanol plant on the tracks south of Maynard, we'd thought the many tanker trains rumbling through town were filled with ethanol--still flammable, but not as spectacularly so as Bakken oil.
Here's the map (Chippewa County is pale green, but that's mostly because the population in these parts isn't very dense.
Photo: A long tanker train parked just north of Maynard, looking south toward the Cargill elevator. It's been there a couple of days. It's possible it's empty, waiting to fill up at the ethanol plant south of town on Highway 212.
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In a letter published in the Sunday Grand Forks Herald, Paul Lysen of Meeker County's Kingston Township accuses Democratic Congressman Collin Peterson of being a Democrat in his letter, Reject Rep. Peterson, a Democrat in Democrat's clothing.
Another version of the letter has been published in the Park Rapids Enterprise, another newspaper in the Forum Communications chain, under the headline, Collin Peterson is not one of us. More on that one later in the post.
Since Congress reconvened with an even more Republican cast, Peterson hasn't been getting any more blue of a Blue Dog, so we suspect with the district back on the national hit list, we'll see more of this purple prose and yellow journalism.
Representative Kevin Cramer (R-ND) sponsored H.R. 3, yet another a bill to automatically approve the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, which would transfer the world’s dirtiest oil through the American heartland to be exported at an international shipping port on the Gulf Coast. Keystone XL would lead to a significant expansion of tar sands development, unleashing massive amounts of carbon pollution and threatening surrounding communities, ecosystems, and watersheds including the Ogallala aquifer, which provides drinking water for millions of Americans. Despite these real threats, Keystone XL would create just 35 permanent jobs and would not enhance American energy independence. H.R. 3 would short circuit the approval process, eliminating the State Department’s ability to assess whether the pipeline is in the national interest and the President’s authority to ultimately approve or reject the project. On January 9, the House approved H.R. 3 by a vote of 266-153 (House roll call vote 16). NO IS THE PRO-ENVIRONMENT VOTE.
He supported tax credits for wind farms and solar installations, but voted against the Keystone Pipeline and against permits for more oil refineries in our country and oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Peterson has always voted for the Keystone project. It's true that he's supported wind and solar, but it's peculiar to pit votes on petroleum industry policy against wind and solar, which are related to electricity generation.
Westrom encouraged executives of Xcel Energy to meet with members of the neighboring Prairie Island Indian community to consider increasing the number of fuel casks and boosting Xcel's commitment to renewable energy at the same time. The resulting law was enacted four years before former Gov. Tim Pawlenty signed a 2007 law requiring Minnesota utilities to generate 25 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2025. Westrom's bill also required Xcel to contribute $16 million annually to a Renewable Development Account. . .
Westrom characterized the wind turbines as "freedom towers." While support of renewable energy among Republicans has decreased since the 2010 GOP landslide, Westrom remains a centrist on energy policy; believing that a diversified portfolio of conventional and renewable energy creates jobs. He characterized himself as a "huge supporter" of renewable energy, including 2001 legislation he sponsored to mandate a 5 percent biodiesel fuel blend for vehicles used by the state.
However, since Westrom campaigned a lot on ramming the Keystone pipeline through, perhaps in these deeply divided times, Lysen inferred from Westrom's intense focus that Peterson opposed Keystone, regardless of what those dirty hippies and their roll call votes say.
Park Rapids Enterprise version: Collin Peterson, bond to be voting for Obamacare?
Peterson has held firm on two issues, the right to life and gun rights, which has inoculated him against kickback from voting the way Obama tells him to on other issues–like supporting Obamacare.
Peterson has held firm on two issues, the right to life and gun rights, and this has inoculated him against kickback from voting the way Obama tells him to on other issues.
As Republicans are quick to remind, U.S. Rep. Collin Peterson, one of 34 Democrats to oppose the Affordable Care Act in 2010, has voted against every full repeal bill the House has considered since the GOP took control in 2011.
He has, however, sided with the party on half of the 50-some Obamacare bills they’ve voted on over the last three years, including all of them since October.
Not that he’s keeping track. In fact, Peterson said his votes since last fall are only “somewhat” related to what the GOP is actually bringing up. . . . .
But Peterson’s record on GOP-led Obamacare votes over the last three years reflects his still-dim opinion of the law as a whole. And while he doesn’t have anything nice to say about how President Obama or Democrats are handling the law’s roll-out, he said he’s not going to back a GOP repeal bill unless it maintains the several parts of the law he does like, something he acknowledges is unlikely to ever happen.
