The Minnesota Department of Finance has released their latest budget forcast for Minnesota’s government.  Essentially, these folks make an educated estimate of how tax revenues are coming in, how government spending is proceeding, and comparing all of that to the budget that lawmakers set in 2005 and updated last May.  This info will then be used to set up the budget that legislators will start preparing in January (or more likely not until February, when the Finance folks will release another updated estimate).  The bottom line?  There’s an extra $2 billion dollars that will be collected in the next two and a half years, but that is not currently allocated to be spent in any particular fashion. 

So, let’s use this occasion to talk about why we need to increase the amount of tax dollars that go to protecting and restoring Minnesota’s Great Outdoors - a keystone of our economy and way of life.
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Today’s topics: Agriculture, Development, Education, Energy, Food, Forests, Habitat, Mississippi River, Non-Native Invasive Species, Pesticides, Transportation, and Water.
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Today’s topics: Development, Energy, Great Lakes, Mining, Pesticides, Transportation, Water, and Wildlife.
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Today’s topics: Agriculture, Department of Natural Resources, Energy, Ethanol, Forests, Funding, Global Warming, Great Lakes, Member News, Solid Waste, Transit, Water, Wetlands, and Wildlife.
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It’s been a dry fall in Minnesota, and that means farmers have had plenty of opportunities to till up the soil after harvest. While driving around in farm country the day before Thanksgiving, I was struck by just how much corn and soybean stubble has been made subterranean the past few weeks. Acre-after-acre of rolling fields are black, giving crop producers a jump on spring planting. The trouble is, spring planting is several months off, and it’s inevitable a lot of that soil will be blown and washed away before it’s put back into use, especially if another open, relatively snow-less winter settles in. All of this exposed soil is particularly troubling considering how global climate change is making our agricultural lands even more vulnerable. So vulnerable, in fact, that attempts to put a positive spin on the greenhouse effect’s relationship to food production are losing steam fast. (more…)

The Department of Natural Resources has announced the new design for the third Reinvest In Minnesota critical habitat license plate.  It’s a fish.

If you care to get up close and personal with the details, a high-resolution version of the image can be downloaded with this link.

Today’s topics: Turkeys, Energy, Global Warming, Legislators, Mining, Natural Areas, Recycling, and Water. 
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European health ministers from 53 countries approved the world’s first charter to fight obesity on Thursday, vowing greater action against the epidemic of expanding waistlines across the continent.

The charter commits governments to things like improving the availability of healthy foods and adopting regulations for safer roads to promote cycling and walking.

You can find the complete 5-page anti-obesity charter here. The language about regulations for safer roads to promote cycling and walking are in section 2.4.6, 2.4.9, and 2.4.11. That last section also puts in a good word for Safe Routes to School.

This is cheery news for anyone interested in healthier people and healthier environments. Getting people to walk and bicycle more often not only shrinks waistlines, it also shrinks air pollution and contributes to energy efficiency.

If you *really* want to know about the environmental benefits of transportation investment, take a look at the National Cooperative Highway Research Program’s “Environmental Benefits of Transportation Investment.” It’s worth the read, even if it is a bit highway-focused.

The days since the election have been bountiful with the periodic release of new tidbits of information on the upcoming legislature.  This of course creates a great opportunity for policy wonks to discuss what that means for their causes - in our case a clean and healthy environment.  Since I’ve been able to be a part of some of these conversation, I can turn around and post some of the talk here with hopes of appearing smart.  The most recent news?  House Republican leadership, House committee chairs, and Senate DFL committee members.
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Today’s topics: Energy, Forests, Mining, Solid Waste, and Water.
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