State Sen. Barb Goodwin (DFL-50) sent this letter to the editor Thursday morning: The 2012 session ended without an attempt from House or Senate leadership to develop a plan for paying back the over $2 billion we borrowed from our schools and without working to prevent another big budget shortfall we know will happen again in the 2013 session. Once again, social issues and the stadium dominated the session. Especially concerning were the continued attacks on working people of many trades and professions. Two attempts were made to get our governor to sign a tax bill that would have given big …
To the editor: Hundreds of Fridley residents spent Tuesday evening, Aug. 2 with their neighbors as we observed Night to Unite. This year marks the 28th year that our neighborhoods have taken this opportunity to celebrate community. Night to Unite gatherings are held to provide neighbors an occasion to meet new residents, reacquaint with old friends, and meet their police neighborhood resource officers (NROs), City Council members, and Fridley firefighters. Party-goers are asked to take a few moments out of the evening to talk about safety issues. Connected neighborhoods—where residents know …
To the editor: On May 16, Gov. Dayton offered his budget compromise offer: slightly less than half in revenue and slightly more than half in cuts. The governor modified his tax proposal and now the proposed fourth-tier bracket would go from $85,000 in taxable income for singles to $150,000 and from $150,000 in taxable income for couples to $250,000. Gov. Dayton’s tax plan would affect less than 2 percent of Minnesotans. This proposal is exactly what the people of Minnesota are expecting of us. They want a reasonable discussion and for us to sit down and work out a fair, responsible budget …
To the Editor: Tuesday in St. Paul the GOP/Tea Party Senate approved budget bills that slash spending on state agencies managing the environment and natural resources, and to that they added cuts to higher education that mean that many of our children will not be able to get a college degree. This is all while the GOP/Tea Party-controlled Legislature tries to cut taxes on businesses and the wealthy in the state. At this point it looks like up to 10 of our state parks will be closed, closings that will devastate the economy of many Minnesota communities. The DNR will lose 15 percent of its …
To the editor: Steve Taylor’s letter (“Senate District 50 Is Example of Bad Legislators Making Bad Law,” March 14) is helpful to understanding the debate between Left and Right that has been enveloping politics in our country and here in Minnesota’s Senate District 50. In 2010 the voters of the district overwhelmingly chose Barb Goodwin, Carolyn Laine, and Kate Knuth to represent them in St. Paul. These are fine, intelligent, effective, hard-working women who, in Taylor’s rhetoric, are liberal, socialist, statist. The voters of the district chose each of them by overwhelming margins over the …
To the editor: I don't want to get into an endless back and forth volley of dueling letters with John Haluska, but it appears that he and his ilk are the ones who are compensating for their lack of substantive ideas with equally vapid and self-serving rhetoric. His last letter tends to support my contention that his crowd does not understand basic economics or the proper role of government in a representative republic. Although Sen. Barb Goodwin, Rep. Kate Knuth and Rep. Carolyn Laine do a very poor job of representing the interests of their constituents and the state, it is the liberal, …
My letter ("Tea Party Influence Will Hurt Fridley," March 8) on the uber-greed of Minnesota’s Tea Party GOP elicited the expected knee-jerk response from Steve Taylor ("Local Legislators' Radical Left-wing Politics at Root of State's Problems," March 9), John Anderson and A.E. King. Taylor, in the wake of George W. Bush’s Great Recession (the direct cause of which was the greed of Wall Street and big insurance, greed that was rewarded by the Bush Bailout), now tells us that State Sen. Barb Goodwin (DFL-50) and State Reps. Kate Knuth (DFL-50A) and Carolyn Laine (DFL-50B) are the villains …
John Haluska's letter to the editor ("Tea Party Influence Will Hurt Fridley," March 8) is a great example of why a free and productive society cannot afford to have liberals, socialists and/or statists in positions of political power. He and his fellow left-wingers obviously either do not understand basic economics and the role of government in a free society as envisioned by the founding fathers or choose to ignore it for political gain.The main theme of the piece revolves around the tried-and-true liberal quest to acquire and maintain political power through the promotion and exploitation …
To the editor: I had the privilege of attending a town hall meeting in New Brighton hosted by Barb Goodwin, State Senator for Senate District 50 which encompasses Fridley, Columbus, New Brighton and part of St. Anthony. Because SD 50 reaches into Ramsey County, Representative Kate Knuth (50B) and Congresswoman Betty McCollum were co-hosts. The meeting opened with a brief presentation by each elected official with Representative Knuth reminding everyone of the need for a civil discussion and to focus on the issues. While the discussion was mainly civil, it was clear from the beginning that the…
To the editor: On March 3, the House of Representatives voted to pass HF 88, a bill that eliminates requirements for schools to maintain a number of counselors based on the number of students. As a current school counselor, I am troubled by the impact this bill could have on our students if it becomes law. While I understand that school districts are struggling and cash strapped, this is no time to remove counselors from school districts and this bill will do just that. Minnesota is already 49th in the nation in our student-to-counselor ratio, with 771 students to every one counselor. In a …
