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Legislative News and Views - Rep. Nels Pierson (R)

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Legislative Update (March 1, 2019)

Friday, March 1, 2019

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

With more snow falling today and this evening, please be careful and take precautions as you are traveling this weekend. In regards to snow, I’d like to send my best wishes to the Hoffman family who operate North-Creek Dairy near Chatfield. Earlier this week, the Hoffman’s barn roof collapsed under the weight of the snow, forcing them to sell their entire herd of cows. Best wishes to the Hoffmans as they move forward after this unfortunate event.

For the third straight week, I had the opportunity to welcome a high school page from our area to the Capitol. This week, Lara Pfrimmer from Mayo High School participated in the program. It’s awesome to see so many students from our communities taking advantage of this unique opportunity!

Before the weekend gets going, here’s a quick update with some details on the sick tax and the proposal to renew it.

Sick Tax

I’ve written in the past about the sick tax, which is a tax on nearly all healthcare services in Minnesota. Following the governor’s budget proposal last week, I again discussed it because the governor is proposing to renew this harmful tax even though it is set to expire at the end of 2019. The sick tax would make every trip to the doctor more expensive and would most affect the sickest Minnesotans who already have the highest medical bills. Making sure the sick tax is not renewed continues to be one of the most important issues to me, and I want to provide you with regular updates on why this is such a critical topic.

While looking through this proposal in recent days, I find myself increasingly viewing the sick tax as an immoral tax on sick people. I believe this tax is an injustice because it singles out people who are already sick and facing high medical bills, and then disproportionately places on them the burden of paying for programs to help sick people. I don’t believe it is their responsibility to pick up this tab. Instead, it should be the responsibility of all Minnesotan taxpayers to fund our state programs to help sick people.

In addition, the revenue that is collected from the sick tax goes to our state’s overall health and human services budget. This means the dollars often finance a number of other programs that won’t help the sick people who are paying the taxes and providing these funds. Again, I don’t believe it is right to disproportionately tax sick people in order to pay for a long list of other government programs.

As the legislative session continues, I will keep working diligently with my colleagues to figure out how we can put an end to this immoral tax rather than extend it.

Please Contact Me

Please continue to stay in touch to share your thoughts on the issues and legislation that will be coming before me in the weeks and months ahead. You can reach me via phone at (651) 296-4378 or via email at rep.nels.pierson@house.mn.

Have a great weekend.

Sincerely,

House Image

Nels