A full repeal bill “repeals pre-existing conditions, it repeals all the good stuff, kids on their parents’ policies, the Medicare donut hole … by doing that, you’re getting rid of the good stuff,” he said. “So why are we doing that?” . ..
After looking at Henry's article and the attached list of Peterson's votes, we can see why the editors at the Grand Forks Herald threw that final prepositional phrase in the trash can.
But on Planet Lysen, Park Rapids Enterprise version, Peterson is supporting something evil than universal health care: the separation of church and state.
Park Rapids Enterprise version: anti-Christian bigots endorse Peterson
Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AU) also endorses him with a glowing 100 percent rating. These are the same anti-Christian bigots who conspire to drive Jesus Christ out of our politics, laws, schools, and public displays.
Collin Peterson apparently agrees with their atheistic goals, but I doubt that many people in the 7th District do.
The word "hack" is also added to the last sentence:
Why should we continue to return this man to office time after time? Wake up, people, and kick this hack Democrat out!
Americans United for Separation of Church and State doesn't make endorsements; moreover, in 2014, only Keith Ellison was rated 100 percent by AU; like the rest of the Minnesota House delegation, Peterson was ranked 0 percent, according to the data available for the group on Project Vote Smart.
Perhaps Lysen means the 2013 ranking, where Peterson was joined at 100 percent with AU's atheistic goals by those godless commies John Kline (R-MN02) and Erik Paulsen (R-MN03), while the rest of Minnesota's congressional delegation stood at zero. (Bachmann's score is now omitted, since she's left office).
We'll presume that the Grand Forks Herald edited this erroneous copy out of the letter; it's unfortunate that it couldn't do the same for the misinformation about Peterson's Keystone votes. Let's hope that the Forum Communications papers that
As far as we can tell, the last time a sitting Minnesota congressman was accused of sharing the goals of atheists was around 1920, when Rev. Ole Juulson Kvale made such claims against bluenosed Gopher Andrew Volstead. That worked out well.
Lysen is no stranger to the ranks of outspoken Republicans in West Central Minnesota, though we don't anticipate him following in Ole Kvale's trailblazing path or Congressman Emmer's mellowing.
In a May 2103 letter to the Litchfield Independent Review, Why did Broman tell Republicans to cave on gay marriage? he attacked the paper's editor while making some rather eccentric claims about what supporters of marriage equality want:
Andrew Broman really stepped in it this time. Why would he tell Republicans to cave on gay marriage ("Democrats spring gay marriage trap," March 7)? Is he really trying to improve their chances of winning elections or is he trying to deceive them into giving up the fight against Democrat ideology? He has earlier attacked Republicans for advancing the Voter ID amendment, claiming that it was “antithetical to democracy.” What he really meant to say was that it was antithetical to Democrats. Broman was helping to preserve their right to lie and cheat their way to election victories.
So, the question remains, why is Broman telling Republicans to give up on opposing gay marriage? The same reason any Democrat would — to grant legitimacy to any and all perversions that Democrat voters choose to engage in. After all, we have to be enlightened and progressive and free from Christian prejudices. We must allow man-boy marriages, man-animal marriages, and man-inflatable doll marriages!
“For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world but lose his soul?” (Mark 8:36.) Most of us Republicans are Christians first and conservatives second. Every Republican caucus, convention, and meeting I have attended starts out with prayer. We do not intend to hide our belief in God under a basket when we go out into the world. Atheists, humanists, evolutionists, Muslims, and earth-worshippers don’t. God is real, and we take His dictates seriously. Marriage is between a man and a woman. Jesus said so. Why should we deny that to win a few votes from Democrats?
Grant the homosexuals their demands and what will happen? Pastors who preach from the Bible about homosexual unions will be hauled into court for hate crimes. Schools will be required to teach that homosexual unions are normal and honorable. Gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgenders, and whatever else, will demand special rights as protected groups.
Faith in God guides our conservatism, as it did the country’s founders. They knew that all humans are fallen. Give men power over others and they will abuse it. The founders’ solution was to keep government close to the governed. The states were free to decide their own matters while the federal government, with three countervailing branches, was to be held in check by the Constitution. If a citizen disagreed with the policies of one state, they were free to move to another. This is what conservatives stand for.
