The Back Pages: Legislature kicks off, Pawlenty calls fair catch

The 2008 legislative session kicked off this week and was followed by the governor’s State of the State address, so today’s Back Pages examines the editorial response to both.

On Tuesday, the Democratic-controlled Legislature began its 2008 session, which must end by May 19, with the introduction of a transportation bill funded in part by an increase in the gas tax. The need for a new transportation bill is a unifying theme among editorials from around the state, as is guarded hope for a productive “short” session.

The Rochester Post-Bulletin

Minnesota needs a major transportation funding bill, and it should include an increase in the state gasoline tax. Our governor, if he wishes, can pass it off as a user fee and thus avoid breaking his now-infamous “no new taxes” pledge.

Debate on this issue will play a major role in the overall tone of the session. House DFLers aren’t veto-proof, and as such will need to reach across the aisle to their Republican counterparts to pass a transportation bill.

Mankato Free Press

The road funding debate in Minnesota isn’t about raising taxes. It’s about creating a sensible system where the right people are paying the right taxes. It’s also about accountability and good government.

Gov. Tim Pawlenty has been the enabler of a dysfunctional system that forces the wrong people to pay the wrong taxes, and allows those taxes to increase exorbitantly. His stewardship of the state’s infrastructure has been somewhere between neglectful and irresponsible.

Worthington Daily Globe

[P]artisan politics may put a damper on productivity yet again. Signs of tension appeared quickly Monday, as Democrats vowed to quickly introduce transportation and state building project bills along with a ballot measure asking voters to raise the sales tax (monies would go mainly to environment and arts programs). Additional taxes – the transportation bill includes a phased-in, five-cent gas tax increase – will no doubt be a pill many Republicans will have difficulty swallowing.

Legislators’ work is made more challenging this session by a budget deficit, and it goes to figure that one party’s preferred place to cut will be different from the other’s choice. But here’s another obvious point: Democrats and Republicans have little choice but to engage in a bit of give and take.

The governor was next to take the stage, this time in St. Cloud, for Wednesday’s State of the State address. The response was underwhelming as Pawlenty offered a few initiatives with no indication of how he planned to pay for them, but issued a bold veto threat to any tax-raising legislation. While few are likely to volunteer for a tax hike, Pawlenty’s veto threats in accordance with his no-new-taxes pledge is a tired political act in a changing economy.

Bemidji Pioneer

Gov. Tim Pawlenty, in his State of the State address Wednesday, went [to] great lengths to describe Minnesotans as a hardy people, with character and resolve, able to cope with everything from massive forest fires near the northern border, severe drought in central Minnesota, historic flooding across southeastern Minnesota and, of course, the I-35W bridge collapse.

“Our state is strong even as we are challenged by the circumstances,” the Republican governor said.

“Minnesotans are understandably concerned about a fragile economy, rising health care and energy costs, making ends meet, and government’s never-ending claims on their pocketbooks.”

It was as though the governor was setting us up for sacrifice – that he will veto any bill that comes before him with a tax increase. While his address provided little in the way of new initiatives, those he did call for – such as a veterans and military package and funding for rural business development – didn’t come with funding suggestions. And while a transportation funding package will most certainly include a gas-tax increase, Pawlenty’s red pen will nix that too.

But we ask, why must we continue to sacrifice, to go without? Certainly Minnesotans don’t want wholesale tax increases, but they do want fair taxation and, when necessary, defensible tax increases. It means closing tax loopholes on corporations with overseas operations, having the wealthy pay their fair share and a modest increase in the gas tax.

Minneapolis Star Tribune

With a State of the State speech Wednesday that was more pep talk than policy prescription, Gov. Tim Pawlenty may have sought to cheer a state that has come down with a case of the economic doldrums.

The message may have had that effect on those who take comfort in hearing that, as ever, the Republican governor stands squarely opposed to higher state taxes. Pawlenty brandished a “taxpayer protection pen” and vowed to veto any tax increase the DFL-controlled Legislature has the temerity to send to his desk.

This is not the time for a state spending spree. But along with the need for fiscal restraint, it’s clear that “No new taxes,” which has been state government’s rule since the days of Pawlenty’s precedessor, didn’t spare the state from a nasty recession in 2001 and hasn’t protected us from losing jobs and seeing incomes slip in national rankings this winter.

Grand Forks Herald

The debate that has followed the Interstate 35W bridge disaster probably would not be quite as shrill if it weren’t for the fact that we all know that Minnesota’s transportation system has been neglected.

We are desperately looking for someone to blame, when in reality no one is blameless.

For too many years, Republicans and Democrats alike have been willing to look the other way while our transportation system has rusted and crumbled. And we, the taxpayers of Minnesota, have not objected.

For the last 20 years, we have been deluding ourselves with the belief that we have invested enough to maintain our roads, bridges and mass transit systems. We have convinced ourselves that our transportation system still is one of the best in the nation, when in reality it has deteriorated to a point of near collapse.

The Back Pages is a weekly roundup of editorial opinions on issues that face Minnesota. Look for it every Monday.