Duluth lawmakers address big topics at town hall

For just over an hour, the three lawmakers answered voters’ questions on a variety of topics, including three big ones: issues of access to child care and affordability and affordable housing, as well as line 3 and the climate crisis.

Cindy Rugeley, associate professor of political science at the University of Minnesota Duluth, moderated the event and asked voters questions submitted to lawmakers in advance or asked live.

Line 3 and climate crisis

Voters asked a range of questions about Enbridge’s Line 3 project to replace 340 miles of pipeline in northern Minnesota, including what lawmakers can do to stop it and why they would oppose a project to replace a 60-year-old line.

McEwen, who strongly opposes Line 3 first and foremost because she believes it threatens treaty rights, said the country must begin a rapid transition to clean energy now and that investing in a pipeline replacement is pointing the country in the wrong direction.

“We have the technology to start a rapid transition to a clean energy economy,” McEwen said. “And what it’s going to require of us as a society is large-scale investment, a large-scale push and it will be unprecedented.”

“What line 3 represents is building new fossil fuel infrastructure. It will transport more than twice the amount of dirty tar sands oil that is currently being transported, ”continued McEwen. “WWe need to keep all fossil fuels in the ground. It is not a radical idea. What is drastic is getting dirty oil from the tar sands through the pipeline, going to market and being burned. “

Schultz, who is on the The Great Lakes Commission, which is made up of representatives from eight states and advocates for the removal of old pipelines, referred to old pipelines leaking into the Gulf of Mexico and “no one taking ownership of the cleanup.”

“At the end of the day, we have to eliminate the market for fossil fuels, which is the demand for fossil fuels. As an economist, I know we’re going to get there. It won’t be too far down the road. future, ”Schultz said. “Now that these prices are going down, we will reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.”

Schultz said the progressive delegation from the Minnesota House of Representatives will continue to work to address the climate crisis and fairly reduce the state’s dependence on fossil fuels.

Childcare

Olson, who sits on the Minnesota House of Representatives’ finance and workforce policy and business development committee, said child care is one of the biggest workforce issues. work of the State and that an early childhood committee works on the problems “without interruption”.

There are two sides to the issue, access and affordability, Olson said.

“We have to make sure the child care is affordable, but yet we also pay a living wage to those who provide the care,” Olson said. “It’s a complex question. A solution that requires serious investment and will require more than one-time funding from the CARES or ARP (American Rescue Plan) law to resolve.

The early years committee has received more than $ 500 million, Schultz said, in funding from the ARP Act and about half of that money will be used for stabilization grants for child care providers with suffering children. high costs.

“Ensuring that we have affordable child care for our low income families is a priority and we will continue to invest because we know how important it is to have affordable child care,” said Schultz . “I have full confidence in Representative (Dave) Pinto (Chair of the Early Years Committee) to continue to do the great job he has already done.”

McEwen urged the community to “think big” on broad issues like child care and to remember that in many peer countries of the United States, child care is provided at little or no cost. .

“We are the richest country that has ever existed on the planet,” said McEwen. “Why don’t we have child care services so that we can have greater gender equality, so that people can work and move around in our society and that we can have quality child care? for our children, and the people who work in these jobs are paid for a living, flourishing salaries and respected as professionals? “

“(We) act like we live in a state of mind of austerity, an environment of scarcity where we always have to scramble to understand the basics,” McEwen said. “This stuff should be a right and we should demand it from our elected officials, at the federal level and from us at the state level.”

Affordable housing

McEwen expressed the same philosophy when talking about how to increase affordable housing options, which she says will require the community to think outside the box, especially since there will always be people who cannot. not work for some reason, but still need to be accommodated. .

“Market-driven housing has limits because we’re always trying to serve people who are looking to make a profit on housing,” McEwen said. “At the end of the day, we have to make sure everyone is accommodated. Housing is a right and we must approach it as a right. This means that we need a variety of solutions and we need to keep all options on the table. “

Olson, who served on the housing committee this year, said tackling the affordable housing crisis requires all levels of government to work together. She said she was delighted to see the town of Duluth using much of its federal COVID-19 relief money to address housing issues.

“At the state level, we continue to try to grow the pie and what we can invest around housing infrastructure bonds and other investments that we can make as well as one-time funding,” he said. Olson said.

One of the ways the state invests in housing is through infrastructure bills. Olson said the House was pushing for a substantial investment in housing in the upcoming state bond bill.

“I’m optimistic and hope we’re in a good position to really make a dent in the future,” said Olson.

Schultz added that one piece of the housing crisis puzzle is the cost of home ownership.

“One of the big expense items is the cost of ownership to build affordable homes, so whatever we can do at state or local level to do it, we have to work on it,” a- she declared.

A top priority for the health and social services committee on which Schultz sits was homelessness prevention and has invested nearly $ 65 million to help homeless people. About a third of that money has been earmarked for counties for emergency shelter and non-emergency services, Schultz said.

“We’ve barely scratched the surface,” McEwen said at the end of the meeting. “There are so many important issues that we haven’t had time to address … Contact us if you feel that you are not discussing important issues that are really dear to you, because we can connect you both to our office to be in dialogue with us and also with the resources of our community.