Broman has proclaimed that the “Republican leadership ought to prohibit Bible-thumping within its ranks” and “rediscover the true meaning of conservatism.” I doubt that he really cares about the true meaning of conservatism. Clearly, he isn’t a conservative himself since his interest is not in helping the cause of conservatism but in undermining it.
Well then. The man-inflatable doll marriage talking point is a new one on us. We also appreciate Christian soldier Lysen giving himself a waiver on that commandment about not bearing false witness. Perhaps a higher power is a-okay on misrepresenting Peterson's dirty energy votes on the Keystone pipeline.
Earlier, Lysen had accused the Litchfield paper of supporting voter fraud, and repeated the old canard that felons voting put Franken over the top in the 2008 election. In his November 2012 letter, 'Our View' supports voter fraud, he writes:
Contrary to your “Our View” editorial of Nov. 12, “Republicans lost their way with voter ID,” you editors and publisher of the Litchfield newspaper were the ones who lost their way by joining with the Democrats to celebrate the defeat of voter ID. Why didn’t you question why the Democrats spent so much money to defeat voter ID? Clearly, the present “honor” system works to their advantage.
In editorials before the election, you agreed with the Democrats who claimed that voter ID was a huge expense that would be dumped on local governments. But, how much does it cost to flash an ID card? If it so expensive, why have over 30 states already implemented it? You also cheered the Democrat’s half-baked contention that voters would be disenfranchised by having to show an ID card. Well, then, in the name of social justice, why don’t you demand that drivers need not show police their identification or that check cashiers need not show their ID to the banks?
Your paper takes the Democrat view that there is hardly a smidgen of fraud to be found in Minnesota voting. Right, and how was it that the votes of a thousand felons (who are ineligible to vote) were counted in 2008 allowing Franken to come from behind to win over Coleman by 300 votes? Do you think we have forgotten this?
Minnesota’s present voting laws are a goldmine for Democrats to exploit. Scenarios where voter fraud is possible under current law include the following:
Registering up to 15 impostors on voting day by one registered voter. The same 15 could be vouched for in another precinct by another registered voter.
Registering in multiple precincts on voting day by producing expired identification cards such as an old driver’s license.
Registering in advance in multiple precincts and going from precinct to precinct on voting day.
Voting by felons.
Voting by illegal aliens (since proof of citizenship is not required).
Double voting by college students who vote in their college town and in their home precinct.
Voting by impostors who assume the identity of people who are dead or who have moved away.
These scenarios are more likely, of course, to occur in urban areas where Democrats predominate and where anonymity is assured.
These abuses would be curbed by a voter ID requirement. So why does your newspaper criticize Republicans for supporting voter ID? You should be applauding Republicans such as our Sen. Scott Newman for trying to bring integrity to the election process. Why should you want to conspire with the Democrats to preserve a tool they can use to win every close election held in this state? Just what is your agenda here in Meeker County?
Lysen can invent as many likely scenarios as he wishes, but there's little evidence any of that has been happening.
Finally, the Kingston Township activist was among those who supported a 2014 Meeker County Republican resolution to immediately impeach President Obama, the Litchfield paper reported:
“I think it’s time we have it on record that we should impeach him,” said Kingston Township resident Paul Lysen, one of about 30 delegates to attend the convention in Litchfield.
The resolution states, “President Barack Hussein Obama has abused his office and acted in defiance and violation of the Constitution. He must be impeached immediately.”
No delegate attending Saturday’s convention voiced opposition to the impeachment resolution.
Several other resolutions also received widespread support, including one relating to the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on a U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya. That resolution calls for the prosecution of former State Department Secretary Hillary Clinton for “countermanding the defense of the Benghazi consulate against the attack from Islamic jihadists.”
A total of eight resolutions were adopted Saturday, and party organizers said the resolutions will be submitted to the Minnesota GOP State Convention, scheduled to take place May 30 in Rochester, for possible inclusion in the party’s platform.
The only resolution to fail Saturday accuses the Democratic Party and mainstream media of engaging in a “conspiracy of lies.” “The Democrat Party and the mainstream media have engaged in a conspiracy of lies to defraud the American people,” the resolution states. “They constitute a criminal conspiracy and must be prosecuted under racketeering laws.”
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All of the statements, opinions, and views expressed on this site by Sally Jo Sorensen are solely her own, save when she attributes them to other sources.
The opinions, statements, and views of contributing writers are their own.
Sorensen, editor and proprietor of Bluestem Prairie, serves clients in the business and nonprofit sectors. While progressive in outlook, she does not caucus with any political party.
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