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| Date: | February 18, 2011 | | Contact Name: | Peter D. Winiecki | | Contact Phone: | 651-297-8077 | | Contact Email: | peter.winiecki@senate.mn | | For Immediate Release | |
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| Letter to the Editor from Senator Dave Brown |
To the Editor:
Last week, Gov. Dayton released his budget proposal, a proposal that missed “competitive reality” according to the Star Tribune. I would like to point a few budget aspects that do not make sense to me.
First, I noticed that Gov. Dayton has proposed to increase the budget by 22.3 percent over current General Fund spending; this amounts to nearly $6.8 billion in new spending. His method of paying for this is the largest tax increase ever imposed for Minnesota. Spending cuts are almost completely absent from his planning and only 8 percent of his plan is comprised of cuts.
Contrary to the Senate Republicans’ proposal to cut business taxes in half, Gov. Dayton has suggested that we increase business taxes $393.2 million over the next biennium. His proposed income tax increases will make Minnesota as highest taxed state in the country. This is the wrong message to send to business owners and job providers.
Gov. Dayton is a former teacher but he is not following through on the promises he made for education. While new education spending equals $52 million in the proposal, it is not used to increase basic revenue, which is the most important source of revenue for classrooms. Instead, the Governor proposes the creation of more government programs, more bureaucracy.
Finally, the Governor proposes to increase Health and Human Services funding by 38.3 percent over FY 2012-2013 by $3.32 billion. This is a budget area that sorely needs reform, not spending exponential amounts of money.
It seems the Governor’s philosophy for this budget is to tax more, spend more and borrow more. I respectfully disagree.
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