Minnesota News Network

Minnesota finance officials are projecting a positive balance of $1.6 billion in the state budget for the next biennium. The Minnesota Management Budget office says the surplus is due to a higher revenue forecast, lower state spending, and an increased surplus for the current fiscal year. In December the forecast looked grimmer with a projected shortfall of $1.3 billion for the coming two years. At that time, Governor Tim Walz had proposed tax hikes on the state’s highest earners–which Republicans oppose. In a statement, House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt says “raising taxes will slow our economic comeback, and make it harder to bring back jobs and paychecks to where they were before the pandemic.” Lawmakers must reach an agreement on an overall state budget of around $52 billion before June 30th.

Governor Tim Walz today announced a timeline for eligibility for all Minnesotans to receive their COVID-19 vaccinations. Walz says Minnesota will expand vaccine eligibility after 70-percent of adults 65 years of age and older are vaccinated–likely by the end of March. After that, Minnesotans with certain medical conditions, food processing workers and some “targeted essential workers” will be next in line for the vaccines. Walz is hoping events like the State Fair will go on as planned if things stay on the right track and he said at a press conference this afternoon that “the thought of being walking down those streets at Dan Patch Boulevard with a corn dog in my hand, is like the happiest thought that I can imagine. That is within our reach, that is within our reach if we do things right.” State Health Commissioner Jan Malcolm says the expansion will first cover eligible Minnesotans “if they have sickle-cell disease, down syndrome, are in active cancer treatments, are immunocompromised, specifically from solid organ transplants, or are oxygen-dependent, chronic lung and heart condition sufferers.” Walz is asking “if you’re young and healthier and you can work from home, wait and let some others in line, just do that courteous Minnesota thing and let a few others get in line. Your time will come up, and it will come up faster than you think.” Republicans say the expansion is a step in the right direction, but are still critical that the Walz administration is making the process “overly complex with confusing timelines and invasive signup forms.”

One in five Minnesota high school students are using e-cigarettes–that’s according to new data from the 2020 Minnesota Youth Tobacco Survey. And Laura Oliven with the state Health Department says the report “found a whopping 70% of students who used e-cigarettes in the past 30 days showed signs of e-cigarette dependence and that is very concerning.” The new Minnesota data also shows about four in five Minnesota students reported that the first tobacco product they ever tried was flavored.  Oliven says one positive to come out of the report: “We have achieved record lows in cigarette use among high school youth and we’re down to 3.2% and that’s a 67% decline from the number of kids smoking three years ago.” Overall tobacco use declined to 20.5% of high school and 4.1 percent of middle school students have used a tobacco product in the past 30 days. Here’s more with Laura Oliven: