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Legislative

Legislative Updates

"The labor movement has led the fight for progressive social legislation from civil rights to Social Security and minimum wage laws." Ray Marshall

"It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs."   Albert Einstein

MSEA Political Committee Members:

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National Topics:		State Topics:
Secretary of Education Watch Administration spokesperson Margaret Spellings' speeches on important legislation such as NCLB, IDEA, Reauthorization, etc.		Minnesota Requirements for Meeting No Child Left Behind (pdf). Statewide Health Care Plan for Public School Employees Statewide Health Insurance Bill, S.F.276 is currently moving through the committee process in the legislature. Watch this site for updates on its progress. Background: The Labor-Management Task Force created by the 2002 Legislature to study the feasibility of statewide health insurance for all Minnesota school employees completed its work in January and issued its findings. Click here for a copy of the executive summary and full report along with the majority recommendation which is strongly supported by MSEA.  Click here for clarification of misleading statements regarding the statewide health insurance plan.

Governor Vetoes Statewide Health Insurance Bill

6.13.07 - On May 25, 2007 Governor Tim Pawlenty vetoed the statewide health insurance pool for school employees bill. The bill had passed both the House and Senate by wide margins. Governor Pawlenty outlined the reasons for his veto in a letter he sent to the Speaker of the House, Margaret Kelliher. View Governor Pawlenty's letter along with a paragraph by paragraph response by Education Minnesota.

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Statewide Health Insurance Pool for School Employees

5.24.07 - On the last day of the session the Minnesota legislature passed the statewide health insurance plan for school employees and sent it to the Governor’s desk for signature. MSEA joined several other unions, led by Education Minnesota, in backing this legislation. The law provides that all school employees eligible for insurance would be grouped in one health insurance pool and six health insurance plans would be offered. At this point it is still not certain that Governor Pawlenty will sign the bill into law or veto it. It is encouraging that the measure ultimately passed by wide margins. We hope that this will influence the Governor’s decision in the right way, and he will use his pen to sign it into law.

3.9.07 - Senate File (SF) 276 and House File (HF) 464 are the companion bills currently actively going through the legislature, which, if passed into law, will create a statewide health insurance pool for school employees and that pool would be the source of health coverage for all school districts. Under these bills (1) a board would be created jointly consisting of management and labor to oversee the pool (2) eligible employers, i.e., school districts, would be required to provide health coverage only through the pool, (3) the pool would have to consist of six health plans with a range of enrollee cost-sharing but geographic variations would be allowed.

If passed this legislation would assure that more school employees would have access to affordable health insurance and it will help to neutralize the extreme fluctuations in premiums that can occur when the pool for a particular employer is very small and it spikes up dramatically because of even one or two catastrophic claims within the insured group.

These bills cover ALL SCHOOL DISTRICT EMPLOYEES and MSEA is working closely with other unions, Education Minnesota, AFSCME and SEIU Local 284 to guarantee passage.

The bills do not take the place of collective bargaining: who is eligible, the amount of the employer contribution and what plan to use still remain as issues to work out in negotiations.

HF 464 is on its way back to the Commerce and Labor Committee and will be heard in that Committee probably before Thursday of next week. So far, it has survived the committee process without any amendments that would dilute its effectiveness.

SF 276 is scheduled to go next to the Senate Health Finance Committee chaired by John Marty. We anticipate that this will occur in a couple of weeks. . Check the links in this website to see if one of your reps or senators is on one of these committees and call them or e-mail them to let them know it matters to you. THEY WILL LISTEN TO YOU BECAUSE THEY WORK FOR YOU.

The school board association and some school districts have been fighting hard against this bill so it is important that our legislators know what we think too. This would mean school employees would be put in a pool with 200,000 members. This spreads the risk significantly and will help stabilize fluctuations in premiums. It is important that all school districts be mandated to participate to keep the pool numbers high enough to make a difference. All we are asking for is the same thing state employees currently have. State employees have six plans available and their pool is about 125,000 members strong. School employees deserve the same.

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MSEA Political Committee Report - 1.20.07

The committee is busy with the PERA elections; the ballots have been mailed out to the members. At the Chief Steward Training we talked to members to see if they have received their ballots and answer any questions that they had. We’ve been getting good feed back from the units. The committee is actively seeking two MSEA units interested in becoming involved in their local school board elections in an attempt to elect a classified-friendly school board member that will listen to your issues. If your unit is interested, please contact Mary Kearney at the MSEA office to learn more about this process. MSEA’s lobbying “Day on the Hill” is tentatively scheduled for March 15, 2007 to address Health Care Reform and Education Funding. If anyone is interested in volunteering to lobby on that day please contact Mary Kearney.

