Legalectric

Today the RW Chamber of Commerce held a “State of the City,” billed as Mayor Gary Iocco and Council Administrator Chris Heineman. At the most recent Council meeting it was billed as Iocco with two council members. ??

The planned part of this shindig was review by Chris Heineman, not exactly stimulating, and after he went through slides, which I’d guess from his comments that he’d done something similar last year, the baton was tossed to Iocco who improvised, and I didn’t get a lot of it down.

Here’s the recording: Nope can’t do it on phone, and can’t do it from the computer either, “Sorry, you are not allowed to upload this file type.” But I do have a recording — need to figure out how to post it.

Posting the recording wasn’t working at all on phone, but here’s what notes I’ve got, and I missed a LOT. Chris just pretty much read the slides, but it was hard to keep up with Iocco:

Here’s the bill everyone’s talking about:

Comments? It’s important to let them know what you think. Here’s the contact info for the Senate Energy Committee (LINKED HERE).

In last week’s Rochester Post Bulletin, about the Senate Energy and Utilities Finance and Policy Committee meeting in Rochester:

Senators take heat on waste-burning energy

• John Molseed jmolseed@postbulletin.com
• Jan 15, 2020

Last night, Sen. Osmek held a Senate Energy Committee meeting in Rochester. It was standing room only, at least 100 showed up (I had 100 flyers, and had 4 left and I know I missed a few).

Here’s the bill DRAFT, SC5558-6:

Here’s the powerpoint explaining the bill:

Who all showed up and testified? All a bunch of paid suits, with just three exceptions, pushed to the very end. Check the list of lobbyists here:

Alan Muller got on the list to testify, he’ll be writing to the Committee soon:

And here’s my comment sent to the committee:

Where were Senators Dibble and Marty? I must confess, I was so disgusted by Sen. Marty’s handling of the e21 debacle back in 2015 that I’ve not been back to the Senate Energy Committee since then (Marty tried to introduce Xcel’s e21 bill, and tried to shut down testimony opposing that bill…
(report from that meeting) though the room was packed with those who had rolled over supporting it, only three of us there opposed it, myself, Alan Muller, and Office of Attorney General’s RUD James Canneday. Sen. Marty pulled the bill as he “introduced” it and then substituted an e21 light and wouldn’t allow testimony on anything else! Well, we did what we could, and it wasn’t until the very end in conference committee or just before that he put the awful Xcel-desired language back in. SF 1735 – SHAME on each Senator who voted for it). Back into the fray, I guess!

My take is that Sen. Senjem, or the Republican caucus, or ???, are concerned about Sen. Senjem’s seat, why else would they put Mikey Bull up there beside him, emitting puffery about the bill? Seems there’s just one other Senate hearing scheduled, info below.

Next up, next week, Mound, Minnesota, in Sen. Ozmek’s district:

Wednesday, January 22, 2020, 4:00 PM

Mound Westonka High School’s Performing Arts Center

905 Sunnyfield Road East

Minnetrista, MN 55364

Now, Mikey, about “carbon capture and storage,” good grief. Did you learn nothing from all those years of Excelsior Energy’s Mesaba Project? Here’s why it’s good the Mesaba Project was not built!

Pipedreams of Green and Clean

Minnesota Senator Osmek is convening a Senate Energy Committee meeting in Rochester this evening to discuss a DRAFT bill SC5558-6:

6 p.m. on January 15, 2020

Rochester Community and Technical College

Heintz Center Commons

1926 College View Rd E

Rochester, MN 55904

Here’s the letter I just fired off to Committee members:

Be there or be square!

click for larger version