Governor Dayton issued a statement last night that the State Capitol would reopen this morning at 9am. This is a result of Governor Dayton’s acceptance of the June 30 GOP budget offer last Friday (7/14), which offered to balance the budget with borrowing from future tobacco settlement payments and shifts in school aid. However, Governor Dayton’s (reluctant) acceptance of the offer came with three conditions:
- All social policy issues removed from budget bills;
- The 15 percent across-the-board reduction to state employees dropped; and
- Passage of a bonding bill of at least $500 million
The GOP-led legislature accepted these conditions, and since Friday, the governor and specific legislators have been drafting the budget bills, to be presented during a special session that the governor has yet to call. Currently, the Senate has posted Judiciary and Public Safety, Transportation, Environment/Energy/Commerce, Legacy, and Higher Education budget bills for public view. MPR also gives a more readable breakdown of these budget bills (as of this posting, just the first two were available).
A special session appears to be just around the corner; according to MPR, it could be called as early as today (particularly since nearly all budget bills have been agreed to).
UPDATE: Just seconds after this entry was published, Bob Hume, Senior Communications Advisor in the office of Governor Mark Dayton, tweeted that a special session will be called and will begin at 3pm today, July 19. See the official letter here.
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