It has been a busy week in St. Paul. The committee process is getting under way and we have already started to hear some of the first bills of the session. Here are a few highlights:

 

I was proud to join my fellow Republicans as we rapidly passed the new Federal Tax conformity bill.

 

House File 6, which conforms Minnesota's tax code to the federal tax code, allowing thousands of Minnesotans to take advantage of federal tax credits including a deduction for higher education, a deduction for teacher expenses, and a mortgage insurance premium deduction. In total, the bill amounts to about $20 million in immediate tax relief for Minnesota families and businesses.

 

This week we had informational hearings and productive discussions on increasing rail safety. Last year, I co-authored a rail safety bill that allowed for increased funding for emergency training in the event of a catastrophic train derailment. The increased rail traffic of petroleum products through our communities is a very important subject for me. Minnesota now has 2 Emergency Response Teams for rail accidents. One is in St. Paul the other in Moorhead. I would like to expand this to cover more of the state, especially those communities that are located near heavily used rail lines.

 

People are very concerned about future increases in gas or vehicle taxes in order to pay for new road and bridge construction. I do not support any increases in taxes.Minnesota would be able to cover the cost of road improvements if we cut other areas of wasteful spending. We will know more as the session unfolds.

 

As always, I will keep fighting to keep our affordable clean-coal power plants operating.

 

There a several bills I plan to introduce and co-author this session to address this critical issue.