On Thursday, December 5, Minnesota Management and Budget (MMB) announced a projected $1.616 billion budget surplus for the State of Minnesota in the current fiscal year. The surplus includes an automatic allocation to Minnesota’s budget reserves, also known as the “rainy day fund”, totaling the reserve balance at $2.359 billion, the highest level in state history. After the reserve allocation, the state general fund balance stands at $1.332 billion.

“Over the last three years, my Minnesota Senate colleagues and I passed balanced budgets that prioritized the needs of Minnesota families without raising new taxes,” said Senator Andrew Mathews (R-Milaca). “Unsurprisingly, fiscally responsible management of our state finances coupled with no new taxes resulted in growing Minnesota’s economy, growing our state budget reserves to record levels, and a well over billion-dollar surplus. While we provided Minnesota families with their largest tax relief packages in nearly two decades in the 2019 fiscal year budget, every Minnesotan deserves more. This surplus proves that more money in the wallets of everyday Minnesotans grows our economy. As such, let’s return this surplus to the people who created it: hardworking Minnesotans.”

“However, as Minnesota enjoys its largest budget reserves in history and a $1.6 billion surplus, I still wonder how much better Minnesota’s fiscal health could be if we addressed the fraud, waste, and abuse at the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS),” added Senator Mathews. “From costing taxpayers tens of millions of dollars in mishandling payments to tribal nations, to reported hundreds of millions of dollars in child care fraud, to repeatedly breaking the law, DHS is in a state of total chaos. During the upcoming legislative session, I will continue to work on targeting the root causes of this gross mismanagement and making sure our taxpayer dollars fund priorities, not fraud.