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MSEA Political Committee Report - 11.18.06

The committee discussed the PERA elections coming up in January and will present a letter to the Board for approval containing the bios and information about the candidates that MSEA is recommending to our members for the PERA Board. Upon approval, the information will be sent out to the members in December so they will be able to make an informed vote in January when the ballots get mailed out on January 10, 2007. Because this is new, the Political Committee felt it was essential to establish the make-up of the committee along with how the committee functions and a mission statement to be presented to the Board for approval. The committee also discussed the importance of having a strategic plan.

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MSEA Political Committee Report - 10.26.06

The committee discussed different ways of teaming up with SEIU Local #284 to get labor-friendly candidates on the PERA Board that would benefit both MSEA and Local #284. To inform MSEA members of what the commitee is doing and why, we decided to discuss it at all the regionals and write informational articles for the newsletters, Board Updates and MSEA website. We need to update the members on the PERA candidate, so they can make an informative vote. The committee is going to need members in every unit to help with getting the candidates elected. To help us get the word out in the membership, we need to start getting members in our units lined up and ready to go come December and January. The cards are mailed out January 10, 2007 and need to be postmarked by January 31, 2007. Our goal is to get every member to vote including our fair share and retirees. We need to reach out to everybody that pays into PERA! Making sure that our money is there when we retire is such an important issue to all of us. We need people on the PERA Board that will watch OUR money.

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State Education Funding
May 9, 2005

Everyone agrees that public schools need more money, but how much and where it comes from are two big questions. Governor Pawlenty has proposed increases of 2.5% and 2% over the next two years. But, $200 million of that money comes from franchise fees from proposed casinos, which Attorney General Mike Hatch says are unconstitutional and will definitely lead to a court fight.

House Republicans have proposed slightly education funding than the Governor, but are also counting on cuts to Health Care and Human Services and adhering to the Governor’s “no tax” pledge. Senate Democrats have proposed an additional $900 million dollars in education spending to be funded by a temporary income tax increase on the wealthy. The Senate is proposing 5% increases in each biennium year.

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MSEA's Legislative Agenda

March 10, 2005: Eight of MSEA's nine Board of Directors and five staff participated in MSEA’s Day of the Hill. In addition to visiting with their respective Senators and Representatives, the Board received briefings by Education Committee Chairs Senator Steve Kelley and Representative Barb Sykora, Speaker of the House Steve Sviggum and Minority Leader Matt Entenza.

Our delegation concentrated on two issues: Education Funding and the Statewide Health Insurance Pool for school employees. On the funding issue, it looks like some Republicans are getting close to breaking with Governor Pawlenty and his “no tax pledge.” There is no doubt that funding will be increased this year. There is a question of whether or not it will be enough.

The Statewide Health Insurance for School Employees bill made it through the Senate Commerce Committee and has been sent to the Health and Family Security Committee. Opposition to the bill is surfacing not only from school administrators, but also from entities that earn income from school employee health insurance. We are trying to get the bill passed in the Senate before having the House deal with it. We were given a boost when Speaker Sviggum committed to supporting it.
Just when you think that all of the ridiculous ideas had been thought of, Governor Pawlenty outdoes even himself. He is now proposing what he calls the Turbo Charged Truth in Taxation. This scheme would add a post card to the Truth in Taxation form sent out by the State.

If 20% of the recipients sent the post card in, it would trigger a reverse levy referendum. Of course, if you rent and don’t own, you don’t get a post card. If you own multiple parcels, you receive multiple cards. If you live outside of the jurisdiction but own property within, you also have a card. If you own property in more than one city or school district, you get cards for all of them. This is a very devious attempt to change representative government by those who don’t value the contributions made to society by public employees.

The Minnesota Senate Bill to drop the state from the No Child Left Behind law has cleared all committees and appears set for passage. This proposal would require the Federal Government to make serious changes to NCLB in the areas of testing and accountability to keep the state as a participant. The Senate’s action is one of many nationwide due to the widespread frustration with NCLB. While the action’s intent is to encourage the feds to change their ways, it may also put as much a $224 million in federal money in jeopardy.

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