Downey: 'I Plan to Be Out Front and Leading' on Government Reform

Editor's note: With the 2012 Minnesota legislative session set to convene tomorrow, Rep. Keith Downey (R-Edina) sat down with Edina Patch to reflect on last year's session, discuss some recent happenings in the Minnesota political scene and provide his constituents a glimpse at what to expect from him in 2012.

Edina Patch: How are you going about preparing for the impending legislative session?

Keith Downey: We worked really hard all fall listening to Minnesotans through our . We have gotten as much pre-work done as I've ever seen down there. We're ready to go with a pretty robust reform agenda.

Patch: You just introduced the Reform 2.0 agenda the other day. Could you summarize Reform 2.0 for people who might not know what it aims to do?

Downey: One of the biggest challenges we face in state government is we're about 20 years behind in improving state operations. We passed in the last session with our budget agreement a fairly large number of government reforms. A number of them were just pilot programs, or first phases of reforms. We were committed to working to advance them this session.

It's really an agenda focused on jobs, the economy, education reform, health care reform and streamlining government. We had a total of 19 town halls throughout the state and members of the Senate had a listening tour they went on. The summation of those is our Reform 2.0 agenda. It's highly aligned with where Minnesotans are in terms of what they want out of their government. It's not a Republican agenda. It's not a conservative agenda. It's a Minnesota agenda. 

Patch: Are you personally going to be introducing a number of those bills? 

Downey: I was pretty active with the Reform 2.0 efforts, both in steering committee and I chaired a working group on state government reform. I have a number of bills I authored last session we'll be bringing back as well. 

Patch: How does that surplus change things for you this session? Will things be different because of it?

Downey: This is the first time I've ever gone into a legislative session in three years without a $4+ billion deficit. The nice thing about that is we can focus on policy and priorities, while the budget scenario isn't the 800 lb. gorilla in the room. 

Patch: What should your constituents expect from you this session? Do you see yourself playing a particular role (authoring legislation, lobbying behind the scenes, etc.)?

Downey: I plan to be out front and leading on all of the government reform initiatives we have. I'll be chief authoring a number of those. The general approach toward solving our long-term structural deficit problems we think should come from reforming and streamlining what we're doing, not raising taxes. I think we're going to have debate once again about whether we can actually change the way we do things as compared to asking Minnesotans to pay higher taxes. I absolutely don't think we need to raise taxes.

Patch: The Minnesota Republican Party has had a rough few months between the issues surrounding Sen. Amy Koch and former party chair, Tony Sutton. How are you feeling about the party as the session approaches?

Downey: I think it feels like we're moving forward after all of that, which is positive. I won't mince words, those things were embarrassing and a real problem. We need to fix them. We need to move forward and get those behind us—not by pretending they didn't happen, but by fixing them. 

The leadership transitions have helped a lot already, and going forward taking responsibility and having the proper transparency and accountability in resolving the issues will restore confidence. Other than occasional media distractions, I don't think it will have any impact on the legislative session.

Patch: One big issue from last year that isn’t going anywhere is the marriage amendment proposal. Do you think that will resurface at all during the session?

Downey: I don't think there will be any legislative action on it. The addition of new constitutional amendments will be a bigger discussion. For example, an amendment requiring voters present photo ID, which is supported in some polls by as many as 80 percent of Minnesotans. That has already been vetoed once by Gov. Dayton. I don't know if we'll pass him that bill or move right toward passing it at a constitutional amendment. I think we feel really comfortable that putting it on the ballot as an amendment makes sense and gives the people of Minnesota a chance to make their opinion known.

Patch: Are there any bills you authored in 2011 that are carrying over or new bills you plan to push in 2012?

Downey: There's a handful. The first is a bill that I'll be co-authoring would eliminate the existing statewide business property tax over a multi-year period. That's one.

Another bill is what we're going to title Equal Pay, Benefits and Bargaining for Public Sector Employees. We'll equalize the pay, benefits and bargaining rights of public sector employees as compared to their private sector counterparts.

I'll also be offering a bill that will move us from unemployment to reemployment compensation.

Patch: How exactly would you accomplish that?

Downey: Right now, it essentially provides a cash benefit to people who aren't working. The minute you start working, you start losing those benefits. I'd rather than for two years pay people to remain unemployed, create a reemployment compensation system of much shorter duration that pays people based on job training, searching and business startup efforts. It will probably be at least two weeks before I introduce that one. It's based on programs in Georgia and Florida, who've both made similar types of moves.

I would also like to consolidate the number of cabinet level agencies from 17 down to eight. Functions won't disappear, they'll just get consolidated under a smaller level of cabinet level officials who will hopefully see opportunities to streamline functions. Second is to take all of our back office functions and consolidate them. Just like the bill I passed last year consolidating IT across state agencies, this would consolidate back office HR, payroll, accounting and procurement.

Patch: What are your thoughts on the various proposals out there regarding the Vikings stadiums? What do you think should be done?

Downey: Frankly, none of us wants to see the Vikings leave. I think there are some pretty realistic ways to get a deal done, while treating the Vikings like any other business. However, the proposals that are out there right now—those that seem to be the governor's favorites—rely on reassigning a lot of state revenue and raising a lot of local government revenue so the state can give the Vikings the money they need to build a stadium. I think we can do it in a way that's much fairer and treats the organization like any other business. It doesn't seem to me like the proposals out there now would do that. 

Patch: What do you make of the governor's $775 million 2012 bonding proposal?

Downey: I can't support a bonding bill like that. It's full of special interest projects sprinkled throughout the state to get votes and make the governor look good. We've been issuing huge bonding bills year after year after year. We're only supposed to do bonding every other year. We've bonded each of the three years I've been there. We've been bonding like crazy and, frankly, I think the governor has run out of bonding projects. Now we're down to working on convention centers. If there were a smaller bill focused on improving some of our core infrastructure, I might support it. At this point, the bill he has is not realistic.

Patch: You're up for reelection this year. When does that process start for you?

Downey: I've always waited until after the legislative session is over for that. I don't feel comfortable starting to campaign a year before the election. Plus we have redistricting on Feb. 21, so I would imagine most legislators will want to do something to get acquainted with their new neighborhoods at that point. In terms of actual campaigning, I don't think anything will start until spring at the earliest.

Patch: Do you think redistricting could dramatically impact your district?

Downey: This is going to sound partisan, but it depends on which proposal you look at. The Republican proposal leaves Edina essentially one district with a small piece to the west of Edina added in. The DFL proposals split Edina. My own opinion is the judges will look at Edina and realize it's a very good approximation of a house district, so they'll keep it intact. Either some little piece will be added in or taken out, but by and large Edina will essentially remain the same.

Patch: Of all the things that will be taking place at the Legislature this session, what do you think Edina residents in particular should be aware of?

Downey: Because we don't have the budget deficit we've had as of late, I hope it'll be apparent we're trying to improve the state's business climate and allow our private sector businesses the freedom and flexibility to grow and create jobs. We're attempting to make meaningful progress on streamlining state government.