The Minnesota House of Representatives on Monday approved salary increases for state employees on a 74-60 vote.
Governor Tim Walz’s administration and 11 labor unions representing state employees struck a deal on the contracts last year that included a 2.25 percent increase starting last summer and a 2.5 percent boost beginning in July.
Democrats, along with the unions, said nearly 50,000 public employees set to see the salary bumps still merited those raises despite the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic hardship it had wrought. But the raises faced an uncertain fate moving forward in the divided Legislature.
Republican lawmakers who control the Senate said they wanted to reopen negotiations given the economic situation. They moved forward a separate proposal allowing businesses to reopen under current executive orders as long as they adhere to guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Minnesota Department of Health.
DFL lawmakers said the state had put up the funds to pay the raises and should make good on agreements the state had made with workers.
“We know our state workers are keeping us safe and healthy,” bill sponsor Rep. Leon Lillie, DFL-North St. Paul, said. “They’re our team and these contracts were negotiated in good faith.”
GOP leaders in the Senate, as well as in the House, said the state should renegotiate the contracts as the state faces a projected $2.4 billion deficit in the state’s two-year $48 billion spending plan. The state has begun laying off employees and freezing nonessential hires to close the forecast budget hole.
“I’ve been telling people for a while now that we are not going to ratify the contracts as is,” Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka, R-East Gull Lake, said, noting he was talking to union and legislative leaders and the governor’s office about approving the first part of the pay increases, but not the second part. “We really would like to let them keep their raise from last year, and if they’ll work with us, they can do that.”
House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt, R-Crown, said state employees understood the financial straits the state was in and said the state couldn’t afford to approve the full pay increase.
Both chambers need to ratify the agreements before July 1 for them to take effect.
Also on Monday, the Minnesota Senate on a 62-5 vote advanced a bill keeping the funds available for COVID-19 response use and setting a Dec. 31 deadline to close it out. The fund was set to expire Monday and the state-appropriated funds were to be returned to the state general fund.
The governor last week asked lawmakers to extend the deadline and to put more money into the COVID-19 response fund. Senators didn’t appropriate more money Monday but said they were in negotiations with Walz to give the Legislature more oversight over the state funds and $1.87 billion in federal response funding.