Molnau should
stay in St. Paul
We're nearly halfway through the 2006 legislative session. The Senate has set an impressive pace for getting its work done, having passed a major bonding bill and eminent domain reform. March has been one of the most productive months ever seen in St. Paul.
This is a critical time for government leaders. We need to plan a contingency budget because a pending court decision about the governor's use of the word fee to describe a tax could cost us $200 million a year and put the state back into red ink. There's other important work to be done. We need the House to pass a bonding package and we need to push forward a plan for transportation funding.
So why - in the middle of all this - is our lieutenant governor/transportation commissioner going to China? I appreciate the importance of our business relationships with China, but there's work to be done and done now in Minnesota. This work needs Commissioner Molnau's attention.
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Increasingly, there are signs of mismanagement at MnDOT. The agency is broke and projects are being delayed. The commissioner is too eager to use the agency's credit card without a workable plan for paying off interest and the result has been two budget shortfalls in the last two years - an unheard of event in the agency's history.
Molnau should stay here and do her job while the Legislature is in session. Her agency is on a fiscal roller coaster and it needs her hand on the throttle. She can't keep her hand on the throttle while in Beijing. She can only do it in St. Paul.
Sen. Steve Murphy (Dist. 28)
Senate Transportation Committee chair
