Committee amends controversial contracts bill

A controversial bill that would ratify several contracts with state employees became somewhat less contentious Thursday when the House Government Operations and Elections Policy Committee amended HF3585 to remove several policy provisions.

Sponsored by Rep. Steve Drazkowski (R-Mazeppa), HF3585 would ratify contracts that had been negotiated with the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees and the Minnesota Nurses Association, among others. But it also contained a number of provisions union employees objected to including language that prohibited members from using paid time off for political purposes, and retroactive wage increases in future contracts.

Many of the provisions were removed by an amendment put forward by Drazkowski before the committee approved the bill on a 7-4 roll call vote and referred it to the House State Government Finance Committee.

However, the amended bill still includes what Drazkowski called a “paycheck protection” provision that would prohibit unions from spending dues collected for political purposes. Instead, unions would need to set up a separate political fund for contributions made specifically to that account, and money could not be transferred between the two.

In a letter to the committee, SEIU Healthcare Minnesota – which represents health care workers –objected to that, and other provisions, saying corporations are allowed to have a collective political voice and “the same principle should apply to unions.”