Dear Friends,
This week was very busy with long floor sessions as the House Democratic majority begin passing their committee omnibus bills, which craft their vision for our state budget. This week, we debated the housing, legacy, state government finance/Veterans' affairs, and transportation omnibus bills. Each bill is hundreds of pages long and full of a huge number of smaller bills. More omnibus bills will be presented next week.
As I have said before many times, I detest omnibus bills and do not believe they are a good way to do legislative business. When dealing with legislation that is this immense, it is inevitable that you will find provisions that you want to support and others that you won't support under any circumstances - and that's the dilemma facing every lawmaker when these bills are before the full House. Each representative must ask themselves if the good outweighs the bad.
Once passed in the House, these bills will go on to be compared with the Senate omnibus bills on the same budget topic. If they don't match up, and they rarely do, House and Senate negotiators will begin to work on a compromise proposal that can ultimately be approved in both legislative chambers before we adjourn for the year.
THANKS TO OUR NATIONAL GUARD
I want to take this opportunity to thank our Minnesota National Guard members who have been deployed to protect areas of the Twin Cities from looters and rioters, as well as any local law enforcement who have traveled to help our Minnesota neighbors.
These men and women are there to protect the area residents and businesses, as well as the peaceful protesters. These are our sons, daughters, moms, and dads - our local heroes. Thank you!
LOCAL 'CHAPLAIN FOR THE DAY'
My thanks to Pastor Eileen Woyen of Trinity Lutheran Church in Albert Lea for being the guest chaplain for Monday's Minnesota House floor session. Pastor Eileen gave a beautiful opening prayer for the Legislature. I wish our floor session would have been in person so I could have personally greeted Pastor Eileen at the Capitol, but at this time the public is not allowed into the Capitol building due to pandemic rules. Whether remote or in person, Pastor Eileen's prayer was perfect.
Have a good weekend,
Peggy