MN House passes hefty transportation funding bill with strong bipartisan support

Bill Salisbury, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
·3 min read

Jun. 23—Minnesota's summer road construction season appears on track to proceed as scheduled after the state House on Wednesday passed a transportation funding bill that will provide $7.27 billion for projects over the next two years.

The House approved the bill on a strong, bipartisan 112-21 vote. The Senate debated the measure Tuesday and could take final action on it Thursday.

If the Legislature were to fail to act before July 1, the Minnesota Department of Transportation said more than 200 state road and bridge construction projects would have been shut down or delayed starting next week.

The transportation bill is part of a $52 billion budget package that lawmakers are trying to pass to avert a government shutdown when the current budget expires. A shutdown means state agencies would be forced to shut down, state employees laid off, facilities closed and services paused.

In addition to appropriating $6.5 billion to MnDOT for 2021-23, the transportation bill provides $516 million to the Department of Public Safety for the Minnesota State Patrol and other transportation-related services and $236 million to the Metropolitan Council for bus and rail transit.

"Roads and bridges. That has been the top Republican priority from day one, and that's what we are re-emphasizing with this bill," Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Scott Newman, R-Hutchinson, said in a statement after the debate in that chamber.

His House counterpart, Transportation Committee Chairman Frank Hornstein, DFL-Minneapolis, said that while roads and bridges get most of the money in the bill, it also provides funding for "every mode of transportation ... every part of the state."

The legislation is a compromise in which both the DFLers who control the House and the Senate Republican majority had to give up some priorities, Hornstein said. House Democrats gave up the automatic gas tax increases tied to inflation that they wanted to provide long-term, dedicated funding for roads and bridges, and GOP senators backed off their plan to shift sales taxes from auto parts and repairs to transportation.

Nonetheless, Hornstein pronounced it a "good transportation bill."

It funds several transit and rail projects, including $58 million for two new bus rapid transit lines, one from the University of Minnesota to Southdale in Edina and another from downtown Minneapolis to the Northtown Mall in Blaine. It also provides $10 million for a second Amtrak passenger train between Minneapolis/St. Paul and Chicago.

Some provisions will improve services for drivers, Hornstein said. It boosts funding for driver exams so motorists won't have wait weeks or drive hundreds of miles to take road tests. It streamlines the process for reinstating suspended driver's licenses and provides self-service kiosks for motor vehicle registration renewals.

There's money to outfit state troopers with body cameras and beef up security around the state Capitol. The Department of Public Safety will be able to hire 42 more state troopers and 34 more Capitol security officers. The department also would receive $15 million for grants to install cameras on school bus stop-arms.

But during a four-hour debate in the House on Monday, members from both parties heaped most praise on the bill's negotiators for increasing spending on transportation without raising taxes.