Legislative Update

Bonding Bill: The bonding conference committee was appointed last Thursday evening, but they have still not held any public meetings. House and Senate leaders are at odds over the total size of the bill. The House is committed to reducing the bill to $825 million, which would keep the bill within the traditional debt service limit of 3% of state revenue. The Governor also supports a limit of $825 million. The Senate is arguing for a larger bill. Until that issue is resolved, the conference committee will not meet to begin negotiating the specific projects in the bill.

Levy Limits: The Governor's tax proposal has been introduced and it includes very strict levy limits for cities with populations over 2,500 and for counties. The Governor's bill, SF 3665/ HF3967, is scheduled to be heard next Monday, March 17 in the House Tax Committee.

ELM for Unaffiliated Libraries: SF 2821, the bill providing access to the ELM databases for public libraries that are not members of their regional library, has been included in SF 3001, the omnibus education policy bill. SF 3001 passed out of the Senate Education Committee this evening and is scheduled to be heard in the Senate State and Local Governmental Operations Committee on Friday.

K-12 Technology Standards: The bill introduced by Rep. Ryan Winkler (DFL - Golden Valley) and Sen. Terri Bonoff (DFL - Minnetonka) to establish a task force to develop technology standards for schools has been included in both the House and Senate versions of the omnibus education policy bill (SF 3001/ HF 3316). SF 3001 passed out of the Senate Education Committee this evening. HF 3316 is expected to pass out of the House E-12 Education Committee on Thursday.

P-20 Partnership: A modified version of SF 2370, Senator Chuck Wiger's bill to establish a P-20 partnership of education organizations and state agencies, has been included in SF 3001, the omnibus education policy bill. The modified version limits the membership to the organizations that are currently participating in the P-16 Partnership. In an earlier version of the bill a number of organizations had been added to the partnership, including MEMO and MLA. However, legislators felt that the additions were making the group too large and unwieldy, with more and more organizations asking to be added, so they decided to return the group to its current membership.