Rice County Republicans

Kathy Dodds reports on the City Hall meeting meeting with Kevin Dahle and David Bly this evening (6th May 2008). It was a small turnout, one reporter, 3 Democrats and 4 Republicans.

The meeting started with them both giving an update on the session.

Funding Central Corridor project. Jim Budin asked why the outstate taxpayers needed to help fund the Central Corridor project when it will not benefit them. Dahle and Bly responded that it would benefit everyone in the long run with less congestion, pollution and waiting times. And Dahle said that for years, the metro taxpayers have helped pay for rural roads, so this was returning that favor. Budin suggested more buses instead.

Imbalance in school funding, effectiveness of schools. Jim Budin questioned why metro schools get more education funding per pupil. Bly’s response was that the cost of living is higher there so you have to pay people more. He also said they have more poverty level students, and need teachers to teach in 14 different languages. There was quite a discussion on education, naturally since they’re both teachers. They both were opposed to the Q-Comp program and said fewer schools are applying for it. The Legislature was able to take $40 million in excess Q-Comp money and will distribute it to schools around the state. And they hope a new President will get rid of “No Child Left Behind”. Both these programs take teachers away from students and dwell more on monitoring or testing than on student interaction time, they said.

One of the Democrats talked about the difference in schools having to do more with the Principal than nearly anything else. There was a suggestion made that perhaps the State should go out and check the principals to see if they are effective. I said I didn’t think that was the State’s job and that the local citizens and Board should make those decisions, and they agreed.

Regressive gas tax, excise tax and tab fees. I brought up the gas tax, excise tax and tab fees legislation, telling them that while they talk about helping citizens by trying to reduce property taxes, they enacted legislation that puts a regressive tax on an individual who wants to replace an older car; now he has an excise tax. And the person who can’t afford a newer car gets hit with higher tab fees anyway. They explained that this was just going back to what the fees were before Jesse Ventura stopped the tab fees. Quite a discussion was held about the cost of gas and the taxes added on to it, that taxes are not that high, as in Wisconsin, they’re higher. They did say that all the gas tax money collected from this legislation is dedicated to roads and bridges.

Stem cell research and abortion funding. Paul Otting questioned tax money being spent on embryonic stem cell research, and said that didn’t square with his feelings about embryonic stem cells. Bly began to respond by explaining that it wasn’t cloning or tampering with cells that way. I spoke up and said that I didn’t agree with my tax money going for embryonic stem cell research as it destroys the embryo, and also, results are positive on finding health aids and cures with stem cells from an individual as well as birth cord and placenta blood. And that we should be spending money on those areas of research instead. I then mentioned that I disagree with my tax money paying for abortions. Bly tried to justify it by saying that if we didn’t, then only the rich could have abortions. I replied that there must be another solution, that people have become desensitized to abortions, that what was intended as an extreme measure is now a common form of birth control, and the number of abortions grows larger every year.

Offering in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants. Then I asked Bly why he voted to offer in state tuition to illegal immigrants. He said that we should help them get a better education so they don’t become a burden to us, and that some are innocent children of illegals. I told him that perhaps that would be fine if we were rolling in money, but at a time when we’re tightening our belts, we can’t be offering these breaks. Dahle said we shouldn’t stop them from getting higher education. I said that we’re not stopping them, just asking them to pay what others who are not Minnesota citizens pay.

Ensuring continuing trust in the voting process - picture IDs. Then the topic of picture ID for voters came up. Dahle is strongly against it because it could disenfranchise voters. I said that we could give plenty of advance warning of the requirement and even offer to take the voter pictures in several locations to get it done. Another Democrat said it wouldn’t work because in the case of his daughter at college, she sends off a request for an absentee ballot, fills it out and sends it in without anyone seeing her ID or photo. Jim Budin stressed that she would be committing fraud.

Press coverage. We’ll see what the reporter for the Northfield/Lonsdale paper writes in her story. She’s a former student of Kevin Dahle. Thanks David Anderson for the information on Bly’s votes. It helped a lot.