Two weeks left in this year’s session

Greetings. We’re down to the last two weeks of session, the fourth quarter so to speak. On Monday, I present SB36 “to establish wildlife mitigation plans and associated liability limitations for wildfire damages.” I’m prime sponsor in the House. We got this through Commerce and Energy Committee 11-0. Now we need a majority floor vote to send it to the governor to become law. This is a huge deal and hopefully when I write next week it has become reality.

Next, on the House floor, SB154. Sen. Hulse is the Senate prime sponsor and I am the prime sponsor in the House. This clarifies eligibility of multiple garages or structures to be classified as owner occupied. This is a huge property tax benefit to acreages with multiple buildings.

Next, I have SB164, which would amend state CDL laws to explicitly require English language proficiency for commercial drivers license applications, tying that requirement as defined by federal law.

Then, in House Commerce and Energy, I have SB110, regulating how broadband internet access service providers use customer data.

Now, that’s just Monday! The rest of the week is equally challenging and my prayer is my voice holds up. I get this little tickle in my throat causing coughing. This needs to stop no later than Monday.

What about property tax reform? Grr, Grr. Not going like I’d like. HB1308 was defeated badly, only 24 yea votes. We had a representative from Sioux Falls carry the bill and he added an amendment to stop sales tax on groceries. I voted against the amendment and it failed but I believe it crippled the actual HB1308 and that’s why we received only 24 votes.

Taking taxes off groceries is not the way to go. Lower income families already have programs, SNAP and EBT (food stamps) so they pay no tax because their groceries are free up to a limit of their family allocation. This not taxing groceries also stops us capturing tourist dollars, which is totally painless to the said tourist.

The argument that Minnesota doesn’t have tax on groceries is lame at best. Minnesota has 9.9 sales tax, a state and federal income tax and their property taxes are equally high as ours are. So, what’s next?

Well, we still have SB96 that allows counties, at their discretion, to increase sales tax a half cent. Each county gets to decide, and I believe this, along with a bill like HB1308, which takes 4.2 cent sales tax to 5 cents, the same as North Dakota, could reduce average owner occupied home owner property taxes by around 75-78 percent. Now that is meaningful property tax reform and its relatively painless, especially with the five million tourists who spend $5 billion each year.

So, how to get a new bill through when the suspense date for all bills ended a couple weeks ago? Great point. We do have three vehicle bills that are shell bills with no guts in them. That’s where we would run a new (maybe same) property tax relief bill/bills. So, there you have it.

Until next week.