MFL Commissioner's Blog: April 15, 2008 Archive

We may have some veto bait headed through the Senate. SF3128, Sen. Richard Cohen's bill that would factor inflation into budgeting forecasts, is being heard by the Senate Finance Committee this afternoon. He has three bills in front of that committee today. He's the chair, so I suppose that doesn't hurt. You'll remember last year, Gov. Pawlenty vetoed the entire tax bill because it included the inflation forecast. He said he felt it would put the state spending on "autopilot." That bill also included property tax relief, but since the governor vetoed it after the House and Senate had adjourned for the session, we didn't get to see either chamber try an override. I don't know if a freestanding proposal, like this bill, would have a chance at overriding a veto, but it would be a points bonanza if it did. Any thoughts on the odds, MFL?

HF1812, that finance bill that the House debated until 3 a.m. a few weeks ago, is back in front of a conference commitee. Sen. Cohen, and Rep. Lyndon Carlson agreed to take out some of the policy that doesn't have any fiscal impact that was included in the House version of the bill. This was the one that Minority Leader Seifert called the "garbage bill" because of all the random stuff it included.

Yesterday, the House went through and gave final passage to a bunch of bills that had been sent over from the Senate. Reps. Jaros, Hortman, Simon, Madore, Winkler (2 bills), Pelowski, Mullery, Thissen, Brod, Dominguez, Neil Peterson, Marquart and Atkins (for the Good Faith bill) all picked up points for passing them through their chamber.

Check back later today, we'll look at a couple more bills being heard this afternoon.

One of the aspects of the MFL that sometimes surprises participants is how lawmakers who wield a lot of power at the Capitol and command headlines rarely are the ones who dominate the power rankings. This is especially true of the leadership.

Let's take a look at how they're doing.

In the Senate, Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller has 28 points, and Minority Leader David Senjem has 46.

In the House, Speaker Kelliher has 43 points, Minority Leader Marty Seifert has 68, although 60 is from his speeches during floor-a-paloozas, and Majority Leader Tony Sertich has 97.

All together, they have 282 points, or as Sen. Ann Rest refers to it, a Monday.

Clearly, we know that the work that these members do is probably not best measured by how many bills they push through the Legislature, as they've got an entire caucus to manage. Which makes SF2211, bill sponsored by Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller, noteworthy. The bill would alter the way that congressional and state legislative districts are drawn.

Right now, the Legislature is responsible coming up with its own proposal for redrawing the lines after each census. Because districts need to have approximately the same population within them, and different parts of the state grow (or shrink) at different rates, some incumbent lawmakers inevitably end up running against each other. If they can't agree on a plan, then it heads to a court to decide.

Under the new proposal, a panel of retired appellate or district court judges with no history of political endorsements would come up with a plan. One provision in the bill calls for districts to be drawn more competitively.

The redistricting committee would then present its plans to the Legislature, which would vote to approve or send them back, but not to modify it. If they vote to reject it, the commission would have two more chances to draw up a map. If the Legislature rejects the second proposal too, then they could modify the third one or failing that, it would go back to the courts where it has been decided the last four times redistricting has been necessary.

This one could be more consequential than most, as Minnesota's population isn't growing as fast as other states, and could lose a congressional seat. How they'd rearrange that could provoke a Legislative street fight. It seems like Sen. Pogemiller's bill could defuse some of that by taking redistricting, at least in part, out of lawmakers hands.

The plan has some high-profile backers, with former governors Al Quie and Arne Carlson, former Senate Majority Leader Roger Moe and Vice President Walter Mondale supporting it.

It passed the Senate Rules and Administration Committee today, and now awaits a vote on the Senate floor..

If you've got some time to kill, you should check out something our MFL founder, and current NewsCut scribe Bob Collins pointed out a few years ago in Polinaut, called the "Redistricting Game." It lets you manipulate districts for partisan gain, not that politicians ever do that.