MN House bill includes local projects

Mark Fichenich

South central Minnesota is far from the focal point of a $255 million construction funding bill that is scheduled for debate in the state House tonight, but the legislation includes money for a long-awaited transportation headquarters building in Mankato and a relatively new plan to clean up a Sibley County lake.

“It think it’s pretty solid from the House’s perspective,” said Rep. Kathy Brynaert of the $20.7 million for a new regional headquarters building in Mankato for the Minnesota Department of Transportation. “Everyone feels it’s long overdue.”

The bill, expected to be approved tonight, also includes $165,000 for cleaning up Gaylord’s Lake Titloe. The bulk of the money is a grant to the city of Gaylord to design holding ponds upstream from the sediment-filled and polluted lake. In addition, there is $15,000 for covers to be installed on farm tile intakes to limit the erosion of soil and attached chemicals into the lake.

Rep. Terry Morrow, DFL-St. Peter, said the chances for the Lake Titloe funding were enhanced by the recognition at the Capitol that the pollutants from the lake drain via the Rush River into the Minnesota River and then to the Mississippi River.

“This was a local bill, but it really had a national impact,” Morrow said.

The House bill is barely a quarter of the size of last year’s bonding bill, largely because lawmakers traditionally focus on the state’s two-year budget in odd-numbered years and pass a large construction finance bill in even-numbered years. About half the money would be borrowed through bond sales and half will come from the state’s budget surplus.

The bill would provide nearly $71 million for college and university projects, although nothing specifically for Minnesota State University or South Central College. Almost $40 million is allocated for rail and transit lines serving the Twin Cities and their suburbs.

The legislation also includes $30 million for a new arena and other improvements at the Duluth Entertainment and Convention Center and $2.5 million for the design work for a renovation and expansion of the Mayo Civic Center.

Brynaert and Sen. Kathy Sheran, DFL-Mankato, introduced legislation seeking nearly $5 million for renovation and expansion of the Midwest Wireless Civic Center, partly in response to the attempts by other cities to get state funding for their facilities. Mankato’s civic center was financed with a local sales tax.

Brynaert said her bill was introduced to draw attention to the basic unfairness of the state financing some civic centers and local taxpayers covering the costs of others. That message was heard by the chairwoman of the House Capital Investment Committee, which put the bonding bill together.

“Alice Hausman said herself that’s an area where we have to talk about equity,” Brynaert said.

Although the MnDOT and Lake Titloe projects are the only ones specifically aimed at the Mankato area, other funding would make its way to the region’s government-owned facilities.

There’s $31 million for maintenance work on existing buildings and other property in the state university system. And there’s $10 million for repair and replacement of local bridges, only about a third of what Hausman hoped to put in the bill earlier this legislative session. The Association of Minnesota Counties asked for $50 million, saying there was a growing backlog of needed bridge projects statewide.

A final bonding bill will be negotiated after the Senate joins the House in passing its bill. Even then, the fate of the new MnDOT building might not be determined because that project isn’t expected to be in the Senate’s bonding bill.

Sheran said she will push the project through the Senate as a stand-alone bill, hoping it will be funded one way or another toward the end of the legislative session in May. Senators know that replacement of the existing Mankato building, located at the intersection of Victory Drive and Hoffman Road, is needed, she said.

“They know it’s a project that’s been delayed too long,” she said.