5.2. ERMUSR 09-08-2015 - Laserfiche WebLink

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S -4 - „ 4,4 � e.. SUi1ttARY The 2015 Legislative Session was convened on January 6, 2015. The November 2014 election had brought divided government back to Minnesota: Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives and DFL Governor Mark Dayton was re-elected to a second term. The Minnesota Senate was not up for election, so the body remained in DFL control. Looking back, "divided"is the most appropriate descriptor for 2015—with divisions not only based on party lines,but at times the Legislature v. the Governor, and rural v. metro interests. The divergences were evident in the energy policy initiatives of the two legislative bodies. The Senate Environment and Energy Committee, with the Administration's support, attempted to build on 2013's efforts by passing a policy omnibus that included an increase in the Renewable Energy Standard(RES) to 40%by 2030 and a Conservation Improvement Program(CIP) goal increase from 1.5%to 2%. However,the lack of rural senators' support for these changes kept this bill from ever being debated on the Senate floor after it passed committee. In the House,the Job Growth and Energy Affordability Committee made its focus "making energy cleaner AND more affordable." It advanced a budget and policy omnibus that included sunsetting the CIP program and establishing a taskforce to develop a successor program, allowing large hydropower to be included in the RES, and allowing the solar mandate on investor-owned utilities to be met by any form of renewable energy. Also included in the House jobs/energy bill was a provision advanced by the MN Rural Electric Association(MREA) and MMUA: net metering reform which would allow co-ops and municipal utilities to charge a fee to recover the fixed costs of providing service to distributed generation customers. To allow non-controversial energy policy items to move forward,the Senate passed a second omnibus bill off the floor. The House did not take action on this bill, firmly maintaining that energy policy would be debated in the budget bill—and the Senate's budget omnibus contained only a handful of energy policy items. (All of these House and Senate omnibus bills are described in detail in the "Unsuccessful Legislation"section of this report.) Environmental regulation was also a major focus of the 2015 Legislature. Several initiatives reining in the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency on water quality standards were passed off the floors of the House and Senate (to the dismay of many metro-DFL senators) in environment/agriculture budget omnibus bills. These issues, along with others, came to a head in the end-of-session negotiations. With a forecasted$2.1 billion state budget surplus, the Governor, House, and Senate all had different budget priorities. The House GOP had advanced a package of business and individual income tax cuts. The Governor prioritized all-day pre-Kindergarten funding. The Senate wanted to raise 119