Lobbyist

critical of local

legislators

Flaherty: Lawmakers

failed to support efforts to

obtain fairer cuts in LGA

By RON LARSEN

Journal Staff Writer

NEW ULM -- For about an hour Tuesday night, the Coalition of Greater Minnesota Cities' lobbyist detailed for the City Council how rural lawmakers including New Ulm's legislative representation failed to support the coalition's efforts to obtain fairer cuts in government aid.

Tim Flaherty of St. Paul, representing 74 Greater Minnesota communities including New Ulm, said a "handful of key people" called the shots in the Legislature as lawmakers hammered out a compromise that saw cities like New Ulm taking big hits in Local Government Aid.

"New Ulm's aid for 2003 was cut 14 percent to $3,683,397, and then it suffered another 24-percent cut in 2004 when it will drop to $3,405,856," Flaherty said. "However, it doesn't bottom out there because it drops to $3,356,599 where it will stay unless it is cut some more. They not only cut LGA, but froze it into the future," Flaherty said.

New Ulm has one shot at regaining 60 percent of the initial cut with a levy-back, meaning that the city will be able to levy beyond its normal levy limit of five mills one time.

"Then, that's all, and you will have to find ways of cutting to stay within your budgets from then on," he said.

However, he noted that the total cut -- $1,707,000 -- means the new formula (used to figure LGA) isn't "too bad."

The reason the 2005 figure is at $3,356,599 is because the Legislature only funded it to 80 percent "so we're hoping to raise that to 85 or 90 percent next year, " Flaherty said.

He said it all boiled down to a case of politics, in this case Republican politics.

"Seven Republican lawmakers broke ranks to support us, but the rest didn't," Flaherty said.

"Does that mean our legislators followed party lines rather than supporting us?" Councilor Ron Fleischmann asked.

"That's right. Neither Sen. (Dennis) Frederickson (R-New Ulm) or Rep. (Brad) Finstad (R-New Ulm) supported you," Flaherty replied.

"How do we change it?" Fleischmann asked.

"I don't know. They keep saying it was us that started it. It wasn't us that turned it into us versus them; they (suburbs) did. Yes, your legislators should say to them (the Republican majority) 'That's not right,'" Flaherty said.

Council President Dan Beranek broke in to tell the cable viewing audience that "it may seem I've let him go on for a long time. Well, I'm asking Sen. Frederickson and Rep. Finstad to come before the council at its next meeting and explain why they didn't support us."

In other action, the council:

* Approved an airport engineering and planning consulting services agreement with Mead & Hunt, Inc., Minneapolis, and approved a task order providing for paying Mead & Hunt $12,681 for resident engineering services for a runway pavement repair and crack sealing project.

* Set an informational meeting involving staff from the New Ulm Medical Center outlining options for future parking expansion at the Medical Center, as well as the proposed Oak Street alignment for 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 22.

* Issued a "blanket" approval to be administered by the city manager for groups wishing to block off streets for "National Night Out" activities Tuesday, Aug. 5.