I marked my calendar today--March 3, 2013--as the first day I actually agreed with liberal Minneapolis Star Tribune columnist Lori Sturdevant. Her Sunday column, "Minnesota school IOU: Why now's the time to repay," argues that the state needs to repay the school funding shift, and soon,
"That way, the state’s books would be back in normal order, with the school-shift option fully available as the state’s backup reserve account when the next economic downturn comes. Like the regular reserve, the school shift needs to be reset to normal to be a useful cushion against economic shocks."
Putting things to right sound like a good idea. Not sure I agree that the school shift is a good idea come the next fiscal crisis.
But anyway, Sturdevant gets closer to the real reason why repaying the school shift now is a good idea, quoting freshperson Democrat state rep. Yvonne Selcer whose bill (HF1) is "part of keeping the promise I made to voters in my district." Sturdevant notes that House Democrats "who made that pledge will face the voters again in 2014".
In the last election, Rep. Selcer upset incumbent Republican Kirk Stensrud by only 202 votes in a hotly contested SW Metro-area suburban swing district.
Following the majority-winning playbook from last fall, Rep. Selcer made repaying the school shift part of a top campaign priority. Her campaign website's "priorities" page opens with this statement,
"RESPONSIBLE leaders balance the BUDGET
"Our community members expect legislators to use a bi-partisan approach to balance our state budget, without shifts or gimmicks, while maintaining our quality of life."
Not surprisingly, Selcer was endorsed by the Star Tribune editorial board. So both the credibility of Rep. Selcer and the Star Tribune are on the line here. The paper and Democrats worked to convince a skeptical public that what Minnesota needed was to end "gridlock" by electing a few "pro-business" suburban moderates who would vote for kinder, gentler "balanced" solutions to the state's problems.
Instead we ended up with one-party rule by what has to be the most radical government the state has seen. The first casualty was bipartisanship.
A Dangerous Game
In her column, Sturdevant reports that local school officials are,
"telling legislators that repaying the shift can wait. Repayment would only accelerate the receipt of money already built into their budgets. It won’t give them what they crave—new money."
Local school officials were conspicuously silent during the demagoguery phase of the operation last fall. Now with their preferred candidates safely in office, officials expect to be rewarded for their part in making it all happen.
Perhaps local school officials do not realize how dangerous is the game they have played. The overheated campaign rhetoric around the school funding shift was--how do I say this delicately--strictly speaking, not true.
Regardless, at this stage, to not replay the shift as quickly as possible would be to add bad faith on top of duplicity. To gain the majority, in no small part, because of the school funding issue, and then turn around and not repay the money until 2017 (as currently proposed) would damage the state's political culture in a way not easily recovered from.
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