“As a student of Stillwater Area High School and a member of Youth Environmental Activists of Minnesota, a metro-wide coalition of students concerned with environmental affairs, I am a daily witness to the passion and desire present in our generation to transform our already beautiful state into a more sustainably conscious home.
Posts Categorized: Legislature
10th grader testifies against coal pollution
Cole Norgaarden, a 10th grader at the Blake School in Minneapolis, testified Thursday, Jan. 27 at the House Environment, Energy and Natural Resources Policy and Finance Committee during the hearing of House File 72. The bill proposes to repeal a Minnesota statute that limits carbon dioxide emissions by utilities.
BUDGET BITES: First budget-cutting bill headed to House and Senate floors
[Editor's note: In an effort to help inform our members about state budget issues, Minnesota Environmental Partnership is working with the Minnesota Budget Project to cross-post updates about the budget.] By Christina Wessel, Minnesota Budget Project The Legislature is moving quickly to pass a “phase one” budget bill that would cut higher education, funding to… Read more »
Quirky Twists of Fate
John Tuma’s Capitol Update – March 26, 2010 “Peculiar haze, or smokey fog … unlike anything known within the memory of man.” – English naturalist Gilbert White, Summer 1783 Natural events in history can sometimes produce a set of coincidences which play out over the years leaving one perplexed at the twist of fate. One… Read more »
A Flood of Activities at the Legislature This Week
John Tuma’s Capitol Update – March 19, 2010 “High water risin’ – risin’ night and day All the gold and silver being stolen away” -Robert Allen Zimmerman, September 2001* It was with great irony that my car radio was blaring these raspy words of Hibbing, Minnesota, native Robert Zimmerman (a.k.a. Bob Dylan) while my car… Read more »
Some Good Agitation for Our State’s Nuclear Energy Policy
John Tuma’s Capitol Update – March 5, 2010 “I think the agitation that I made on the matter contributed much to the discontinuance by the government of the pernicious practice” -General Christopher C. Andrews, 1902 Of my favorite of the many Civil War portraits that adorn the Capitol is the one just above the receptionist… Read more »
February Daydreams of Summer Canoe Trips
John Tuma’s Capitol Update – February 26, 2010 “There is magic in the feel of a paddle and the movement of a canoe, a magic compounded of distance, adventure, solitude, and peace. The way of a canoe is the way of the wilderness and of a freedom almost forgotten. It is an antidote to insecurity,… Read more »
Has the Governor’s State of the State speech set the tone for a rancorous political session?
John Tuma’s Capitol Update “We, the people of the state of Minnesota, grateful to God for our civil and religious liberty and desiring to perpetuate its blessings and secure the same to ourselves and our prosperity, do ordain and establish this Constitution.” -The preamble to the Constitution of the state of Minnesota, August 29, 1857… Read more »
Off to a Good Start
John Tuma’s Capitol Update As the legislative session opens this week, legislators and Gov. Pawlenty have taken some positive early steps for the environment with the capital investments bill. Hopefully they will take some lessons from the leadership of former Governor Floyd B. Olson in 1933. Recommend on Facebook Share on google plus Tweet about it
The Law of Nuclear Waste
John Tuma’s Capitol Update – The Pre-Session Version “There is a basic law of nuclear waste often overlooked – all waste remains where it is first put.” – Richard Wilson Riley, Then Governor of South Carolina, 1982* This little bit of southern frankness from South Carolina happened to find its way into Minnesota… Read more »