Column: Bob Haas, My Point of View

Republicans became the majority party elected in 2010 saying they were going to create jobs, jobs, jobs and make government live within its means.

What they didn’t tell you is they were going to spend a lot of time pushing an agenda detrimental to many women and basic human rights, cut funding to nursing homes and programs for the elderly, as well as raise tuition at our community college at a time when we need more help with training, not less. They also didn’t tell you they were going to make sure your property taxes went up and borrow money against future revenues.

Here’s what happened from my point of view: I’ll start out by giving them some credit. At least some school districts were able to obtain an increase in funding for their K-12 programs, but then the legislative majority turned around and borrowed money from state education programs and now districts will have to go to banks and pay a good share of that increase out in interest payments.

At a time when they should have been honoring their campaign commitment to concentrate on getting people back to work, the Legislature spent a great deal of time during this past session figuring out how they could get government more involved in women’s reproductive rights and a marriage amendment. This from a Republican Party that talks about keeping government out of our lives.

The majority also told you they had reduced the growth of human service programs from an estimate of 22 percent down to 1 percent. It looks to me as if the largest growth in our human service programs is not the single parent receiving public assistance benefits, it is programs for our elderly.

What they did here was cut $133 million from nursing home funding and $43.3 million from programs assisting elderly and disabled people to stay in their homes, according to legislative information I’ve been able to find. It is sad to think that when one of our relatives needs one of these services and doesn’t have the money to pay for it themselves, we may be told “I’m sorry, there isn’t a slot available for your loved one.” Frankly, the need for these services will only increase as our population ages.

Training for jobs is becoming more important as we move into an era needing more technical jobs. Community colleges are an important part of our future, yet they continue raising tuition costs because of large decreases in funding, pushing college for many students out of reach.

Then there is the property tax problem. The Republicans came up with a system that takes away credits, with the end result being higher real estate taxes. I found that numbers are still being debated, but by my estimate, this could be an increase of from 4 percent all the way up to almost 17 percent depending on what kind of property you own and where you live in Freeborn County. Keep in mind this will happen even if county and city governments do not raise tax levies.

So what do we do about these problems and get back to what should have been first on the legislative agenda — jobs, jobs, jobs? First of all, we need to realize we cannot cut our way out of this recession. We need to bring the word compromise back into our vocabulary. We need to develop a fair tax system so everyone, including corporations, can participate and have skin in the game. If we were going to borrow money against future revenues, why would we not spend at least some of that money funding an infrastructure bank at the state level to begin work on the roads and bridges everyone keeps talking about?

Next, we need to concentrate on the unemployed. We have individuals receiving human service benefits who participate in work programs. Because these are federal dollars, we have to follow many federal regulations that have nothing to do with helping a person find employment.

Let’s immediately ask the federal government for waivers, so we can better concentrate on jobs. Let’s also get the bureaucrats out of St. Paul and into local workforce centers. If the manpower was here locally, we could mandate that every person receiving unemployment benefits visit these centers to look for work. None of these actions would cost additional dollars. Let’s get busy.

 

Albert Lea resident Bob Haas is a member of the Freeborn County DFL Party.