On Tuesday, Minnesota Senate Republicans kicked off the legislative session by putting families at the top of their 2019 session priority list as they unveiled the subjects of the first five bills to be introduced later this week. Helping families with the cost and availability of childcare and health care, with an emphasis on mental health care, will be the focus of Senate files one through three. Finding and eliminating waste and fraud in state government and aligning the tax code with the federal government round out the first five bills introduced in the Senate.

 

“Senate Republicans are back in St. Paul and ready to get back to work serving families across Minnesota. After a productive biennium we’ve had several months to get feedback from the residents of our districts,” said Senator Bill Ingebrigtsen (R-Alexandria). “From what you’ve told us we’ve made progress, but that there is still more that we can do. Your feedback has shaped our 2019 agenda-supporting mental health, making child care more accessible, reducing health care costs, increased government accountability, and reforming our dated tax code. This is an agenda that aims to help all Minnesota families their budgets and their values.”

• Supporting mental health – Senate Republicans promise a stronger legislative response to the growing problem families are facing regarding mental health, especially in our schools and on the farm.
• Making child care more accessible and affordable – During statewide listening sessions over the summer, Senate Republicans heard from parents struggling to find and afford child care. New legislation will address the regulatory overreach that causes these problems and encourage new child care providers to start up.
• Lowering health care costs – Senate Republicans will build upon their recent success in lowering health insurance premiums by offering new proposals that allow patients more freedom to choose their doctor, shop around for the best value for their health care dollar, and make health care billing more transparent.
• Making government more effective and accountable, and eliminating fraud– Senate Republicans will introduce several proposals to hold government more accountable and stop wasting money in the areas of child care fraud, MNLARS and other statewide IT failures.
• Making our tax code simpler and fairer – In addition to making tax filing easier by conforming to the new federal tax law, the Senate Republicans’ proposal will simplify the tax code and reduce taxes for Minnesota families.

 

Senate Republicans will roll out additional details and more legislative priorities in the coming weeks.