Republican lawmakers are blasting top officials at numerous state agencies for mismanaging contracts that caused nearly 18-hundred violations of state law in the past year. Saint Paul Democrat Richard Cohen responds it appears violations go back a number of years, and so blame rests mostly on previous governors and current Governor Tim Walz inherited the situation. “Surely the least amount of blame would be placed on this current administration, since they’ve been there for all of eight months or so,” Cohen said.
But Republican Senator Julie Rosen from Vernon Center says, “There needs to be some accountability for, for example, the 130 million on missteps from D-H-S in 2019 under this governor’s watch.”
State officials released numbers showing 32 agencies did not follow contracting rules. The Department of Employment and Economic Development had the most violations — nearly 600 — more than double the number at the Human Services or Health departments.