Residual Forces

The Legislature passed the bloated Bonding Bill yesterday.

There’s $4 million to study the idea of a high-speed rail corridor from St. Paul to Chicago. Rochester gets $3 million to expand the National Volleyball Center. There’s even $135,000 for headstones for unmarked graves of deceased state hospital patients.

Projects as disparate as renovations for the Como Zoo polar bear and gorilla exhibit and an anti-terrorism training center at Camp Ripley came closer to becoming reality Tuesday when the Legislature passed a $925 million state construction bill.

Debate in the Senate took a mere 25 minutes before the measure passed on a bipartisan 57-10 vote.

But that easy approval is prelude to what is expected to be a contentious fight with Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who has said $925 million is too much.

Pawlenty has signaled distaste for the measure, saying it needs to be $825 million. 

The Bill is going to put Minnesota’s financial health at risk, not to mention simply force future generations  of Minnesotans to pay the debt for the pork projects of today’s Democratic Legislators. 

The most critical issue that Minnesotans needed to be addressed by the bonding bill is almost nowhere to be found in this pig of a bill. Roads and bridges are MIA on the list of projects. Sure we can find money to waste on studying a commuter rail line to Chicago, but not for roads and bridges. We can find more money to build buildings for the Higher Ed special interests, but not for roads and bridges. 

This bill is a shameful example of how tone deaf the Legislature is. What we need in Minnesota, especially at a time of economic downturn, is a focused bonding bill that would provide funding for priority projects to benefit the most people possible. Instead we get nearly $1 Billion dollars of pet projects and political paybacks for DFL Legislators. 

Well, It is an election year, I guess I can’t act all surprised that the DFL would abuse the power given to them by the voters in 2006. 

The key to saving the state from this DFL credit card spending binge will be the Governor and his veto pen. Will he veto the whole bill, or scrap projects to cut the bill by $100 million to meet the guideline amount? 

The Senate is a shoe-in for an override as the DFL has a partyline vote majority to do so. The MN House requires some Republicans to flake off. The bill did pass the House with 90 votes, which is the threshold. I’m compiling the list now of the Republicans who defected to the binge spending side of the isle. 

Stay tuned.